The average American uses 650 pounds of paper each year; 100 million tons of wood could be saved each year if all that paper was recycled.
Americans use 2.5 million plastic bottles every hour. Recycle one ton (2,000 lbs)of paper we save: 17 trees, 7.000 gallons of water; 79 gallons of oil (enough to run the average car for 1,260 miles); 4,100 kilowatts of energy (enough power for the average home for six months); 3.3 cubic yards of landfill space and 587 pounds of air pollution.
The 17 trees saved by recycling one ton of paper can absorb a total of 250 pounds of carbon dioxide out of the air each year.
Recycling one aluminum can saves enough energy to run a TV for three hours or the equivalent of a half a gallon of gasoline.
If every American recycled just one-tenth of their newspapers, we could save about 25 million trees each year.
About 80% of what Americans throw away is recyclable, yet the average recycling rate is only 28%.
The average American uses 142 steel cans annually.
On average, each one of us produces 4.4 pounds of solid waste each day. This adds up to almost a ton of trash per person, per year.
Americans throw away enough aluminum to rebuild our entire commercial fleet of airplanes every three months.
Half of all polyester carpet manufactured in the US is made from recycled soda bottles.
