How much waste do you think you produce everyday? Do you know how much you are actually producing? Have you ever thought about what happens to the products you throw out? According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the average American produces “4.40 pounds per person per day.” That’s a lot of trash! Let me ask you another question, when you throw out your trash do you ever think about where it goes? Or what happens to it? As consumers, we are constantly buying things which eventually end up in a landfill. However, once we throw things out we rarely think about what happens to them afterwards. Trash doesn’t just disappear, it gets thrown in a landfill and can cause harm to the environment, animals, and people nearby.
Take a moment to reflect on your daily routine, how much stuff do you throw out everyday? What about your eating, do you make food from home? Order takeout? Buy a few items from the grocery store? Do you go to Dunkin or Starbucks for a drink? The more you think about it, the more you discover how much unnecessary waste you consume in a day. Even at the grocery store items are constantly packaged with an excessive amount of plastic. I love Dunkin and Starbucks, and I’m also guilty of drinking out of plastic cups with plastic straws or styrofoam, but I’ve realized that it is so wasteful. While I can understand some instances where packaging is very much needed, there are also times when it could be eliminated. Take this photo for example, there is no need for these oranges to be packaged in plastic containers. A simple way to eliminate all the excess plastic would be to keep the peels on the oranges and store them together, not individually, on a shelf. Click here to see more examples of unnecessary packaging. 
Another problem with waste is that when not properly disposed, it can cause harm to the environment and those who live there. The ocean is home to thousands of sea creatures, but unfortunately their home is being contaminated with tons of plastic and other various trash.These poor sea creatures (see right image) are facing the consequences of human production of plastic. Sea creatures are trapped in plastic and even mistaking plastic for food, which can be fatal. These poor creatures are dealing with the consequences of humans and costs them their lives. Even though trash in general ends up in the ocean, the most common pollution is due to plastic, as shown in the above pictures. Using the image below, we can also observe the different types of plastic that end up in the ocean. The diagram below shows that plastic bags and straws are among the most common plastics that end up in the ocean. The easiest way to prevent these plastics from ending up in the ocean is by not using them. 
Animals aren’t the only ones who end up with problems from our waste. The website American Disposal points out that “what goes in the ocean goes into you.” Even though this probably applies more to people who eat fish, it is still an important lesson. If you don’t want to be eating plastic, and facing the side effects of doing so, then why would you want animals to? People who live near landfills also face the consequences of waste. In Ghana, the Agbogbloshie Scrapyard is the perfect example of this. The people who were working in and around the e-waste landfill ended up with traces of lead, iron, PCBs, and more in their body. No one wants to, or should, be facing health threatening problems due to human consumption and waste.
The perfect solution to these problems is a “zero waste lifestyle.” Lauren singer, a recent college grad, explains in her Ted Talk how she converted to a zero waste lifestyle. In three years, she has managed to only produce enough waste to fill one mason jar. That’s awesome, right? I applaud Lauren and others who have managed to live zero waste. I understand the reasoning behind it and think it makes a big difference in terms of how much waste someone produces but I don’t think it is attainable for me right now, especially because I am away at college, but maybe one day. If you are interested in learning more about how to live a zero waste lifestyle, click here.
The world will continue to produce more and more items, and continue to use an excessive amount of plastic. However, this cannot continue for much longer before the already detrimental environmental impacts get worse. To be sure, let’s reflect again on our own waste. In the image below, you can see how much waste an average person produces, and then see what that looks like per year. One person, in one year, produces enough waste to match the height of the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Even as a country, if we continue to produce as much waste as we already are, we will face terrible consequences.
So what happens now? The point of this blog was not to make you convert to a zero waste lifestyle right this second, but instead reflect on your own life and make small or big changes to reduce your consumption and waste. Make small changes first. Start by bringing reusable bags with you to the store and using reusable water bottles and cups. Start a compost at your home to reduce the amount of food waste you produce. These might not seem like huge changes, but after a while hopefully you will become so accustomed to it that it is easier to make bigger changes, like a zero waste lifestyle. If as many people as possible were able to reduce their own waste and consumption, it will make a big impact on the environment and our world.
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