Statistics that make my boots heavy.

The EPA estimates that:

+ 64 billion paper cups and plates

+ 73 billion styrofoam cups and plates

+ 190 billion plastic containers and bottles (YOU MEAN TO TELL ME THERE ARE PEOPLE WHO STILL DON’T RECYCLE!?)

+ 8,000,000 tons of plastic packaging

are thrown away every single year. What a travesty. 13,510,000 TONS of non-compostable material purely for temporary, disposable use that we pay for and then pay to put into the dirt for safe keeping when we’re done. And that’s only American statistics!

Luckily, there is corn, the American solution to everything. Corn-based products have been engineered to replace the standard plastic/paper/styrofoam disposables, but are better in that they are biocompostable, meaning they disintegrates and are incorporated safely back into the ecosystem. The thing is, the first step is reduction, but corn is the next best thing. They use it on Capitol Hill, but it’s not mainstream yet.

~ by madeleinehawks on March 24, 2008.