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Issue 1, November 2004 |
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Photographs courtesy of Alupro |
The Green Team Challenge #2
Regular readers of Better World will know that the first of our green team challenges got off to a flying start with our intrepid green explorers from the BT Corporate Responsibility team ditching their regular cleaning products and embracing planet friendly alternatives.
But how would they cope with a far more challenging task? According to Friends of the Earth, around 80% of the 25 million tonnes of our household waste could be recycled, but the national rate is a meagre 11%.
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"When it comes to our recycling, the UK is lagging behind the US and many of our European neighbours" |
Statistics abound "the average person throws away their equivalent weight in rubbish every three months", "an average UK resident bins half a tonne of rubbish each year" the figures are frightening but our out of sight out of mind attitude has to change as our landfills get fuller and public concern about incineration (which accounts for 9% of our waste disposal) puts a brake on alternative methods of disposal.
The long of the short of it is that were consuming at an alarming rate and the vast majority of what we buy ends up in a hole in the ground (but hopefully, not in our neighbourhood).
When it comes to our recycling record, were lagging behind the US and many of our European neighbours. Figures from the US Environment Protection Agency for example reveal that as a nation, they recycle 28% of their waste, compared to just 11% in the UK. Indeed, according to Friends of the Earth, if everyone in the world was as wasteful as we are in the UK, wed need another SEVEN planets just to stand still!
So, how feasible is it to recycle 80% of our waste as Friends of the Earth suggest? Enter the BT Green Team challengers.>>