Top 10 Reasons to Buy Recycled Products

Recycled consumer goods are becoming increasingly common. Recycled paper notebooks, bags, plastic containers, and even clothing can be found in many stores across the country. You may wonder why buying recycled products is important or whether it really makes any difference. Why should you buy recycled? Here are the top 10 reasons...

1. Purchasing recycled products encourages manufactures to create more products from recycled materials, which encourages more facilities to offer the recycling of glass, plastic, metal, and other materials. It "closes the loop," so to speak.
2. Recycling products creates jobs for workers at collection facilities and in recycling plants. It is said that for every 15,000 tons of waste, nine workers will be needed in a recycling facility while only one worker would be needed to take the same waste to a landfill.
3. Choosing to recycle instead of throwing away items teaches future generations about the importance of taking an active role in the preservation of our environment.
4. Recycling saves precious natural resources like trees and underground ore. For each ton of paper recycled, 17 mature trees are left standing.
5. Recycling preserves non-renewable resources, like coal and oil, that are used for energy production. A ton of recycled paper saves enough energy to power a home for six full months.
6. Recycled products contribute to less environment pollution than 'virgin' products. For example, producing a ton of virgin paper contributes to 60 pounds more air pollution than recycling an equal amount of paper.
7. Recycling also saves water and can contribute to cleaner water in rivers, streams, and lakes. To use the paper example once more, recycling a ton of paper uses 7000 fewer gallons of water than creating a ton of virgin paper.
8. Purchasing products made from recycled plastic - which may include bottles of laundry detergent, water, or milk as well as polar fleece clothing - keeps a virtually non-biodegrading material out of landfills. Plastic is notorious for its ultra-slow rate of decomposition. When these items are sent to landfills, they may lie unchanged for hundreds or thousands of years. Purchasing recycled plastic encouraged manufacturers and other consumers to recycle plastic instead of throwing it away.
9. Buying remanufactured or reconditioned electronic and computer products keeps harmful materials that are hazardous to the environment and to human health from entering landfills.
10. Recycled materials often save costs at the manufacturing level. Depending on the product, it can cost half as much to recycle as to create an equal amount of new material.