Trash & (Zero) Waste in a Disposable World

Trash Transformation Trash is a topic that most people tend to ignore; it is dirty and foul. It is easy for people to simply throw away their trash and forget about it after they have left it sitting on the curb. However, all of this trash ends up somewhere, and that place is the landfill. It was interesting to see first-hand where my trash goes. Upon entering the DADS landfill, I couldn’t help but notice how desolate the area looked. There was wide open land for miles, and tall hills covered in dirt and dead grass. At first glance it wasn’t too bad to look at because all of the trash was covered up. Yet looking around at the open expanse of land while listening to the statistics of the landfill made the experience a lot more real. It was disheartening to think that 2,000 tons of trash is coming into DADS a day. I began to picture what all of the flat land would look like after only a few more years. It was astounding to visualize and made me upset. I wish there was some other way to get rid of our trash besides burying it. Continuing on the tour, we ascended one of the trash mounds that is currently being used. That is when I really began to feel sad because I saw all of the trash exposed. I looked at everyday items such as a sock, a ball and an old tire that were just sitting there with no use, left to rot away underground. My emotions of shock and despair felt as raw as the trash I saw laying at my feet. DADS will be filled in about 129 years, and although everyone that is alive now will be dead by then, this will be a problem for future generations. All of the trash is taking up a large amount of space, and the population is only increasing! It was nice to see occasional flowers growing around the site because it showed that there is hope and some beauty to be seen. I was also happy to learn about the gas pumps that pulled methane out of the trash in the ground that was turned into energy. One solution to the trash problem is awareness. Throwing away waste has almost become second nature to people, and as Capra phrased it, this problem is “largely a crisis of perception”. He writes that “most of us, and especially our large social institutions, subscribe to the concepts of an outdated worldview, a perception of reality inadequate for dealing with our overpopulated, globally interconnected world”. I once saw an old commercial from the 1950’s on TV that advertised paper plates and other paper products. The commercial gave off the image that using paper products is great because there is no mess, once you are finished, you simply throw it away! This is an outdated idea that society still lives by. For example, Kleenex now makes disposable hand towels – the commercial promises it is a “cleaner” way to dry your hands. In order to make a change with how much we throw away, we need to change our perception, which all begins with awareness. If people became aware of how much trash they threw away annually and how much trash they could have actually recycled, they could start wasting less. I hope that through awareness can come forth a trash transformation.