Republic Services wants to reduce your trash pickup. The company has proposed decreasing trash pickup to once a week, and improving recycling service in exchange. The idea rubs some people the wrong way, but the company says the move will increase recycling rates.
Experts weighed in on how trash service can change our habits and affect wastefulness. Our discussion yielded some provocative trash facts:
- According to Jeremy O’Brien of Solid Waste Association of North America, Las Vegas' practice of collecting trash twice a week is unusual – most communities have once weekly pickup.
- “Garbology" author Edward Humes says Americans generate over 7 pounds of trash a day, compared to 2.2 pounds per resident in Japan.
- Humes says we make twice as much trash today as we did in 1960, and the biggest component in the trash mix is packaging.
- Walmart has calculated that if they reduce their packaging by 5 percent, they can save over $3 billion a year.
- Tara Pike of Rebel Recycling says Nevada had a goal of 25 percent recycling by 1995, which it still hasn’t met in 2013.
Can Las Vegas do better with recycling? Listen to the interview and share your thoughts.
GUESTS:
Bob Coyle, Vice President, Republic Services
Tara Pike, Director, Rebel Recycling
Jeremy O'Brien, Director of Applied Research, Solid Waste Association of North America
Edward Humes, Author, Garbology: Our Dirty Love Affair with Trash