The summer heat is not the only thing that is climbing this time of year. As seen from the graph below, UBC (used beverage can) reclamation rates released for May 2008 showed an impressive increase of 23.3% from the month prior. Year-to-date totals revealed a steady incline of 3.4% compared to this time last year. These increases are good news in the ongoing efforts to combat the 251 million tons of garbage produced each year by Americans. Reclaiming more cans from the waste stream for recycling translates into turning down the thermostat on electricity usage and greenhouse gas emissions- all of which results in a cleaner planet for everyone. With the rest of 2008 remaining, let’s see if we can turn up the heat on recycling even more aluminum cans!
Friday, June 27, 2008
Like Summer Temperatures, Aluminum Can Recycling on the Rise
The summer heat is not the only thing that is climbing this time of year. As seen from the graph below, UBC (used beverage can) reclamation rates released for May 2008 showed an impressive increase of 23.3% from the month prior. Year-to-date totals revealed a steady incline of 3.4% compared to this time last year. These increases are good news in the ongoing efforts to combat the 251 million tons of garbage produced each year by Americans. Reclaiming more cans from the waste stream for recycling translates into turning down the thermostat on electricity usage and greenhouse gas emissions- all of which results in a cleaner planet for everyone. With the rest of 2008 remaining, let’s see if we can turn up the heat on recycling even more aluminum cans!
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
It’s Big Ben…only BETTER
Editor's note: I'm posting this contribution on behalf of Guest Blogger Amy Chen, summer intern at Alcoa. You never thought the sight of your favorite clock tower would be what inspired you to recycle, but the mayor of London certainly hopes that the sight of the 20ft high aluminum rendition of London’s Big Ben will remind us all to reduce, reuse, and recycle!
Four aluminum replications of famous UK structures, constructed solely with Coca-Cola cans, were unveiled in the UK last week as part of UK Recycling Week. Included amongst these famous scenic choices are Big Ben, the Angel of the North (less cool than the Big Ben, perhaps, but if you saw the 10,000 miniature Coke cans needed to construct it, you’d still be impressed!), Bristol’s Clifton Suspension Bridge, and the Birmingham Bull Statue.
And OK, so maybe this will take tens of thousands of aluminum cans out of the recycling stream. And it will cost us a little energy, perhaps, but hopefully the hordes of people rushing to recycle their cans will offset this loss.
Four aluminum replications of famous UK structures, constructed solely with Coca-Cola cans, were unveiled in the UK last week as part of UK Recycling Week. Included amongst these famous scenic choices are Big Ben, the Angel of the North (less cool than the Big Ben, perhaps, but if you saw the 10,000 miniature Coke cans needed to construct it, you’d still be impressed!), Bristol’s Clifton Suspension Bridge, and the Birmingham Bull Statue.
And OK, so maybe this will take tens of thousands of aluminum cans out of the recycling stream. And it will cost us a little energy, perhaps, but hopefully the hordes of people rushing to recycle their cans will offset this loss.
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