Why do we Recycle???

Question

Think about it...Everything in this whole entire existence recycles ITSELF.

When an animal dies the bacteria eats it and then they fertilize the plants which feed the animals that make more animals and die...

So plastic would probably get decomposed and feed the plants or whatever it's made from.

So when we speed up this process we make a fire (which produces carbon) and then we melt the plastic into a new object.
Aren't we just trashing the planet because we are to impatient to wait?

Answer 1

We recycle because, while things that we use WILL recycle themselves, their cycle takes so long that it's almost not like it's ever done..
You can't look at one item that is recycled and make such a general statement. If the items being recycled can be useful again, and, thereby, cut down on the amount of raw materials that must be used to make NEW things, then, recycling is a very good way to go.

Answer 2

Why do we recycle???

Hummm!, may be because if we recycle or we extract useful materials from (garbage or waste), we would be able to use things over and over again. This process would save our money, our labour, and our time. In addition, Recycling saves trees, water, oil, landfill space, energy and helps eliminate air pollution! It protects wildlife habitat and biodiversity.
Most items made of paper, cardboard, glass, steel, aluminum, as well as many plastics, can be recycled - in other words, used over again in a different form instead of being thrown away. By recycling, we preserve the natural resources and save the energy we normally would use to manufacture things from virgin materials. We also generate less pollution and save ourselves millions of dollars in disposal costs by cutting down on the amount of trash we need to throw out every day.
I don't think that we are trashing the planet by planet because if you think from another site, (as you said when we speed up the process, we make a fire which produces carbon) carbon co2 is something that plants inhale. Carbon dioxide is something that helps plants in the process of photosynthesis, which results as OXYGEN!!!

Answer 3

Why recycle?
Well for starters the resources that we currently use will start to dwindle.

It takes less energy to recycle than to produce from new. This means that our current resources will last that little bit longer.

Waste... where does it go? Landfill in case you didn't know, and we are running out of places to put it. It also produces bad smells and methane, which contributes to Global Warming.

The cycles you talk about take hundreds, thousands or even millions of years. As you, or I are only here for a mere 80 or so it may as well take forever.

Even biodegradable 'stuff' takes years to decompose. A banana skin takes 2 years to degrade.

Enough for now although I could go on.

Answer 4

we recycle things so that we can re-use or others can re-use all items that we can, some people may say something is on it's last leg, but others see the life left in the item. there is so much already in the landfils, and we recycle so the landfils don't get as full. when you recycle items, you are not only giving back to the community, you are also helping the land. when things are recycled thru the land, it takes the earth a while to break it down to recycle it. if you google recycle, there are so many answers to find, each one great in it's own way. the more we recycle, the more we help the earth, and that itself is a wonderful thing.

Answer 5

Actually maybe nature didn't account for all of the extremely resilient plastics and non-biodegradables that we humans are coming up with :). So plastic would get decomposed if just left in a pile of dirt but over MANY MANY more years than is healthy for the ground. A quick wikipedia search tells you that even the ones that are categorized biodegradable stay in the ground for many decades until showing signs of decay. So in conclusion, we should recycle so that we can reuse all the stuff we can that doesn't break down easily in nature.

Answer 6

actually we recycle because we don't want to use all of our resources on things that can be recycled. LIke we recycle paper because if we cut down more trees, there will be less carbon dioxide and the land will be stripped dry. So yay for recyclin =)

Answer 7

Your right, we are too impatient. The whole world is out of balance and all these do-gooder recycling hippies are wasting their own energy on something with little or no impact.