Assignment #6: Solid Waste

 

Lesson 6 - Solid Waste Management

 

INSTRUCTION

What if you cancelled your contract with Sanipac and kept all of the garbage you and your family produced for a year in your garage? How much would you end up with? Would you be shocked into making any significant lifestyle changes?

America leads the way in the amount of trash we produce per citizen. This contributes to environmental problems that go beyond overcrowded landfills and also include global warming, increased resource use and the loss of critical habitat due to resource extraction

This week, you will examine the challenges of municipal waste and the effectiveness of composting and recycling as it pertains to trash.

 

On Essay Writing:

Your writing reflects your sincerity, attention to detail, opinion and research. Be sure to proofread your work carefully and to tie your opinion to facts obtained through research (i.e. support your opinion). Cite all works used in your research in a Works Cited page.

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DUE DATE: May 4, 2012
TO: Environmental Law Students
FROM: Helen Haberman, Instructor
SUBJECT: Waste Generation and Solid Waste Management


Assignment (40 points)

The U.S. produces 200 million tons of municipal solid waste per year--and the landfill area used by the nation's ten largest cities alone is larger than the entire state of Indiana.

Your task this week is to research and write a 1-2 page paper about the municipal solid waste stream and to understand how trash is collected, transferred and disposed of. Your essay will also assess the mitigating and aggravating effects of recycling and consumerism in the U.S. on the problem as well.

Please use the guiding questions provided to organize your paper. You will use the websites provided to read the main article and to research information.

Skills: You will need to read, research, evaluate and compose an essay about municipal waste and its effects.

Format: Papers must be word-processed using a 12-point font and double-spaced.

 

Websites/Resources

  1. •First, read the EPA Fact Sheets about Municipal Solid Waste Generation, Disposal and Recycling in the U.S

  2. •Then, check out solutions by reviewing the Recyling, Composting and Source Reduction links. What are some cities doing to limit the environmental impacts of trash in their communities?

 

Guiding Questions:

  1. •Define municipal solid waste. What is and is NOT included in this definition?

  2. •What are the numbers for waste generation (trash) and recycling in the U.S. per year? How does the U.S. compare to other nations in terms of amount of municipal waste generated?

  3. •What are Americans throwing away and what are we recycling or composting? How much trash is still thrown away today that could be recycled or composted?

  4. •What role does consumerism play in the problems with municipal waste in the U.S.? Explain.

  5. •What surprised you about the data in this report? What stood out to you as important? Why?

  6. •

  7. •Check out the solutions suggested around recycling, composting and reducing the need for items that become trash. What do you think is working now and what more should be done to address the problems of waste generation in the U.S.?

Tips

Organize your essay by using the questions. Be sure your work answers all the questions but in essay format.

Proofread your essay. Have another person proofread it too.

Correct all grammar, punctuation and spelling errors.

Complete a Works Cited page where you cite sources and / or websites used.

Deliver a printed copy of your finished essay to your in-folder. Do this even if you send an additional copy of it using the text box below!


Evaluation

Your essay will be evaluated on the following criteria:

  1. •Complete answers to the guiding questions (60%)

  2. •Well-organized (intro-body-conclusion) (25%)

  3. •Absence of any punctuation, grammar, or spelling errors; double-spaced(10%)

  4. •Works Cited page (5%)