Centre County Recycling

Calculating the Benefits of Recycling

Do you ever wonder if it’s worth your time and effort to recycle?  Does tossing a few bottles and cans in the recycling bin really make a difference?  Are you really saving that much energy and preserving that many natural resources just by performing this one, simple act?

Well, the numbers are in and what you read next might just surprise you.  We gathered Centre County’s 2008 recycling data and entered it into the Environmental Benefits Calculator (EBC).  The EBC was developed by the National Recycling Coalition (NRC), the Northeast Recycling Council (NERC) & the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to produce easily understandable results from recycling efforts.

In 2008, Centre County residents, businesses and institutions recycled 156,686 tons of material including leaves for composting as well as material that many area businesses recycle on their own and report to us.  The Authority’s Recycling Facility processed 12,211 of those tons last year. Centre County residents, businesses and institutions disposed of 94,302 tons of material at our Transfer Station, including an undetermined quantity of recyclables that had not been properly sorted from trash.

The results of the county’s recycling endeavors do not go unnoticed.  By recycling 156,686 tons of material last year, we were able to:

·          - reduce the amount of greenhouse gasses emitted into our atmosphere by the equivalent of taking 61,893 cars off of the road for one year;

·          - save enough energy to heat 18,402 homes for one year (that’s 1/3 of the homes in Centre County!);

·          - save 8,074 tons of iron ore, coal & limestone; and,

·          - save 246,984 trees from being cut down and used for paper products.

Great job Centre County!