Where does my trash go?
The average American consumer throws away 4.9 pounds of trash each day according to the EPA (292.4 million tons in total in 2018), with 50% of this amount going to the landfill, 24% being recycled, 12% combusted with energy recovery (this means that the trash is incinerated in a facility that captures some of the energy that results from treating it; another term is “waste-to-energy”, “WTE”), and 9% being composted.
According to the Environmental Research and Education Foundation (EREF), in 2013 there were a total of 9,028 facilities across the US handling our municipal solid waste, which is the way the industry refers to what ends up in your household garbage and recycling bins, in addition to wood waste and yard trimmings. Of the 9k total facilities, there were 3,913 recycling facilities, 3,494 composting facilities, 1,540 landfills, and 81 waste-to-energy plants. About 65% of landfills were publicly owned, and the majority of recycling, composting, and WTE facilities were privately-owned. This fact reminds us that for the most part, these waste management operations are private businesses that need to make money to survive.
Each state has its own approach to handling waste, with huge variation. For example, in 2013, Louisiana landfilled 94% of its municipal solid waste, while Connecticut landfilled less than 1%. Maine sent 59% of its waste to WTE facilities, while more than half of US states didn’t use WTE at all. Washington composted 17% of its waste, while Alabama didn’t compost at all. (These statistics are based on data reported by facilities, so it doesn’t account for the fact that waste often crosses state borders to be treated. I was feeling pretty smug about New York having the lowest amount of waste managed per person until I found out that it was the top exporter of its waste to other states to be processed.) To find out where your waste goes specifically, you need to check with your municipality.
Waste management is a complex and capital-intensive industry, and learning about the intricacies of the logistics around each step of the process has left me even more convinced that it makes sense for us as consumers to reduce what we throw in the trash to begin with as much as we can. After all, there is something absurd about the idea of my garbage being trucked around the country to be disposed of properly.
