Humanity should have long ago realized that taking care of the ecology and environment is the key to sustaining life on our planet. However, people have just recently begun to consider it, wasting precious time and causing a global environmental catastrophe. Learn more at houstoname.
Fortunately, in many countries, sorting garbage is regarded as one of the most important components of environmental compliance. Despite being the world leader in total waste, the United States follows all recycling and waste disposal regulations. Americans are given every opportunity to make their duty of sorting and disposing of waste as easy and comfortable as possible.
How is waste sorted and disposed of in Houston? Do all Houston residents follow the waste sorting rules? Where does the garbage from the trash cans go?
Garbage sorting
The United States, like many other countries, sorts garbage to speed up and simplify the recycling and waste disposal processes for specialized companies and factories that carry out this task.
Unfortunately, not all countries sort rubbish properly, for example, the CIS countries pay insufficient attention to this and do not adhere to the most basic sorting standards.
Although all citizens of the United States are required to sort waste, each state has its own set of rules and regulations. Typically, they are determined by local authorities. Let’s have a look at the most prevalent model, which can also be seen in Houston.
Food waste is typically discarded in homes with garbage chutes: it goes into a single bundle. The rubbish that is not recyclable, or that will be disposed of, is also packed in a separate bag. If there are no special paper tanks in the yard, it is carefully folded beside the garbage cans and gathered by the trash can. In general, separate bins are available for cans and glass, ensuring that the right garbage goes to these containers.
Residents of Houston frequently collect recyclable or sortable garbage on their own. This includes, for example, old clothes and shoes.
Special containers can be found throughout the city that indicate which waste should be placed where. As a result, you can dispose of glass, plastic and old batteries nearly anywhere in the city.
Where does waste end up?
In Houston, garbage gets picked up once a week. Most of the time, this is a set day of the week, and Houston residents receive notice in advance. After a special machine collects waste from the designated tanks, it is transported to the transshipment station. There are numerous such stations in Houston.
One of these is located at Sam Houston Transfer Station. The entire process of further sorting garbage happens there: some is sent for further sorting and recycling, while other is compacted to help save room in trucks.
Following that, rubbish that requires further sorting is delivered to special enterprises in Houston, while garbage that requires disposal gets tightly stacked in special trucks.
The final stage is the transportation of waste (that is not subject to further processing) to a landfill. Garbage is transported from Houston to Atascocita Landfill, which serves as the final destination in this lengthy operation. There are around 129 landfills in the state of Texas for different types of waste.
Each year, Houston creates approximately 4.2 million tons of waste and garbage. In fact, until a few decades ago, the United States did not take waste sorting and recycling very seriously. Perhaps this is why America produces more waste than any other country.
However, do not disregard the fact that Americans, including Houston residents, have changed their attitudes during this time. Since 1997, November 15 has been celebrated as America Recycles Day across the US.