Garbology

When you hear the term Garbology, you might think this is not a real term. It is not something that most of us would have heard. Whether you want to believe it or not but Garbology is, actually, a branch of science. The essay will help in explaining you the origin and purpose of Garbology.

In 1973, William Rathje, began a project in The University of Arizona on modern archeology that led to the initiation of Tucson Garbage Project, which laid the academic foundation of Garbology. They collected the trash, which people threw away and observed their lifestyles. They followed the same scientific research process, which every scientist does. The core aim of this experimentation was to focus a study on trash, and provide important information about the landfills. Along with its exploration of how people live, Rathje's study looked at what types of trash took up the most space in landfills. They identified the sources of various landfills and studied how they have changed over the passage of years. Most commonly known forms of trash are Fast food containers, Styrofoam and diapers. But, when they carried a research on trash they found out that, these trashes only fill up 3% of the landfills. The results of the study were shocking and they found out that the plastic only made up 20-24% of the landfills. The majority of the trash was papers that were around 40%. Rathje and his team were shocked to see this, as paper is a recyclable material and it must not go to landfills. This experiment laid the foundation for Garbology, which is taught in various institutes today, under the archaeological studies. In the year 1991, a documentary for kids was launched, that was based on a Canadian sample and aimed to highlight the importance of recycling and decomposition. It also served to identify whether implementing blue box recycle programs will decrease the amount of trash in landfills or not. There were many other significant programs that were eventually launched, to help people realize the importance of recycling and most of them laid emphasis on understanding garbology. The trash, that we throw away, also depicts a lot about our lifestyles.

Garbology is the science of trash and deals with how we can play our part in reducing the trash in landfills. Everyone can learn through garbology and make this planet a better place to live.

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