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When you take into account the full lifecycle of the products we use every day and the increased energy needed to make replacement products from virgin, ra.w materials; the actual impact of all this waste grows significantly. Accounting for the connections between waste in many sectors, including mining, deforestation, industrial agriculture, manufacturing, transportation, anal electricity, our wasting actually represents 36.7% of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions (Platt et al,; 200$. pg 24). Recycling, composting, and producer responsibility are powerful tools to reduce waste and therefore, our. greenhouse gas emissions. Specifically in Minnesota, reducing our waste has a greenhouse gas reduction impact equivalent to shutting dawn 20r% of our state's coal power plants, or reducing every car usage in the state by two-thirds, or using 75% less electricity in our own. homes. Through azero-waste approach across our whole country, we could achieve reductions in greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to closing 21°/o of all U.S. coal-fired power plants (Platt et al., 2005. pg 50). 2. Climate Cllange Impacts of Waste Waste in incinerators and landfills create greenhouse gas emissions. When trash is burned, incinerators emit carbon dioxide (CO,} and nitrous oxide (N,O), a greenhouse gas 310 times more powerful in atmospheric warming than. carbon dioxide. On average in the U.S., incinerators emit snore carbon dioxide per. megawatt-hour than. coal- fired, natural-gas fired, or oil-fired power plants (Hartwell, 2007}. Many people believe that throwing food scraps and paper products into a landfill is harmless because they biodegrade. However, most people are surprised to learn that when these materials break down in a landfill, they become powerful contributors to greenhouse gas `~- emissions. Compostable materials such as food waste and paper decompose anaerobicly (without oxygen) in a landfill, producing methane (CHa) which has 23-71 times greater heat trapping capabilities than carbon dioxide. Landfills are the single largest direct human source of methane (Platt et al., 2008. pg 7). Creating energy from waste Methane from landfills anal the 13TUs generated from. incinerators are sometimes captured and converted into energy. However, energy from. waste is inefficient and does not eliminate the pollution created by landfills and incinerators, including the emissions of greenhouse gases. Even when a landfill is capturing soiree methane gas for energy production, many studies have shown that most of the methane gas is released before landfills even begin to capture it. This fact results in landfill capture rates being overstated, in some models dramatically (Anderson, 2006). Page 2