Fast Food Waste Threatens our Marine Environment, Drags Down Diversion Rates


America's fast food culture is hurting more than our waist lines. With its grab-and-go, overly packaged food stuffed with unnecessary condiments, fast food outlets are our country's primary source of urban litter and a significant hurdle to local communities' waste diversion goals.

Litter characterization studies across the country have recognized fast food restaurants as the primary identifiable source of urban litter. The most abundant type of non-cigarette litter is foamed polystyrene ("Styrofoam"). This foamed plastic, a staple of fast food restaurant, becomes a permanent fixture in our environment when littered. Easily travelling through gutters and storm drains, it eventually reaches the ocean. Indeed, plastics from urban runoff is the largest source of marine debris.

Furthermore, fast food restaurants are a drag on local communities' waste diversion rates. Currently, less than 35% of fast food stores' waste is diverted from landfills, the vast majority of which is cardboard. Very little food packaging and almost no fast food plastic is currently diverted from landfills. This low diversion rate is surprising considering the vast majority of restaurant waste is not plastic--its main litter culprit--but rather paper, a perfectly recyclable resource. The problem of fast food is not insurmountable. Like many areas of waste generation, a few simple, economical changes in the way the fast food industry handles its waste could change what currently is a major source of unrecyclable, permanent litter to a model for other businesses.

What CAW is Doing:

  • CAW is working with local communities to help increase the number of municipalities that have adopted takeout food recyclability requirements.

Learn More about the Issue of Takeout Food Waste:

‹ What CAW is Doing to Make Multifamily Recycling a RealityupZeroing In On Zero Waste ›

 

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We are in the state of

Submitted by ParisP on March 15, 2010 - 02:30.

We are in the state of calamity where we need to join hands together to surpass the problem that we encounter.Life is not that easy that's why we need each other to lean on.There are many problems in the society nowadays.Like for example,the environmental issues that keep on making us down about its effects.But no matter how complicated those things are,we should never give up.The book written by Anne Leonard about the environment and nature explains how these things should be resolve.But I don't think I'll buy the book version of The Story of Stuff.I know Annie Leonard has a good cause (and it is) but from what I understand she doesn't cite sources that go much farther than anecdotal evidence.Yes,we are justifying here about the evidence.It will be the basis on how these things should be explained in a more simpler way.That isn't to say that we aren't doing environmental damage – I submit Lake Erie into evidence, QED – and that undoing some of that damage as best we can is definitely worth far more than a few payday loans worth, but the data is coming from the fringe, which is not always the best way to get informed.