NYC produces 3.2 million tons of trash!

OMG! New York City, one of the biggest cities in the world produces more than 3.2 million tons of trash a year! 

But none of that trash actually gets processed within the city! Let’s see what will happen. So NYC ships its trash to many different states around the east! There, the trash is burned and made into electricity which we can use! Let’s see the process. 

So in the early morning, 2000+ trash trucks go and pick up most of the trash New Yorkers produce! Then it is taken to a trash facility and by then the sun would have been rosen! A tractor scoops up the trash and dumps it underground which is 450 to 600 tons of trash a day! The blocks are then put onto a barge and shipped to different states which is then the responsibility of Covanta! They do this to reduce carbon emissions by 32,000 tons. At CovantaWaste to Energy facility, they burn the trash and convert it into electricity which everyone could use! All of the NYCs trash is sent to waste to energy facility to get that converted to electricity. The incinerators burn the trash at 2000 degrees Fahrenheit to produce electricity for 45000+ homes. The remaining metals will be pulled off by a magnet. The gases that are produced by burning the trash are also treated and they make sure that poisonous gases are treated and the normal air is released out of the plant.

Waste to energy produces CO2 emissions but in a year this process eliminates a million tons of CO2 emissions a landfill would have produced. The process generates a small amount of methane but the methane they offset from a landfill results in an actual decrease in CO2 emissions. 

Let’s hope we find ways to deal with this trash in better ways. Until then, try recycling as much as possible and produce less trash to reduce the burden on companies dealing with trash. Please do take care of the earth as you take care of yourself!

By Sri Nihal Tammana