top of page

WHAT WE BUY

How our purchases matters.

The things we buy affects climate change. About 29% of the nation’s Greenhouse gasses comes from the way we make, consume and dispose of products. This is more than the 25% emissions that only comes from heating our homes and the 15% emissions that come from the use of local transport (Vox, 2018).

HOUSEHOLD AND PERSONAL CARE

  • These products produce toxic waste and when they are not disposed of properly, they are very harmful.

  • The waste can harm humans, animals, and plants if they encounter these toxins buried in the ground, in stream runoff, in groundwater that supplies drinking water, or in floodwaters, as happened after Hurricane Katrina (National Geographic, 2019).

hygiene 2.png

CONSUMER GOODS

  • Every European citizen generates an average of 1,69 kg of waste per day. This is an estimation of more than 620kg waste per year for every single European citizen (Acciona, 2018).

  • Most of these wastes are disposed of after one use, such as packaging of fast food and plastic straws.

  • Fabrics, such as Polyester, Nylon, Acrylic and other synthetic fabrics, are very often used to make clothes and make up about 60% of all the clothes around the world. These materials are hard to impossible to recycle.  

2019-02-06 (2).png

ELECTRONICS

  • According to a United Nations-backed study in 2016, there was more than 45 million tons of E-waste around the world. This amount of waste is equal to 4,500 Eiffel Towers.

  • The Raw materials that were being used were estimated to 55 billion euros. These raw materials consisted of gold, silver, copper, and palladium.

  • Only 8,9 million tons of these materials were documented to have been collected and recycled in the year 2016.

  • Most of the e- waste end up as waste on landfills. If changes won’t come soon, these 45 million tons of E-waste will increase to 52,2 million tons by 2021.

the-carbon-footprint-of-our-ewaste_54cd3
bottom of page