In just one year, the UK produces enough household waste to fill dustbins stretching from the Earth to the Moon...and back.
Each person in the UK:
- uses approximately 134 carrier bags a year,
- throws away about seven times their body weight in rubbish every year,
- produces about 500 kilos of household waste per year.
UK families use around 500 glass bottles and jars a year - all of these can be recycled.
It is not known how long glass takes to break down but it is so long that glass made in the Middle East over 3000 years ago can still be found today.
The amount of waste paper buried in landfill each year would fill 103,448 double decker buses. Parked nose to tail, these would reach all the way from London to Milan.
Every year, 17 ½ billion cans are manufactured in the UK.
1.9 billion Aluminium cans and 1.5 billion steel cans are recycled. Sounds good - but every day 80 million food and drinks cans end up buried in landfill.
Each child uses a total of 5850 nappies in their lifetime - that weighs the same as an average family car!
One million tonnes of nappies are thrown away every year, that's 8 million nappies every day.