Standard American recycling system overview (Duong 2021)
First, the consumers throw away their trash into separate bin colors corresponding to the trash type.
Next, the trash bins are transported to a recycling facility. The facility will clean, sort, and prepare recyclables. Lots of unwanted materials get mixed in with the recyclables, so some trash will take additional work to sort. Unwanted trash gets sent to landfills. Finally, the recyclables are made into new products at other facilities like plastic bottle factories or paper mill facilities.
Standard Sweden recycling system overview
First, the consumers throw away their trash into separate bins for recycling. The trash gets sent to the recycling plants where the recyclables get recycled, and the trash gets incinerated to turn into energy. Although most of Sweden’s trash gets incinerated and turned into energy, the rest of the recyclables still go through a standard recycling process. Although this is very rare, some of Sweden’s waste gets sent to landfills, though only 1 percent of trash ends up in that situation.
