Given the complex ecosystems surrounding most of our day-to-day work and activities as humans, quantifying the impact that we have on our surroundings can become a quite complex problem. The same principles that apply to our daily lives also apply to this project, in which we are striving to make a positive impact on the environment through recycling aluminum cans. While numerous other factors still come into play (e.g., the part of the world in which you reside, any trash bags that were used to house cans, any extra miles driven for the purpose of recycling, etc.), the following calculator serves as a simplified representation of the impact that an individual can have by recycling aluminum cans.
Go ahead and play around with the calculator to see what your impact might be. I’ve worked out an example for a typical donor, and have also included a few sources where more information can be found below.
Calculate Your Impact
At the end of our project, we’ll be publishing a more in-depth analysis including:
- Aluminum cans recycled (note: only those that would have went to the landfill will be included)
- Trees planted
- Miles driven for the project
- Flights
Cheers,
The Consultant
Example: Typical Donor
Input:
Number of Cans/Month: 300
Number of Months: 12
Results:
393.75 lbs CO2 reduced, which is equivalent to saving 20.09 gallons of gasoline or planting 0.197 trees (assuming that the tree lives 40 years).
Keep in mind, the result above is just for 1 year - by continuing to recycle after this project is over and by getting additional members of the community involved, the donor can exponentially increase their impact.