Plastic:
1) Americans use 2,500,000 plastic bottles every hour! Most of them are thrown away!
2) Plastic bags and other plastic garbage thrown into the ocean kill as many as 1,000,000 sea creatures every year!
3) Recycling plastic saves twice as much energy as burning it in an incinerator.
4) American throw away 25,000,000,000 styrofoam coffee cups every year.

           Glass:
1) Every month, we throw out enough glass bottles and jars to fill up a giant skyscraper. All of these jars are recyclable!
2) The energy saved from recycling one glass bottle can run a 100-watt light bulb for four hours. It also causes 20% less air 
      pollution and 50% less water pollution than when a new bottle is made from raw materials.
3) A modern glass bottle would take 4,000 years or more to decompose — and even longer if it’s in the landfill.
4) Mining and transporting raw materials for glass produces about 385 pounds of waste for every ton of glass that is made. 
      If recycled glass is substituted for half of the raw materials, the waste is cut by more than 80%.

Energy is essential to our daily activities. It is needed to provide us with light, heat and powers such as cooking facilities and electronic devices. We are now relying on energy for communication, transportation and industrial measures. So, how would our everyday life be without energy? It would doubtlessly become much more difficult! To avoid that from happening, let us not be abusive.  Basically, we should start conserving energy in our homes, so, in this article, I will suggest some ideas, hoping you readers would be more careful with your daily activities.

First of all, switch to eco-friendly energy. Renewable energy is energy produced from natural resources (wind, sunlight, rain, tides, and geothermal heat) which are naturally replenished, or in other words: renewable. Not having non-disposable energy would obligate you to buy that certain object that requires energy constantly. The following would waste a great amount of money and not to mention, electricity.

Second of all, turn off unused appliances and lighting. Leaving them on for a long period of time can waste a huge amount of energy without you even realizing it! Simple things like switching off the lights can help enormously. If ever you need light during the day, open the curtains and let the sun shine through! It’s effective if you require light and  heat. It is equally a valuable source of vitamin D.  And also, don’t leave fridge or freezer doors open longer than necessary.

Third of all, wash economically. Did you know that taking a shower instead of a bath uses around 50% less energy? A shower is much more faster than a bath. It saves time and is quick and efficient.

So generally, a bath is for relaxation whereas using baths to particularly clean only your body is a waste of water. Washing economically doesn’t just apply to your body, the clothes you wash are definitely included. Avoid using the washing machine with a partial load. And also, tumble dryers uses a big amount of energy. Try hanging your clothes on a line instead, besides, this is also better for your clothes.

Almost all of the energy that we use in our homes comes from burning fossil fuels. The greenhouse effect is in danger since the burning fossil fuels releases big quantities of carbon dioxide into the air. Following my suggestions will not only save you hundreds in bills, but also help rebuild a state of equality to your life and to the planet

We human beings are needy. So needy, that we buy food frequently and sometimes too much of it. And by doing so, most of us will just throw out the unwanted. This is what we call food waste. In the following, I will go in further details of this problem we currently have. I will explain how is it exactly that we waste and I will also go into the statistics and also on the effects it has on the environment.

We waste food in many ways. Here are some of the numerous methods that we do:
-   We buy too much food, more than we need.
-   We hastily buy food, especially when hungry.
-   We put too much food on our plates.
-   Instead of recycling the food, we throw it in the garbage.

Now that you know how wasting food works, let me inform you on some of the statistics I’ve found as well as the impact it has on our planet. According to my research, Canadians spend about 19.5$ billion on food they don’t eat and a single family household in Toronto produces around 275 kg of food waste each year. I also found that 9-15 million tons of greenhouse gases are released in Canada due to this food waste problem. That’s approximately the weight of 120 CN Towers! And we all know that greenhouse gases contribute to the climate change of the planet… So by wasting food, we put our planet in danger.

It is practically impossible to completely annihilate our food wasting problem, but we can still try and reduce it:
-   Save your leftovers or recycle them.
-   Plan meals and have a purpose for every food you buy.
-   Store food properly. Avoid your food to rot easily.
-   Freeze the food that you wish to conserve.

By doing these little things, you can help diminish food waste. You can help the environment.
“http://www.thestar.com/News/Ideas/article/429617”

Sources: Toronto Food Policy Council, Jonathan Bloom, Waste & Resources Action Programme

Everyday we pollute our atmosphere by doing simple things such as driving our cars, traveling in airplanes and lots of other stuff that produces carbonic acid gas. We ignore the fact that our actions intensify the greenhouse effect.

I will now explain briefly the impact on human health, the sea level that increases and finally, the climatic changes.

The central issue is how this has great impact in human beings and how it affects personal lives. Let us consider the consequences on our health. Our health suffers because of the rising heat and the presence of numerous sicknesses that are spread by insects (malaria, Nile virus, etc.), not to mention: asthma, skin disease and epidemic.

Second of all, the melting ice and the expansion of the sea water caused by the climatic rise is the reason why the sea level increases. It rises at 15 to 95 centimeters causing people to lose their home. Because several people live in coastal regions of lowlands, the ground risks getting flooded seriously or permanently. This incident happened to 600 villagers from Alaska and thousands of habitants from the north of Quebec.

Finally, unexpected climatic changes are coming our way. Forest  fires are more frequent and will damage big areas. Farmers will take advantage of long vegetative seasons but long cycles of dryness and floods will make crops more difficult. In short, global warming causes several problems. 

Conclusively, I would like to propose certain suggestions that would help our planet. We should often use renewable products so we can re-use them instead of wasting them. We should also start recycling habitually. These little actions can make big differences in the world that will satisfy us and our planet. So, please… the planet’s begging you to use your every effort to SAVE THE PLANET.

In our world today, our planet is going through many difficult situations. The problems that I would be concentrating on this essay are environmental problems such as pollution, global warming, deforestation and more. I will also mention suggestions on how we can help our planet.

Global warming has a big impact in human lives and also those of  animals. I have gathered information that illustrates the melting of the ice in various parts of our planet because of global warming. Many animals like the polar bear need an ice capped environment to live and survive.  The melting of the ice makes the water level rise and can result in flooding. When this situation happens, the death of innocent human lives become the effect.

Where does global warming come from? In my opinion, the main cause of global warming is human beings who do as they please without thinking of the impact it does to our planet. We are creating what we call a greenhouse effect. The greenhouse effect is when it traps some atmospheric gases in the earth and heats it up. We are creating it by producing a lot of carbon dioxide.

So how do humans make carbon dioxide? Well, we can create some by exhaling. But that doesn’t really count as polluting because breathing is a necessity. Driving a vehicle is a human activity that contributes to the greenhouse effect because it releases air pollution. Deforestation is also another human activity because trees absorb CO₂ and if trees disappear  it can have less CO₂ absorption.

So in order to help our planet, we should drive less and go for carpooling or take the public transport more often. As for reforestation, we should recycle our papers that way not many trees will be cut.

 Another thing that I want people to do is save our energy and water. We can save a big amount of energy just by doing little things. Here are some suggestions, turn off the lights when you leave the room, unplug any electronic device that are not used.  We can also save water by closing the faucet while brushing your teeth and limit your shower time.

We should also stop littering because it also harms the environment. It can end up in the sewers or water canals and pollute the water, or if we litter close to an animal habitat that animal can be poisoned by the trash we throw.

The message of my essay is that we should all start caring for the Earth because we will never know what will happen in the future.