Piles of cardboard and paper littering America’s landfills represent $4 billion in lost economic value, according to a new analysis by researchers at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL).
January 18, 2024
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Paper and cardboard waste landfilled in 2019 by type and state. The pie charts’ sizes represent the quantity of landfilled material in kilotons The material types are shown as a percentage of total landfilled material in different colors. Figure by NREL.
Piles of cardboard and paper littering America’s landfills represent $4 billion in lost economic value, according to a new analysis by researchers at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL).
The study, which was funded by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO), found that of the estimated 110 million metric tons of paper and cardboard waste tossed out across the United States in 2019, approximately 56% of that waste was landfilled and 38% was recycled. The rest was burned. Paper and cardboard waste constitutes about a quarter of municipal solid waste and includes newspapers, magazines, books, napkins, junk mail, photographs, pizza boxes, and milk cartons, to name just a few categories.
In addition to the energy expended manufacturing new paper goods and the lost economic value of paper and cardboard waste, landfilling paper and cardboard contributes to methane emissions, waste-disposal fees, deforestation, and local siting and environmental issues. Fortunately, this category of waste is amenable to strategies—including reuse, recycling, and composting—that can mitigate the drawbacks of landfilling.
Learn more about this latest research in a series of articles that quantifies the problem—and details opportunities—of landfilled materials.