Persuasive Essay On Landfills

Imagine yourself in the middle of a rainforest, listen to the sounds around you, smell the fresh air, hear the wildlife; take that image and get rid of the trees around you, the sounds of wildlife, and the smell of fresh air. Instead of a rainforest you are now in the middle of a seemingly endless sea of trash and waste. The fresh scent in the air gone, the sprawling land of greenery and trees gone, and the sounds of the forest is reduced to the sound of heavy machinery trying vainly to reduce trash into smaller more compact waste.
Landfills in America have taken many square miles of what used to be fertile land, forests and communities and that trend does not seem to have an end. The waste, we as Americans, dispose of each year is in the tons and that number rises annually. One of the reasons why this occurs is actually quite simple; population. Population in modern day America has soared to well above three hundred million, in 1915 that number was hundred million. Urbanization and industry has given way to deforestation and landfill creation. The need for more landfills has caused many health concerns, issues, and problems to not only those living near and

Benzene, methylene chloride, perchloroethylene, trichloroethane, trichloroethylene, and vinyl chloride were all found in these landfills. Landfills are designed to have boundaries as to where these gases are released but on most occasions and according to tests made some of these toxins were found in surrounding areas. Methane was the most common one found and it can also be the most dangerous, it is thinner than air and highly flammable (Garbology, Chapter 1 pg. 6). If trapped in a closed building, any spark can cause the building to explode. This is a worldwide issue that must be dealt with