NAME: _________________________________________________________ DATE: _________ CLASS: _______

Personal Waste Collection

Introduction
How much waste do you think you produce each day? According to the United States
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the average person in the U.S. produces about 2.2 kg or
4.9 lbs. of trash per person. That waste adds up! According to The Handy Science Answer Book, the
average person in the U.S. throws away
• enough aluminum every three months to rebuild all the commercial airplanes in America,
• enough tires each year to circle Earth almost three times, and
• about 18 billion disposable diapers each year, enough to reach to the moon and back
seven times if connected end-to-end.

In the U.S. in 2018, the total amount of waste per person—municipal solid waste (MSW)—was
approximately 292 million (U.S.) tons. Of that, about 69 million tons were recycled, 25 million tons
were composted, 35 million tons were combusted with energy recovery, and 18 million tons of food
waste were repurposed for agricultural/industrial uses. That means 145 million tons of MSW (50
percent of the total) ended up in a landfill.

An even greater concern is that approximately 7.6 billion tons of industrial waste are produced
each year. Can you imagine how much waste that is?

Part 1: Take the Challenge!

Most of us have no idea how much waste we produce each day. With this activity, you’ll get a
glimpse! Your challenge is to collect all your trash for a 24-hour period in a garbage bag. Then you
will review and organize the bag’s contents to learn something about your personal waste habits.
Follow the instructions on the next page, and record your findings on the Personal Waste Eco-Audit
Datasheet on page 3.

First, predict how much waste you think you generate in a 24-hour period. (You don’t have to share
this with anyone—just think about it.)

Materials Needed
• Scale (such as a bathroom scale, hanging scale, or a fish scale). If you do not have a scale, you
can use something with a known weight to effectively estimate weight, such as a 1 lb. can of
beans or bag of rice.
• 1 large trash bag
• 1 smaller trash bag with twist tie
• Protective gloves (rubber or latex)

Safety Alert!
Be certain that all students understand that they are not to collect “dirty” trash (e.g., used tissues or toilet
paper) or other materials that could be hazardous to their health. To prevent possible cuts or other injuries,
make sure students are careful with fragile trash such as glass containers. Also be aware that some students
may be allergic to latex and require an alternative.

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NAME: _________________________________________________________ DATE: _________ CLASS: _______

Personal Waste Collection, continued

Instructions
1. Read through all these instructions before you begin.
2. Get a large trash bag and a smaller trash bag that you can carry with you at all times
during a 24-hour period. You can plan to keep the smaller bag within the larger one. You
will be using the bags to collect everything you would ordinarily throw away, recycle, and
compost for 24 hours. The smaller bag allows you to keep food wastes separate from your
other trash.
3. Keep the bag(s) with you at all times and throw every bit of trash you generate into the
bag(s), except for “dirty” trash. Rather than adding dirty trash (toilet paper, tissues, etc.),
put the same amount of clean and unused material in your bag. For example, if you use
four squares of toilet paper, add four clean squares of toilet paper to your bag. (Yes, this
wastes materials in the short term, but it is in the name of science and may help you waste
less later!
4. Be sure to also collect items that you usually recycle or compost! Remember to put food
wastes into the smaller bag.
5. After 24 hours, weigh the bags and record their weights on the Personal Waste Datasheet
on page 4. If you do not have a scale, compare your trash to something you know the
weight of, such as a can of pre-weighed beans or a 1-lb. bag of rice. For example, how
many cans of beans or 1-lb. bags of rice would equal the weight of this bag?
6. Put on your protective gloves, and then separate your garbage into the categories listed in
the Data Collection chart.
7. After sorting all the trash, weigh the items in each category and record the number. Be sure
to use either kilograms or pounds, as instructed by your teacher.
8. When you’ve weighed the items in all categories, add up the amounts, and record the
total in the final column. This number should be very close to your original, presorting weight
(from step 5).
9. Calculate the percentage of the total each category represents by dividing each
category’s weight by the total weight and then multiplying that by 100. Record each
percentage. Check that all the percentages add up to 100.
10. Transfer to the second chart the weight you recorded for each category on the first chart.
Multiply each Daily Total by 7 to get a Weekly Total. Then multiply each Weekly Total by 52
to get an Annual Total.

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NAME: _______________________________________________________________________________ DATE: ______________ CLASS: _____________
Personal Waste Collection, continued

Personal Waste Datasheet

Part 2: Record the Data
Record the weight of your trash (in kilograms or pounds):
Original (pre-sorting) weight of trash bag with trash: ______________

Original weight of trash bag with food wastes: ______________

Step 1: Data Collection

Paper Cardboard Plastics Metal Glass Food Waste Other Total

Weight
% of Total

(To calculate the percentages, divide the category amount by the total weight; then multiply that number by 100.)

Step 2: Personal Eco-Audit Analysis Sheet

Material Daily Total (kg or lb.) Weekly Total (7 days) Annual Total (52 weeks) %
Paper
Cardboard
Plastics*
Metal
Glass
Food Waste
Other
TOTALS
* Note that the questions on the next page require you to further sort your plastics by the number on the bottom.

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NAME: _________________________________________________________ DATE: _________ CLASS: _______

Personal Waste Collection, continued

Part 3: Analyze Your Results

1. If this is the second time you’ve completed a personal waste eco-audit, find out how much
waste you produced last time. Are the numbers similar? Why or why not?

2. Explain factors that might influence why your daily total is similar to or different from the
daily average (2.2 kg or 4.9 lbs.) of a typical person in the U.S.

3. Do you think the numbers you tallied for one day’s worth of trash are reflective of your
typical waste habits, or do you think you might usually throw away more or less trash in a
day? Explain.

4. What steps could you take to reduce your household waste?

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NAME: _________________________________________________________ DATE: _________ CLASS: _______

Personal Waste Collection, continued

5. Which was the largest category of waste you produced? Why do you think this was the
largest?

6. Do you already recycle or compost anything? If so, which items and why?

7. Look at the bottom of each plastic bottle, and identify how many items of each type
of plastic appear in your waste:

Type 1: __________

Type 2: __________

Type 3: __________

Type 4: __________

Type 5: __________

Type 6: __________

Type 7: __________

Unlabeled/unknown:

__________

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NAME: _________________________________________________________ DATE: _________ CLASS: _______

Personal Waste Collection, continued

8. Look at how much trash you have in front of you. If every year the U.S. produces 7.6 billion
tons of industrial trash and 292 million tons of municipal trash, how many times more trash is
that compared to the total pounds of trash you have in front of you?

9. What are at least three ways we could reduce industrial waste?

10. Compared to the per capita global average, the average person in the U.S. produces
three times more trash, and the United States has consistently ranked as the biggest waste
producer of all countries. What factors do you think contribute to the waste habits of
people and industries in the U.S.?

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NAME: _________________________________________________________ DATE: _________ CLASS: _______

Personal Waste Collection, continued

Part 4: Think About a Design Challenge

11. Examine the charts produced by the EPA below. The first one shows total municipal waste
generated by material and the second shows municipal waste materials that are recycled.

With your design challenge, you will be creating a solution designed to significantly reduce
waste and/or increase recycling. Based on these charts, which category would you like to
tackle in your design challenge? Explain.

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