To the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce, Maxfield said, “For our company, it begins and ends with the soil, as it does in life. One of the tenants of the great agrarian society that Jefferson envisioned was rooted in the belief that the cultivation of the soil provides direct contact with nature. It is in this re-connection where we see hope for the future. It is here where we are reacquainted with the notion that we are part of the natural system and not removed from it; where we seek to learn from nature, rather than find ways to extract from it. This reconnection provides an understanding that in nature, there is no waste. ” Read the full speech here.

To Accion Colorado, he said, “The story of these entrepreneurs is that of the Founding Fathers of the United States. They were a group of passionate entrepreneurs whose vision defined a country, and a spirit of innovation that lives on today. And though what these founders created has grown into an incredible enterprise, capable of securing arguably more debt than necessary, they would have been hard-pressed to find a conventional lender willing to take the risk to get them off the ground. However, this story and that of the founders represent the intangibles that go beyond the balance sheet and financials, the HUMAN SPIRIT. It is this value that Accion truly embraces.” Read the full speech here.

Read more about The Cradle To Cradle Alternative here:
www.mcdonough.com/cradle_to_cradle-alt.htm

Read more about Zero Waste here:
www.zerowaste.org
www.ecocycle.org/zerowaste
www.zerowasteamerica.org

2. Creates Jobs
More than 56,000 recycling and reuse enterprises employ 1.1 million workers nationwide.

3. Reduces Waste
The average American discards 4.6 pounds of trash every day. Most of this goes into to landfills, where it’s compacted and buried.

4. Good For The Environment
Recycling requires far less energy, uses fewer natural resources, and keeps waste from piling up in landfills.

5. Saves Energy
Manufacturing with recycled materials offers a significant energy savings. For example, manufacturing with recycled aluminum cans uses 95% less energy than the production of entirely new cans.

6. Preserves Landfill Space
Recycling preserves existing landfill space and minimizes the need for new landfills.

7. Prevents Global Warming
Every year, recycling at current rates prevents the release of 180 million metric tons of CO₂ equivalent into the air.

8. Reduces Water Pollution
Making goods from recycled materials generates far less water pollution than manufacturing from virgin materials.

9. Protects Wildlife
Using recycled materials reduces the need to damage forests, wetlands and rivers — places essential to wildlife.

10. Creates New Demand
Recycling and buying recycled products creates demand for more recycled products, decreasing waste and helping our economy.

1. The average American generates 4.6 pounds of trash every day (57 tons in a lifetime). This means that 5% of the world’s people generate 40% of the world’s waste.

2. Colorado residents produce more than 9 pounds of trash each day.

3. Americans throw away: 43,000 tons of food each day, 2.5 million plastic bottles every hour, 4 million tons of junk mail every year, 20,000 cars a day, 270 million tires every year, 65 billion aluminum soda cans per year, 1.6 billion pens every year and 25 billion styrofoam cups per year.

4. Every year we make enough plastic film to shrink-wrap Texas.

5. We throw away enough aluminum cans to rebuild our commercial air fleet every three months.

6. Every day we discard enough iron and steel to supply all of the nation’s automakers.

7. We generate an additional five million tons of waste during the holidays. Four million tons of this is wrapping paper and shopping bags.

8. The average American uses 680 pounds of paper a year. One billion trees worth of paper are thrown away every year in the United States.

9. Each year, we throw away enough office paper to build a 12-foot wall from Los Angeles to New York City.

10. We toss out enough paper & plastic cups, forks and spoons to circle the equator 300 times. The average American office worker goes through around 500 disposable cups every year.

11. Americans make nearly 400 billion photocopies a year — about 750,000 copies every minute of every day.

12. U.S. businesses use 21 million tons of paper. That’s about 175 pounds of paper for every American.

Sources: National Recycling Coalition; U.S. Environmental Protection Agency; U.S. Department of Energy; Center for Sustainable Systems, University of Michigan.