First of all, what exactly is recycling again? Recycling is defined as the process of collecting and processing materials that would otherwise be considered as trash and turning them into new products, according to the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA.gov). The idea of recycling actually occurred long decades ago before it became popular in the late 19th century. It has been a part of the human practice before the traditional term of modern day recycling. Recycling was necessary in the past due to not having enough readily materials and products were not yet mass-produced like in today’s culture.
The early practices of recycling took place in areas in Europe and in Asia. During the ancient world, the Jewish code created the rule by having responsibility of disposal of own waste. Another example was from the Romans where they compiled scrap pieces of bronze and metals to be melted down and casted into new statues or weapons for the Roman legions. Japan in 1031 began the first recorded use of wasted paper into new paper, which was introduced as papermaking and the idea was received from China. In 1690, the recycled manufacturing process was also introduced and took place in Rittenhouse Mills near Philadelphia where paper came from fibers of recycled cotton and linen rags (Hoy, Suellen M., & Robinson, Michael, …show more content…
The modern environmental movement ignited in 1962 from Rachel Carson’s best-seller book, Silent Spring. Her book included the dangers of toxic chemicals from landfills in groundwater, whereas at the time, landfills were unregulated and used for hazardous wastes (Cooper, 1998). Along came the wife of President Lyndon B. Johnson, Lady Bird Johnson, who helped sparked a campaign to clean up trash along the roadways.
The federal government progressed several laws throughout the 1960s since the environmental movement had indirectly influenced recycling programs. Trash become a publicly national issue and was first recognized significantly in 1965. Congress enacted the Solid Waste Disposal Act, where the primary goal of the act is to “initiate and accelerate” and had launched a federal research program into the technology of waste disposal. It also assisted aid to state and local governments in their waste disposal programs (Cooper,