Introduction: US citizens die along with their planet with every breath they take. It's no secret that America has a pollution problem, but what isn't widely known is that the recycling rate is only 35%, while other countries, like Germany, have a recycling success of 68%. This isn't the scariest fact, according to the UK's Royal Statistical Society, only around 9% of the nearly 35 million tonnes of plastic produced each year is recycled. Plastic is a form of pollution that contributes to climate change, climate change massively affects the planet we live on. Thesis Statement: What should be done is for the United States to make recycling mandatory to prevent climate change. The United States should mandate mandatory recycling to reduce gas emissions, reduce trash in landfills, and clean polluted bodies of water to reduce climate change. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Topic Sentence: To understand the seriousness of why mandatory recycling should be mandated, US citizens need to understand what gas emissions are. Evidence and Citations: According to one of NASA's top editors, Holly Shaftel, "Climate change is a long-term change in the average weather patterns that have come to define the Earth's local, regional, and global climates." Comment: Greenhouse gas emissions are gases (mostly carbon dioxide) caused by human activities such as factories, transportation, and normal commercial products. However, what US citizens don't realize is that the gas emissions that are affecting climate change are affecting them too. Greenhouse gas emissions trap heat, which makes the climate warmer for people living in warmer areas of the United States, which also contributes to respiratory illnesses from air pollution. Evidence and Citations: In a study written by Allen Hershkowitz, he wrote: “In 1994 alone, the 1,834 plastic manufacturing facilities operating in the United States emitted more than 111 million pounds of toxic air emissions, 507 million pounds of related waste to production, tens of thousands of pounds of discharges to surface waters, and hundreds of thousands of pounds of other pollutants.” Comment: Paper mills (factories dedicated to producing paper from trees) contribute significantly to greenhouse gas emissions. Factories cut down trees to use paper, which is not recycled and reduces the number of trees in the environment. Not using virgin materials, such as trees, will help reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. By recycling paper and letting trees thrive in the environment, the amount of carbon dioxide would be removed from the air, which would also help store carbon in the soil and release oxygen into the atmosphere. Evidence and Citations: Another concept that people don't realize is that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimated that if the United States increased the current recycling rate from 27% to 35%, it would reduce emissions of greenhouse gases of 11.4 million tons of carbon dioxide. Comment: It may not seem like a huge amount considering that Earth's atmosphere is currently clouded by as much as 412 million tons of carbon dioxide, but it's certainly a staggering difference and a step in the right direction. Topic sentence: landfills are also an important problem contributing to the epidemic of changeclimate. The EPA describes landfills on its website as "Modern landfills are well-designed and operated facilities for the disposal of solid waste" and states that the United States has more than 3,000 active landfills. Landfills produce fewer gas emissions but maintain the same liability to the climate change epidemic, which is why many organizations are trying to find different ways to dispose of their waste. In a perspective essay written by the author, William J. Cohen, he states: “In 1991 the four municipal councils in the region, including Lunenburg County and the cities of Bridgewater, Lunenburg and Mahone Bay, approved a regional recycling strategy that would offer an alternative to the county's burning and landfill system, a system on a collision course with Nova Scotia's clean air goals. These clean air targets were to be achieved by 1996, and the province's waste reduction targets were to be achieved by 2000.” Cohen then proceeds to state how Nova Scotia has established a provincially mandated recycling program, in which the process has achieved one of their main goals of reducing the volume of waste from landfills by at least 50%. Cohen then explains how their goal was achieved by saying, “Lunenburg County's strategy was fairly straightforward: it involved operating a separation facility for recyclables, a composting facility for both source-segregated organic waste and mixed waste, and a dry landfill for organic waste separated at source and for mixed waste. residues. Hazardous waste and large discarded items, such as household appliances, would also be recycled.” Considering that many counties in the United States have numerous landfills, just like greenhouse gas emissions, landfills are also very dangerous for US citizens. A lawsuit filed by the Holt family, who resided in Tennessee, against the Dickinson County landfill in 2004. The family ultimately won the lawsuit due to an unfortunate spill from the landfill. The landfill business lost much of the limited credibility it had left. Comment: Mandatory recycling would help reduce landfill, raise awareness of climate change and make a change to the problem. Citizens would not have to rely on a third-party company to potentially harm the people around them and would be free to recycle their products and/or compost them. Many countries have demonstrated that changes within their regions have brought benefits by reducing landfill and the impact this has had on climate change around them. Topic sentence: Water pollution is the third largest contributor to the climate change epidemic at 80% of the total. the world's wastewater is released into the environment untreated (Denchak). Evidence and Citations: With climate change increasing, water levels are also increasing. Pollution plays a major role in water climate cycles, which has made the cycles unstable, unpredictable and much more dangerous than they have been for the past 30 years. Nowadays, water has become so fatal that the amount of drinking water available on earth has dropped to less than 1%. The water has become toxic to humans due to high amounts of arsenic, copper and lead. All three of these toxic components have been found in tap water in every single state in the nation. Not only are chemicals being dumped into water bodies, but waste is also being dumped. Water pollution is.