Trash Talk: What Happens After You Throw Something Away?
- Sami Hoeldtke
- Jul 22, 2025
- 6 min read
Ever wonder what actually happens to your trash after it leaves your curb? In this article, we dive into the hidden journey of waste—where it goes, how it’s managed, and why it matters. From landfills and incineration to recycling and waste-to-energy plants, this article explores the systems that handle the 4.9 pounds of trash the average American produces every day. You'll learn about the environmental and health impacts of landfills, the role of consumerism in our growing waste problem, and how a circular economy could offer solutions. This isn’t about guilt—it’s about awareness and empowerment. By understanding what happens to our waste, we can start making more conscious choices that reduce our footprint. When it comes to trash, "out of sight" shouldn’t mean "out of mind."
The Basics
What Happens when you throw something away? Where does it actually go? There are a lot of variables here, but for the most part, there is a basic process that happens once you throw something away. The trash is collected and sorted, and then dispersed to various end locations and processes, sometimes landfills, sometimes incineration, or maybe a recycling facility.
Most developed countries have waste collection services that you pay into if you own a home, for a company to come by on a weekly or so basis to pick up your trash bins and collect their contents. For apartments or flats, a similar thing often applies where you either pay a fee on top of your rent, or it is factored into the cost of your rent already, for a company to come collect the contents of the dumpsters on site. In the Unites States they are called garbage trucks, and there are about 180,000 of them nationally, each having separate routes to collect trash. Some companies take these loads straight to a landfill. Other companies and services might go to a Material Recovery Facility first, which is where the contents are separated and dispersed to recycling facilities, landfills, or waste-to-energy facilities. If landfills are quite far from where the waste is collected, sometimes it will be taken to a transfer facility in between.
Landfills
According to the World Bank , landfills are the most common destination of waste, with about 37% of waste globally ending up in some form of landfill. A close second is open dumping, which is where about 31 percent of waste ends up. Open dumping is arguably worse than landfills because its unregulated. There does not have to be any protections in place like liners or other things that landfills use to help mitigate some of the negative consequences of them. It is literally, as the name implies, the practice of dumping the waste in an open area.
So what's a landfill then? Luckily, landfill regulations have come a long way in the past few decades to help mitigate the negative consequences of them on human health and the environment. In the US they are federally regulated and there are various types of landfills each following respective protocols. Generally speaking, a landfill is a site designated and designed to contain household trash which now have structures in place to help prevent contamination of their surrounding areas.
Typically, the bottom of landfills are lined with clay and then a layer of plastic to collect any liquid or toxins that are released as the trash is compacted. Often times there is a drainage system to collect any liquid released. Layers of trash are added on and compacted, sometimes mixed in with layers of dirt. A “completed landfill” is then sealed over with another layer of plastic and clay, topped with a very thick layer of soil so in theory, things can grow on top of it and it remains covered. However, this does not change the fact that it is still a pile of trash, and this trash decomposes to varying degrees which releases methane, a greenhouse gas. Landfills often have a very distinct and pungent smell as methane is responsible for a cow-manure stench. This, coupled with literal tons of garbage, makes for a less than desirable sensory experience. In newer landfills, the methane is collected and sometimes burned for energy or vented. But this and other air pollutants released by landfills can have negative health effects on people who live nearby. Landfills are typically constructed in lower-income areas which have less access to resources in the first place. Additionally, if there is a leak in a landfill, that liquid called leachate can contaminate the groundwater supply.
Incineration
Incineration occurs at a waste-to-energy plant. This is where solid municipal waste (aka your garbage) is burned to create electricity. In the US, the most common method for this is called the mass-burn system. Put simply, a large sum of waste is put into an incinerator with a boiler that produces steam. This energy is then turned into electricity. The pro of any incineration method is that it largely reduces the volume of trash as it's reduced down to ash. There are some pollution measures in place to collect certain contaminants from the smoke before it's released through a smoke stack, but incineration does still release greenhouse gases, mostly carbon dioxide.
The Big Picture
Why does this matter? What does a landfill have to do with you and your little household waste bin? The society we live in today is largely based on consumerism. One of the implications of that is the heightened production of waste.
A linear economy which is what the capitalistic society largely operates by, is the process of extracting materials, turning those materials into something, or producing something from them, consuming that product, and then disposing of said product. Conversely, a circular economy has much more emphasis on reuse and repairing, and recycling or composting to keep things in circulation and minimize what is wasted.
It is not your fault the system is built to operate linearly; however, we can and do have a responsibility now that we are informed to adjust our actions accordingly.
This is especially important if you live in the developed western world, as the country that produces the highest amount of solid municipal waste is…drumroll please…the United States. To add fuel to the fire, the United States and Canada are both ranked very poorly for waste management systems.
Environment America gave a very eye-opening visual:
Every 15.5 Hours Americans throw out enough plastic to fill the Dallas Cowboys home field, the largest NFL stadium in the country.
What Does This Have to Do With You?
The average amount of waste generated by Americans is 4.9 pounds per person, per day.
It's no surprise now knowing these numbers, that 7 states are projected to run out of landfill space within the next couple years. Additionally, the entire United States is projected to run out of landfill space in less than 60 years. At the time of writing this article, I am 26 years old. If all goes according to plan, I will still be alive during that time. This is a problem that is already unfolding and will continue to unfold throughout our current lifetime. This is not an abstract issue happening in 200 years from now.
That is why your lifestyle matters, that is why what you throw away matters, that is why that plastic carton that you threw out instead of recycling matters. We’ve all done it; we have all been guilty of that, and the recycling system is also far from perfect. This article is not meant to scare or shame you. But to give you the information that's out there and connect this information to your own habits and your own life.
It is not your fault the system is set up linearly, but now that we know better, we can make a change.
So now we ask that you reflect on your own life and that 4.9 pounds of waste per day and see if that resonates, and start identifying where you can reduce waste in your life. Imagine if everyone in the US did that, let alone the world, how much different these scenarios would look; how fewer landfills there would be and how much cleaner our air and water would be.
Let's not forget we’re in this together.
Together we have the power to make this world a much more comfortable and sustainable place.
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