Your Green Education for the Day

care of Seventh Generation...

got this from their latest newsletter
(I bolded some of the especially eye-opening ones)

• Average number of pounds of paper used annually by every American: 680
• Number of trees required by every American to meet their yearly demand for paper and wood products: 7
• Percent of the U.S. waste stream composed of paper (by weight): 35
• Gallons of petroleum saved by recycling one ton of paper: 380
• Number of trees saved by recycling one ton of household printing paper: 24
• Number of annual pounds of carbon dioxide absorbed by those 24 trees: 353
• Cost equivalent of flood protection provided by U.S. coastal wetlands: $23 billion
• Medium estimate of the annual value of all the goods and services provided by nature: $33 trillion
• Annual output of the total world economy: $44 trillion
• Percent increase in U.S. socially responsible investment funds from 1995-2005: 300
• Value of all socially responsible investments in the U.S.: $2.29 trillion
• Reduction in the estimated value of a single human life by the current EPA administration: $820,000
• Percent increase in the incidence of cancer, adjusted for median age, from 1972 to 1999: 24
• Percentage of American women who will face cancer at some point in their lifetime: 39
• Percentage of American men who will face cancer at some point in their lifetime: 44
• Estimated number of synthetic chemicals currently in production: 80,000
• Approximate number of approval applications for new chemicals received by the EPA each year: 2,000
• Percent of all chemicals for which human and environmental safety tests have yet to be performed: 90
• Amount of equivalent human energy contained in 10-1/2 gallons of petroleum: 4 years of hard labor
• Approximate total amount of wind energy released by a typical hurricane: 1.5 x 10^12 watts
• Approximate total amount of current global electrical generating capacity: 3 x 10^12 watts
• Estimated amount of global ocean wave energy recoverable using current technologies: 7.5 x 10^14 watts
• Percent of total world energy output consumed in the United States: 26
  Percent U.S. energy demand grows each year: 3
• Approximate percent of additional energy needed to wash clothes in 140° water vs. 104° water: 100
• Percent increase in U.S. water use per person since 1950: 127
• Number of gallons of water wasted by a leaky faucet dripping once per second: 2,700