1.6 billion pens end up in landfill every year

1.6 billion pens end up in landfill every year

Have you ever thought about how many pens and writing utensils end up in landfill? How many do you think you've used during your lifetime? How about the amount of pens you've got lying around in your house?

I took this picture for this post, this is literally 2 minutes of looking through the stationery cupboard at my parent's house. I'm sure there are 10 times as many pens in their house as this.

 

We have a company called Bic (Société Bic S.A.) to thank for billions and billions disposables littering our planet front and back. They launched the first disposable pen in the early 70s, a disposable lighter in '73 and their disposable razor in '75. Just five years later, they've conquered almost a quarter of the market shares, shaving wise.

But we're here to talk about pens. The US environmental protection agency tells us that 1.6 billion pens are disposed every single year. And yes, these almost all have plastic casings.

 

Want to know what you can do to send less pens to landfill? Check out my article on paper pens from Eco Scribe here.

 

Sources:

Sustainableplastics.com
Wehatetowaste 
Fundinguniverse

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