Every Day is Earth Day

Founded in 1970, Earth Day is a worldwide annual event that encourages environmental efforts and awareness.

At National Jewish Health, every day is Earth Day as we seek to protect and preserve the environment while treating patients and conducting research. Our organization promotes cost-effective business practices that include meeting and exceeding environmental laws and regulations, recycling materials, minimizing waste, reducing dangerous emissions, conserving resources and much more.

Celebrating Earth Day at our main campus includes offering opportunities for employees to learn more about protecting the environment through presentations and supporting related activities such as Bike to Work Day. One of our daily environmental efforts is a single stream recycling program that collects all papers, plastics, metals and other items, unsorted, into one collection receptacle. Results of this program include:

• Recycling in 2015 increased 10 percent
• Employees recycle 58 percent of outgoing trash
• Regular trash pickup was reduced from twice a week to once a week

To encourage employees and patients to use refillable water bottles, there are six water bottle filling fountains on the main campus. These stations have kept 31,866 disposable plastic bottles out of landfills.

Helping the Environment at Home

Here are some easy ways you and your family can help protect the environment:

• Shop with reusable bags or boxes.
• Use refillable water bottles instead of buying bottled water.
• Buy and use rechargeable batteries.
• Buy recycled products.
• Safely dispose of expired and unused medication.

Did You Know?

2  – months it takes to recycle and reuse an aluminum can
3  – hours 1 recycled aluminum can is able to power your TV
17 – trees can be saved by recycling 2,000 pounds of paper
500 – years aluminum stays in its can form in a landfill
680 – pounds of paper each person uses in a year