Garbology is the study of modern refuse and trash as well as the use of trash cans, compactors and various types of trash can liners. It is a major source of information on the nature and changing patterns in modern refuse, and thereby, human society. Such research is followed by industries wishing to demonstrate that discards originating with their products are (or are not) important in the trash stream, and by municipalities wishing to learn whether some parts of the trash they collect has any salable value. The studies of garbology and

archaeology Archaeology or archeology is the study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of Artifact (archaeology), artifacts, architecture, biofact (archaeology), biofacts or ecofacts, ...

often overlap, because

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserve ...

ized or otherwise time-modified trash preserved in middens is quite often the only remnant of ancient populations that can be found. For those who did not leave

building A building or edifice is an enclosed Structure#Load-bearing, structure with a roof, walls and window, windows, usually standing permanently in one place, such as a house or factory. Buildings come in a variety of sizes, shapes, and functions, a ...

writing Writing is the act of creating a persistent representation of language. A writing system includes a particular set of symbols called a ''script'', as well as the rules by which they encode a particular spoken language. Every written language ...

tomb A tomb ( ''tumbos'') or sepulchre () is a repository for the remains of the dead. It is generally any structurally enclosed interment space or burial chamber, of varying sizes. Placing a corpse into a tomb can be called '' immurement'', alth ...

trade Trade involves the transfer of goods and services from one person or entity to another, often in exchange for money. Economists refer to a system or network that allows trade as a market. Traders generally negotiate through a medium of cr ...

goods, or

pottery Pottery is the process and the products of forming vessels and other objects with clay and other raw materials, which are fired at high temperatures to give them a hard and durable form. The place where such wares are made by a ''potter'' is al ...

, refuse and trash are likely to be the only possible sources of information. In addition, ancient garbage sometimes contains information available in no other way, such as food remains,

pollen Pollen is a powdery substance produced by most types of flowers of seed plants for the purpose of sexual reproduction. It consists of pollen grains (highly reduced Gametophyte#Heterospory, microgametophytes), which produce male gametes (sperm ...

traces of then local

plant Plants are the eukaryotes that form the Kingdom (biology), kingdom Plantae; they are predominantly Photosynthesis, photosynthetic. This means that they obtain their energy from sunlight, using chloroplasts derived from endosymbiosis with c ...

s, and broken tools. As an academic discipline it was pioneered at the

University of Arizona The University of Arizona (Arizona, U of A, UArizona, or UA) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Tucson, Arizona, United States. Founded in 1885 by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, it ...

and long directed by William Rathje. The project started in 1973, originating from an idea of two students for a class project. ''Garbology'' is also used as an overtechnical term for waste management, with refuse workers called ''garbologists'', first seen in Australia in the 1960s.

History

Early work at University of Arizona

William Rathje's start of his ecologically oriented garbology excavations began in 1987. Rathje was hoping to find more information regarding what the landfills contained as well as to examine how garbage reacts in its environment. During the time that Rathje was starting his projects many misconceptions began and the nation became more conscious of what they were throwing away. Many

Americans Americans are the Citizenship of the United States, citizens and United States nationality law, nationals of the United States, United States of America.; ; Law of the United States, U.S. federal law does not equate nationality with Race (hu ...

started thinking the landfills were filled with their "most commonly used items"; fast food containers, disposable diapers, and Styrofoam. Rathje thinks this assumption derives from the fact that these items are often the most colorful and easy to spot. The industrial trash was not correctly accounted for before Rathje's project. According to charts before Rathje the amount of

material in the land fills was zero. He started by

surveying Surveying or land surveying is the technique, profession, art, and science of determining the land, terrestrial Plane (mathematics), two-dimensional or Three-dimensional space#In Euclidean geometry, three-dimensional positions of Point (geom ...

different areas of the country to better understand what types of garbage survives under different climates. He found there was little difference between the sites because the garbage is compacted. The California landfills did have less paper than those in Illinois. Recycling is thought to be the cause of the paper difference between states. Rathje's research uncovered some other misconceptions about

landfill A landfill is a site for the disposal of waste materials. It is the oldest and most common form of waste disposal, although the systematic burial of waste with daily, intermediate and final covers only began in the 1940s. In the past, waste was ...

s. In particular, it was revealed that the rate of natural biodegradation is far slower than had been assumed (e.g., in capacity planning). It was found that the plastic bottles that were crushed at the top were able to be re-inflated easier than those that were at the bottom because of a new system of bottle making called light-weighting. This is the process of using less plastic in bottles to conserve material and save money. Light-weighting is not limited to plastic alone; this process is used for aluminum and paper as well. Rathje also found that Americans were wrong about what they thought they threw away most. When combined, the three most infamous types of trash—diapers, fast food containers, and Styrofoam—amounted to less than three percent of the landfill's waste. Rathje found that

plastic Plastics are a wide range of synthetic polymers, synthetic or Semisynthesis, semisynthetic materials composed primarily of Polymer, polymers. Their defining characteristic, Plasticity (physics), plasticity, allows them to be Injection moulding ...

was 20-24% of waste and

paper Paper is a thin sheet material produced by mechanically or chemically processing cellulose fibres derived from wood, Textile, rags, poaceae, grasses, Feces#Other uses, herbivore dung, or other vegetable sources in water. Once the water is dra ...

alone was 40 percent of the waste found in landfills. Thirteen percent of this paper waste was from

newspapers A newspaper is a Periodical literature, periodical publication containing written News, information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background. Newspapers can cover a wide variety of fields such as poli ...

. Rathje states the irony of this fact in his book. He talks about how newspapers are usually the ones that report things such as waste and

pollution Pollution is the introduction of contaminants into the natural environment that cause harm. Pollution can take the form of any substance (solid, liquid, or gas) or energy (such as radioactivity, heat, sound, or light). Pollutants, the component ...

and it is these same newspapers clogging the landfills. Rathje discusses the rate of closing landfills and how for every six small landfills closed one large landfill opens. At the time he

published Publishing is the activities of making information, literature, music, software, and other content, physical or digital, available to the public for sale or free of charge. Traditionally, the term publishing refers to the creation and distribu ...

his book he predicted that in the next five years 50 percent of the landfills open at the time would close. He determined this from his findings. In an effort for states to prevent their area becoming a large landfill often states ship their trash to other states. States such as

Michigan Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...

are taking measures to prevent their state from being the landing spot for the nation's trash. Michigan has found that in the past years most of their rise in trash rates are because of trash imports from

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...

Present-day studies

Garbology today is used to assess waste and figure out new ideas for waste management. Edward Humes estimated that the average US citizen produces 102 tons of refuse in their lifetime.Humes, E. (2012) Garbology: Our dirty love affair with trash. Avery, 288 pp. In 2009, scientists were studying the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, an area of floating plastic trash in the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...

, and its effect on the

marine life Marine life, sea life or ocean life is the collective ecological communities that encompass all aquatic animals, aquatic plant, plants, algae, marine fungi, fungi, marine protists, protists, single-celled marine microorganisms, microorganisms ...

, and how to solve the rising problem. Another study is the process of changing waste into

energy Energy () is the physical quantity, quantitative physical property, property that is transferred to a physical body, body or to a physical system, recognizable in the performance of Work (thermodynamics), work and in the form of heat and l ...

. As both become a rising problem the methane in landfills has the potential to be used to generate small amounts of

electricity Electricity is the set of physical phenomena associated with the presence and motion of matter possessing an electric charge. Electricity is related to magnetism, both being part of the phenomenon of electromagnetism, as described by Maxwel ...

. Garbology as an approach has been practiced by various fields like social sciences studies garbology how human have explored waste management and its various other uses while science uses waste management technologies. Different fields of study has explored the study of garbology and its uses. Garbology as an anthropology study has been proved very helpful in exploring the past and discovering ancient sites using the 'litters', telltale domestic items, legible newspapers made their task easier. Household garbage proved to be more helpful and it required a lot of fieldwork and physical labour. Garbology is not mathematics, one needs to dig it, feel it, sort it. to smell it. Garbology has the potential to teach us more sustainable methods when it comes to managing our waste. Our lack of knowledge has resulted in many recyclable items being thrown out on a daily basis. In response, many schools have incorporated garbology into the

curriculum In education, a curriculum (; : curriculums or curricula ) is the totality of student experiences that occur in an educational process. The term often refers specifically to a planned sequence of instruction, or to a view of the student's experi ...

, with general focus on the three concepts of reduce, reuse, and recycle. ''Garbology Kids'', a series of books written by Sabbithry Persad focuses primarily on teaching kids lessons about sustainable waste methods by offering useful sources and activities through various

social media Social media are interactive technologies that facilitate the Content creation, creation, information exchange, sharing and news aggregator, aggregation of Content (media), content (such as ideas, interests, and other forms of expression) amongs ...

outlets. According to Environment America, as of 2021 the United States accounts for 12% of trash produced worldwide while only being made up of 4% of the total population.

Green cities

Portland, Oregon Portland ( ) is the List of cities in Oregon, most populous city in the U.S. state of Oregon, located in the Pacific Northwest region. Situated close to northwest Oregon at the confluence of the Willamette River, Willamette and Columbia River, ...

consistently rates at the top of every list of sustainability, green buildings, recycling rates, clean transportation, energy efficiency, and eco businesses. Portland is considering implementing anaerobic digesters and plasma gasification that would efficiently decompose garbage.

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a population of 1.4 million in the Urban area of Copenhagen, urban area. The city is situated on the islands of Zealand and Amager, separated from Malmö, Sweden, by the ...

, Denmark is the most efficient city in the world with garbage. 3 to 4 percent of the city's waste ends up in landfills. When compared to the 69 percent of the US's average, this is a very small percentage. Trash is largely incinerated and in the process used to generate electricity. Six out of ten Danish homes are heated this way. Garbology is also what the community of Holden Village has called its communal sorting, separating, and disposal of landfill, recycling, and compostable items. Holden hires a full-time "Garbologist" who leads groups of community members in the sorting of the village waste.

Investigative uses

A. J. Weberman coined the word ''garbology'' in 1971 when he searched through Bob Dylan's trash for journalistic information. In this sense, the concept is used as an investigative tool of law enforcement (as endorsed by California v. Greenwood), corporate espionage, or other types of investigations. This not only includes physical sorting of papers from a rubbish bin but also analysis of files found in a computer's recycle bin. The FBI ran "trash covers" against various organizations deemed subversive in the early 1950s. The Trinity Foundation used such measures to demonstrate that the organization of the crooked televangelist Robert Tilton discarded prayer requests it received after removing the money inside. Investigator Benjamin Pell sold information gleaned from paperwork in prominent people's garbage to the British press in the 1990s. In some countries garbology is illegal unless it is being used by the country's intelligence services. However journalists continue to use it to investigate the stories they produce.

References

{{Reflist

External links

"Following Garbage's Long Journey Around The Earth"
radio interview with Edward Humes on '' Fresh Air'' (31 mins; 2012) Waste management Historical archaeology