What product takes up the most space in US landfills?

According to the US EPA, the material most frequently encountered in MSW landfills is plain old paper, it sometimes accounts for more than 40 percent of a landfill’s contents. Newspapers alone can take up as much as 13 percent of the space in US landfills.

Biodegradable materials, including paper, do not easily decompose once they are disposed of in a landfill. Paper is many times more resistant to deterioration when compacted in a landfill than when it is in open contact with the atmosphere or your compost pile.  A study by William Rathje, who runs the Garbage Project, has shown that, when excavated from a landfill, newspapers from the 1960s can be intact and readable.

Consider shredding your non-glossy paper and adding it to your compost pile.  The ‘āina will thank you for it.