Community Involvement

ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT OF TRM’S REUSE/REFURBISHING/RECYCLING PROJECTS

Source for information: Bill Smith, Senior Environmental Specialist/COT, Public Works Department Phone: 253-593-7719 E-mail: bsmith@cityoftacoma.org

Reduced Air Emissions and Waterborne Wastes

In the last fourteen years, since 1995, TRM has recycled (refurbished)
over 240 TONS of toys!!

To reach this determination, TRM volunteers weighed 5 large (heavy), 5 medium, and 5 small TRM toys and averaged those figures to arrive at the average weight of 3.5 lbs per TRM toy. This weight was multiplied by the total number of toys distributed by Toy Rescue Mission over the past 14 years (over 139,000 toys).

Using these statistics (for one year), we were able to calculate the following information entered into a recycling formula provided by the City of Tacoma (www.epa.gov/cleanenergy/energy-resources/calculator.html). We were then able to calculate that TRM saves enough greenhouse gasses (CO₂ emissions) from being emitted to equal:

• 8 cars off the road (or 4,737 gal. of gasoline not consumed), or
• 97 barrels of oil consumed, or
• Electricity to power 5.5 houses per year.
• Our recycling rate is at 84.2%. This equates to:
  • Savings of 41.7 metric tons of air pollution not emitted
  • Savings of .2 tons of water saved
  • Savings of 4,020 resources saved.
• TRM collaborates with approximately 75 non-profit agencies in the Tacoma/ Pierce County area to “reuse” (restored, refurbished, redistributed)! Our used toys are sorted according to three categories:
  • First Quality = Gift Quality (used, but able to be restored to “like new”
  • Second Quality = Still useable, but not gift quality. These items are sent to agencies to use on-site in recreation rooms, etc. We did NOT determine the recycling benefit from these toys, as we do not keep track of these donations. Based on estimation, our recycling figures could easily be doubled if these toys were added to our calculations!
  • Third Quality = toys that are broken beyond repair, missing essential parts, or otherwise damaged and not able to be restored for use. These are parted-out and useable pieces are saved and reused on other toys.