On December 20, 2011, on The Dr. Oz Show (television) Dr. Oz and EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson had the following exchange at the conclusion of an interview on water safety:
Dr. Oz:
“As a last comment, if your goal—which it is—is to make the world a cleaner, healthier place, looking around, what would you do? What is the most important message you could make with us? What’s the biggest wish you have?”
Jackson:
“Its actually much lower tech than anyone might think.
You know, we recycle about 39% of our waste on average—the 250 million tons we generate every day. If we would bring that number up, if we would insist on a recycling rate in our country at 80, 85, 90 percent we would do a bunch of things: Certainly, we would have a cleaner environment. We would save a tremendous amount of water and energy. We would create millions of jobs, because recycling, in and of itself, would become a supply chain in our country—a very domestic one.
So although it sounds simple, when you see those recycling bins–when people start to talk about recycling–think of it as a homegrown jobs program and an environmental program and an energy program and a water program all in one.”
To see the full response click on the link below. Move the timer in the control bar that pops up to 3 minutes 55 seconds.