Trash now is different than it used to be.
Virtually everything in your trash has plastic
or flame retardants or some kind of chemical treatment
that trash 50 years ago didn't have. A good example
is paper - It's okay to burn paper, right? Nope.
Paper now is treated with chemicals to make it
really white and to keep it from turning yellow.
It also has coatings on it, and ink... Some paper
even has plastic in it!
That all means that it's really important
now not to burn your trash. These chemicals, when burned
at a low temperature, put out byproducts that form
nasty toxic chemical compounds like Dioxin and Hexachlorobenzene
(whew! That one's even scary to say!). These compounds
have been proven to increase the risk of all kinds
of health problems from asthma to cancer. (For more
info on the health dangers of burning trash, see
the page called "Is it REALLY that bad?")
The short answer is "pretty
much everything,"
but here's a list of things that you might find in the
average person's trash that are especially bad when burned:
treated wood, plastics, newspapers, electronic products,
cardboard, fabrics, tires, food wrappers, magazines,
soda cans, cereal boxes... You get the picture. It's
all bad to burn!
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