Just a thought…

A new 1/3-ounce, 18-karat gold ring creates about 20 tons of mine waste.
Source: IdealBite.com

So, just to do some quick math… there’s 32,000 ounces in a ton, and a ring is only 1/3 of an ounce… that’s about 1,920,000 times more waste than there is metal in the ring. Yes, about TWO MILLION TIMES more waste than metal in the ring.

Short story, buy vintage or recycled jewelry. Seriously. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out how much better for the environment it is not to ever, ever, buy new jewelry- not to mention all the social atrocities associated with the mining industry. Just an estimate- and this is from a friend who’s visited and seen a mine in Africa, won’t mention which one, first hand- is that mining workers have a ten year lifespan, once they enter work at the mine.

If you think about it, we have to have enough metal above the ground- MORE than enough, considering how long we’ve been mining, to have more than enough to make jewelry for every person on earth. Not to mention the vast number of metal objects that make it into the trash (landfills)- aluminum and tin cans, pots and pans, even the little metal bits on pens that get thrown away. What I’d like to see is all the current manufacturers of all those products that use metal declare they will no longer use virgin (new) materials- but that they’re going to find ways to recycle all the millions of tons of metal that have already been mined. I’m sure if they started mining landfills they’d hit paydirt.