The damage of garbage pollution to the ecological environment presents multi-level harmful characteristics. Solid waste accumulates in the natural environment for a long time, which first changes the physical and chemical properties of the soil. Chemicals such as plasticizers and flame retardants in plastic waste continue to be released, leading to soil compaction and fertility decline. Experimental data shows that mixing 2 kilograms of plastic fragments per square meter of soil can reduce crop yields by more than 30%, and the heavy metal content exceeds the standard by 5-8 times. Even more serious is the leachate produced by landfills, which contains over 40 toxic substances and can penetrate a 10 meter thick layer of clay, polluting the groundwater system. Groundwater monitoring in a certain city shows that the COD index in the water wells within 500 meters downstream of the landfill exceeds the standard by 12 times, and the ammonia nitrogen content reaches 45 times the standard for drinking water.

The threat of garbage pollution to biodiversity is particularly prominent. Marine plastic pollution has formed five giant garbage belts, with an area of 1.6 million square kilometers in the Pacific garbage belt. The mortality rate of sea turtles who accidentally ingest plastic is as high as 50%. The terrestrial ecology has also been severely affected. Plastic bags on grasslands that are swallowed by cows and sheep can cause blockages in the digestive tract and lead to death. As a result, a pastoral area in Inner Mongolia loses thousands of livestock every year. A more hidden hazard comes from electronic waste. One mobile phone battery can contaminate 60000 liters of water, and the world produces over 50 million tons of electronic waste annually, of which 70% ultimately enters illegal dismantling channels. The released heavy metals such as lead and mercury are enriched through the food chain, causing the concentration of pollutants in top predators to reach over 10000 times the environmental background value.

Garbage pollution also triggers a chain of ecological disasters. Persistent organic pollutants such as dioxins produced by open-air burning can spread up to 1000 kilometers away with atmospheric circulation, and have been detected in polar bears. Garbage mountain collapses occur frequently, and the landslide accident in Shenzhen in 2015 resulted in 73 deaths. Investigation shows that 90% of the landslide body is composed of construction waste. These ecological damages are irreversible, plastic bags take 200 years to fully degrade, and the toxicity of certain chemicals can sustainably affect more than ten generations. The annual economic losses caused by garbage pollution worldwide reach up to 80 billion US dollars, not including the hidden costs of ecosystem service loss, which is eroding the Earth's life support system.