Environmental campaigners say during this year's holiday season the British population will produce up to three million tons of waste in their frenzied Christmas consumption, increasing the environmental threat to the planet.

According to environmental campaigner Donnachadh McCarthy, the amount of garbage people put in their bins will double over Christmas, which means double the usual amount of waste will go into incinerators.

"It means we will have a huge orgy of destruction, with carbon dioxide pouring out over the Christmas period, melting the polar ice caps."

For many people Christmas is about eating and drinking to excess. Still, many claim that it isn't difficult to have an environmentally-friendly holiday season.

According to the Environment Agency based in the country, British people bought over six million Christmas trees last year, the majority of which were thrown out after use, creating around 9-thousand tons of additional waste.

Environmentalists advocate buying a tree with roots so it can be replanted, or finding a supplier that takes some measure of responsibility

Angus Murray of the Eco-friendly Christmas Tree Company says they only use trees from sustainable Scottish forests and plant three to five trees for every one they sell.

"After Christmas we also provide a recycling service. We collect the trees and take them to green sites and chop them up into wood chips and mulch, so they can then get put back into the ecosystem by being spread on fields."

But trees are not the only problem. On average, 83 square kilometers of wrapping paper is thrown away in the UK during Christmas.

And the excessive consumption of food and drink also takes its toll, with an extra 750-million bottles and 500-million cans being thrown away during the Christmas period.

Helen McCallum of the UK's Environment Agency believes environmental issues "have gone right up the agenda" and that people really do want to do the right thing.