Recycling

Recycling

   Out with old, in with the new.  Seems logical, this time-tested adage; and part of that cycle seems to be something that we give little thought to these days, that of recycling.  In many parts of Europe, recycling is not only second nature, but mandatory.  Sorting plastics and paper and metal, and even garbage, is usually done conscientiously for living spaces and land disposal sites are small and the view is that recycling benefits the earth anyway.  But in the consumer-hungry United States, recycling has been a bit slower to catch on.  Sorting at first proved too difficult --this plastic type and not that plastic type, no glass, no magazines only newsprint, etc.-- so recycling took time to catch on;  in the beginning, it just seemed easier to throw everything into the trash, all of which went into the landfills (which were plentiful).  Here's how Wikipedia described one of the aptly titled landfills in New York, Fresh Kills:  At the peak of its operation, the contents of twenty barges –each carrying 650 tons of garbage– were added to the site every day.  In 2001 it was estimated that, if kept open, the landfill would have eventually become the highest point on the East Coast. 

   This all became the subject of a book by Elizabeth Royte titled Garbage Land.  In an interview, she writes: One of the most shocking things I learned while researching my book, and the most important thing for all of us to remember, is that for every barrel of waste you send to the landfill, there are 71 barrels' worth of waste generated by the industrial processes that transform raw materials into finished goods.  When you avoid buying new goods, you help avoid all that other waste upstream.

   In some cases, such as steel, recycling is necessary (scrap iron, like a starter batch of yeast for sourdough bread, is part of the process required to create new steel).  According to the American Iron & Steel Institute, 70 million tons of steel are recycled each year, more (by weight) than paper, plastic, aluminum, and glass combined, amounting to an estimated recycling rate of 81% (the same institute says that "almost 80% of discarded appliances are recycled every year").  The result is an energy savings of 74% (as compared to what would be needed to make new steel).

   And here's what the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries says about our recycling in the U.S....65% of our paper is recycled, as is nearly 60% of our aluminum;  80% of our glass is recycled, as are close to 100 million tires.  But all of those great statistics still represent an average recycling rate of just over 30% (although that is up from the 10% recycling rate 30 years ago...part of this was due to the observation by recycling companies that people just wouldn't make the effort to sort their trash unless it became easier; so recycling companies basically said, just dump everything that's recyclable into one bin and we'll sort it out on our end).  Still, 2/3 of our 250 million tons of trash, including 2/3 of our glass and over 85% of our plastics, continue to be put into landfills or burned (this includes some of the 38 billion plastic water bottles we throw out here in the U.S.).  According to the Environmental Protection Agency, food has now become the leading item we toss out, averaging 20 pounds per person per month (on a plus note, the city of San Francisco has made the recycling of food mandatory and its recycling rate is now nearing 90%).

   All of this led Mother Earth News to write, Is Recycling Worth It?  In the piece by Joanna Poncavage,  she answers: In short, yes.  But, to keep it effective, the way we think about waste must shift away from mindless consumption.  Even as we’re recycling more, we’re creating more garbage — 4.38 pounds per person per day in 2012, up 63 percent from 2.68 pounds in 1960.  According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the total amount of garbage for the same period increased by 183 percent, from 88.1 million tons in 1960 to 251 million tons in 2012.  The author goes on to provide recommendations by categories on what to do with your trash and where or how to recycle it, including your electronics (she writes: One million recycled cell phones can provide 35,000 pounds of copper, 772 pounds of silver, 75 pounds of gold, and 33 pounds of palladium).

   But as just one example of how far we have to go, Wired wrote about recycling taken to a new level, that of dumpster diving.  In the article by Randall Sullivan, dumpster diver Matt Malone makes a six-figure salary at his day job as a security specialist; but at night, he dives into dumpsters and pulls out what stores have discarded and...he makes more than his day job pays!  The bottom line is that our resources, even with recycling, are not without end.  As author Poncavage says, we indeed need to "shift away from mindless consumption."

   Reduce, reuse, recycle...from clothes to books to composting food.  It's a simple thing to do.  While in Germany, the decision was made for us...a plastic bottle of Pepsi had an 85-cent waste fee tacked on (the glass bottle had no such deposit fee since glass recycling was mandatory).  Now that is one easy way to influence not only what you throw away, but what you buy.  Glass bottles...I remember them.  Quite nice really...and easily recyclable.