The current recycling plan here in Austin is called curbside recycling. It’s a mess, currently, we can only recycle #1 and #2 plastic bottles (no other shapes or forms of plastic), glass, metal cans, cardboard (no paperboard), and paper. However, the “rules” for recycling are complicated, cardboard has to be cut to 2′ x 2′ squares and bundled together with string or twine, paper has to go into a separate bin from the glass, metal and plastic. You almost have to have a degree in science to figure out what you can and cannot recycle.
Starting in October we are going to “Single Stream” Recycling, that is we are going to get a big blue plastic cart that we can put all of our recycling in. And now its going to be all cardboard, paper, metal, glass jar’s and bottles, and all types of rigid plastics #1 through #7. This is going to be a huge improvement over the current plan.
It used to be that I never wonder what happened to the things I put in the recycling bin. The men came every Wednesday, dumped the bins into the truck and off it went. I slept easy knowing that I was doing as much as I could to recycle. The truth is somewhat different now that I’ve done some reading and research. After it gets to the recycling center here, it’s all sorted into different piles according to what it is. If the items are contaminated by whatever- food or other waste, chemicals, etc. it’s sent to the landfill. Let’s look at a couple of the things that are shipped out of the center.
Scrap Paper - This is your old newspapers, junk mail, catalogs and such. According to the March 10, 2008 Paper Stock Report, US domestic demand for scrap paper in December 2007 was around 2.8 million tons, this is paper that is reused within the US for what ever purpose. Exports of scrap paper for the same month were 2.6 million tons, this is paper that the US exports for whatever reason to a foreign country, and the biggest buyer of the scrap paper? China. That’s right millions of tons of scrap paper is exported to China for recycling and re-use. However a portion of that paper is rejected for whatever reasons and is either put into a landfill there or burned. China takes our scrap paper, reuses it for cardboard, paper, or pulp packaging, puts whatever item in it , and exports it to the store down the street, where we buy whatever gadget we need.
Metals - The same thing happens to metal, its sorted into types then either reused domestically or exported. I don’t have firm numbers on the amounts, but one report I’ve read says that 95,414 short tons of non-ferrous scrap was shipped in February. By the way this metal is used to make the cases, screws to make the items packed in the boxes made from the paper above.
I now wonder how much it costs to transport all this material. Is the energy saved by recycling so great that the costs in diesel, and fuel oil for the trucks, trains and ships to transport this material halfway around the globe is offset? What about the emissions from the above vehicles along with whatever emissions the recycling plant puts out? Especially in a country that does not seem to have very strong environmental laws. Would it make more sense environmentally and economically to reprocess it here in the US then export the material?
I don’t know the answers to the above but I know, I’ll still be putting out the recycling every week.
