Recycling Debate

[2buttons]

I am a recycling skeptic. I understand the idea of a closed loop, but I think everything from driving over consumption, to all the energy and carbon required for the recycling process might make the benefit minimal at best, and at worst it might be actually bad for the environment.  There are plenty of articles in mainstream liberal outlets such as NYT that suggest that I am not the only recycling skeptic.

Persuade me otherwise with hard facts based on real science, so I can be a recycling conformist and my wife can stop yelling at me for not recycling. 

[Reynolds531]

It may not be perfect but nothing is. Why not at least do paper and metal? Those are the things your municipality will get paid for.

[nereo]

What precisely are you skeptical about?
That it's more economical to recycle?  That most of what you put into your recycling bin gets recycled at all?  That recycling is ecologically better than manufacturing from new? That recycling doesn't reduce consumption of resources? Something else?

Each are separate issues, and worthy of its own discussion.  Whether recycling is "worth it" depends on what metrics you are using to base your conclusions on.

ETA: of course what material we're talking about matters enormously as well. Recycling metal cans is much simpler and cheaper than recycling most molded plastics. Recycling electronics and battery components may not make economic sense vs purchasing the raw materials, but it addresses a waste-disposal problem.

[TomTX]

Recycling metals is typically very cost effective.

Recycling used oil, electronics and batteries is needed from a waste management perspective. They are not safe to simply dump. Around here there is some pretty good business in the electronics recycling - after disassembly the metals go into the metals recycling stream, and the plastics go to a company that specializes in molding new materials out of the plastics.

Recycling clean paper from an office environment is marginally cost effective. Large amount of fairly homogenous material picked up from a few locations.

Postconsumer plastics, paper and such is questionable.

[Fishindude]

Good thoughts.
Something that kind of rubs me wrong is glass beer bottles.   Used to be that all glass beer and pop bottles were returnable, got cleaned, reused, re-labeled and refilled at the distributor.  Now they are thin glass, screw top and they all go in the trash or recycling.   I don't think much of this actually gets reprocessed, due to costs.  To me, this is one area where a whole bunch of landfill could be avoided.   Same with milk jugs, etc.  If you can't put liquids in returnable glass, put it in 100% recyclable steel or aluminum.

My county has a phony recycling program.   They have bins around town everyone dumps paper, cardboard, metals and glass into.   Everything goes into one container, not sorted and I am darned near sure it all just gets dumped in the landfill.  I think it's just a feel good thing having a recycling program going and probably opens the county up to get some grants, etc.?

[TravelJunkyQC]

My BF is an environmental engineer who works on water treatment for landfill lixiviate, so he could definitely tell you more and in clearer terms that recycling is better than putting more stuff in a landfill. I suppose I simply defer to his judgment on this one, because he works on these sites.

Yes recycling takes a lot of energy and has a hefty carbon footprint, but landfill accumulation is worse. He's actually a strong proponent of destroying a lot of things through burning, because the ashes can then be filtered and used as landfill cover, and the burning is less dangerous to the environment than the leaching of chemicals into the groundwater system.

As many above mentioned, glass and metals are all relatively easy and environmentally friendly to recycle. Plastic is a pain in the ass. But if you must purchase plastic, better to recycle than to put it in a landfill. If your city works with an incinerator for trash, it might be a toss-up for the plastic as to which one to do (recycle or throw out).

[bacchi]

My city makes money from postconsumer plastics recycling. (I was surprised too.) Cardboard is also profitable to recycle.

Recycling has an externalities problem. We don't pay for the full environmental effects of using virgin materials so it's hard to know whether it's really worth it.

[tooqk4u22]

This question is like "Is it better to drink your coffee from a disposable foam cup every morning or buy and use the same mug everyday?"

Where the argument is that the cost to produce, transport, clean with soap and water daily, and eventual disposal results in the foam cup being the more "green" choice whether economically or based on environmental impact. 

Even if it all adds up, the intangible of not having 365 new foam cups in a landfill somewhere has to be worth something. 

[TomTX]

This question is like "Is it better to drink your coffee from a disposable foam cup every morning or buy and use the same mug everyday?"

Where the argument is that the cost to produce, transport, clean with soap and water daily, and eventual disposal results in the foam cup being the more "green" choice whether economically or based on environmental impact. 

Even if it all adds up, the intangible of not having 365 new foam cups in a landfill somewhere has to be worth something.

As a data point, my ceramic coffee mug typically is used for 3 fills per day, then gets a quick rinse with a small amount of water (hm... maybe 10-15% of mug volume?) Dishwasher once every 5-7 days.

[RobFIRE]

One problem is of course that highly accurate whole-lifecycle data is going to be hard to estimate, will vary from location to location etc. so any numbers produced on cost and benefits are always going to be an estimate on certain assumptions. So there is enough leeway for people to argue things one way or another.

It's also true that recycling, in a number of circumstances at least, is treating the consequence and not the cause. You can purchase an item that comes with lots of excess packaging and recycle that packaging (deal with consequence) whereas really the problem is that less packaging should have been used in the first place (deal with the cause). Secondly, packaging such as plastics could be replaced with another material (there are biodegradable "plastic" drinks glasses made from a cellulose-based material that are used at certain sporting events instead of plastic). So sometimes recycling can seem like a small gain and not really addressing the bigger problems of over consumption etc.

However, packaging, particularly metals, embody a large amount of energy from the energy cost of their original production, so recycling them does offer a significant energy saving.

[Dee18]

I believe firmly in the following order:
refuse-cut off junk mail, refuse leaflets being passed out, buy bulk instead of pre-packaged foods, don't buy something you will only use occasionally, etc
reuse-use something you already have, borrow it, or shop at the thrift store
reduce-make conscious choices-don't print it when you can read it online, have a smaller house to use fewer resources, avoid food waster by shopping carefully
recycle-I recently saw an interesting student film about how recycling creates jobs for low skilled workers while decreasing the need for landfills

[nereo]

I believe firmly in the following order:
refuse-cut off junk mail, refuse leaflets being passed out, buy bulk instead of pre-packaged foods, don't buy something you will only use occasionally, etc
reuse-use something you already have, borrow it, or shop at the thrift store
reduce-make conscious choices-don't print it when you can read it online, have a smaller house to use fewer resources, avoid food waster by shopping carefully
recycle-I recently saw an interesting student film about how recycling creates jobs for low skilled works while decreasing the need for landfills

+1

There's a reason that "recycle" is part of (and last in) the "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle" mantra.

[Northwestie]

There are some good life-cycle studies out there and they come to the same conclusion.

Only paper and cardboard have a marginal economic advantage -  all other cost money to recycle - plastics, metal, and yard waste.

And all of them have a larger carbon footprint than if you just took them to the dump and buried them.  There is no shortage of land space in the US for this.  Now there are other considerations - if we recycled all our plastic there would be less of it in the ocean, supposedly.   But from an environmental standpoint recycling is a feel-good exercise.  We think we are doing something useful, but not so much.

See the link within this link for a longer discussion:  http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/04/opinion/sunday/the-reign-of-recycling.html?_r=0

[Helvegen]

Good thoughts.
Something that kind of rubs me wrong is glass beer bottles.   Used to be that all glass beer and pop bottles were returnable, got cleaned, reused, re-labeled and refilled at the distributor.  Now they are thin glass, screw top and they all go in the trash or recycling.   I don't think much of this actually gets reprocessed, due to costs.  To me, this is one area where a whole bunch of landfill could be avoided.   Same with milk jugs, etc.  If you can't put liquids in returnable glass, put it in 100% recyclable steel or aluminum.

One of the big selling points for me to buying my milk and cream from a local dairy is that the bottles the milk and cream come in are reusable and subject to a hefty $2.00 deposit. No big deal just to rinse them out and take them back when I need more milk/cream.

[NoVa]

Aluminum takes an enormous amount of energy to create initially, very little to recycle/reuse. I am not sold on the plastics either, good to keep them out of the landfill, but I don't know that they are economically all that viable.

jfolsen

[Cranky]

Buy less stuff. Reuse the stuff you already have. Don't throw out stuff and replace it with new stuff.

But recycling is better than just dumping things in the landfill. Metal is obviously profitable, because the scrap guys pick up anything we leave at the curb. People pick up aluminum cans and sell them.

I see a lot of stuff made with recycled plastic. I think it's glass that is the iffiest.

That doesn't mean that recycling is somehow *bad*, but that it's better to buy less stuff.

[TomTX]

There are some good life-cycle studies out there and they come to the same conclusion.

Only paper and cardboard have a marginal economic advantage -  all other cost money to recycle - plastics, metal, and yard waste.

And all of them have a larger carbon footprint than if you just took them to the dump and buried them.  There is no shortage of land space in the US for this.  Now there are other considerations - if we recycled all our plastic there would be less of it in the ocean, supposedly.   But from an environmental standpoint recycling is a feel-good exercise.  We think we are doing something useful, but not so much.

See the link within this link for a longer discussion:  http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/04/opinion/sunday/the-reign-of-recycling.html?_r=0

If you're calling metal non-economic, either you misread the (paywalled) article or the author is seriously off the wall. Metals recycling usually subsidizes the rest of the program

[Northwestie]

There are some good life-cycle studies out there and they come to the same conclusion.

Only paper and cardboard have a marginal economic advantage -  all other cost money to recycle - plastics, metal, and yard waste.

And all of them have a larger carbon footprint than if you just took them to the dump and buried them.  There is no shortage of land space in the US for this.  Now there are other considerations - if we recycled all our plastic there would be less of it in the ocean, supposedly.   But from an environmental standpoint recycling is a feel-good exercise.  We think we are doing something useful, but not so much.

See the link within this link for a longer discussion:  http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/04/opinion/sunday/the-reign-of-recycling.html?_r=0

If you're calling metal non-economic, either you misread the (paywalled) article or the author is seriously off the wall. Metals recycling usually subsidizes the rest of the program

If you mean the life cycle costs of producing new metal vs. recycled metal you are correct.  But municipalities LOSE money in their recycling programs because of the cost of pickup and transportation, administration, and low price point the receivers are willing to pay.  Even for aluminum cans.   And then there is the attached carbon footprint of that transportation and collection.

[TomTX]

There are some good life-cycle studies out there and they come to the same conclusion.

Only paper and cardboard have a marginal economic advantage -  all other cost money to recycle - plastics, metal, and yard waste.

And all of them have a larger carbon footprint than if you just took them to the dump and buried them.  There is no shortage of land space in the US for this.  Now there are other considerations - if we recycled all our plastic there would be less of it in the ocean, supposedly.   But from an environmental standpoint recycling is a feel-good exercise.  We think we are doing something useful, but not so much.

See the link within this link for a longer discussion:  http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/04/opinion/sunday/the-reign-of-recycling.html?_r=0

If you're calling metal non-economic, either you misread the (paywalled) article or the author is seriously off the wall. Metals recycling usually subsidizes the rest of the program

If you mean the life cycle costs of producing new metal vs. recycled metal you are correct.  But municipalities LOSE money in their recycling programs because of the cost of pickup and transportation, administration, and low price point the receivers are willing to pay.  Even for aluminum cans.   And then there is the attached carbon footprint of that transportation and collection.

Sure, some municipalities lose money on their overall recycling program. Less when you account for the garbage disposal costs avoided.  And there is carbon footprint. But for the vast majority, the metals are profitable.

[GetItRight]

I suspect recycling is not economically viable on its own merit and may be a net increase in pollution and energy consumption. I'll exclude things like metal which obvious is economically viable as you can go anywhere and get paid for scrap (I have a scrap pile and take metal when it's worth a trip). Recycling the other things does reduce the landfill usage though, a real issue. I think it may make more sense for some things to sort and bury, creating future goldmines (so to speak) when recycling those materials is economically viable vs manufacturing new from raw materials. Much recycling is downstream, rather than like for like, so use is often limited. As for glass bottles and such as someone mentioned, I doubt there'll be a shortage of sand any time soon. Just one example where I suspect cost of recycling is higher than making new.

Regardless, I do recycle rather than trash what is offered to be easily recycled included in the cost of what the government already takes from me. I try to minimize volume of landfill and recyclable material I create, as I feel that has a greater environmental (and economic) benefit than worrying about recycling every last scrap.

[Choices]

I agree that reducing and reusing should come before recycling, but I do believe in recycling.

Does your city's sorting facility allow tours? Ours does, and it was incredibly informative.

[2buttons]

Wow. Pretty shocked at the responses.

So its clear to me that reduce and reusing are primary objectives and recycling has a spectrum of utility dependent upon the product. 

[nereo]

Wow. Pretty shocked at the responses.

So its clear to me that reduce and reusing are primary objectives and recycling has a spectrum of utility dependent upon the product.

...dependant on the product, your municipality, your location, and how you determine costs of mineral extraction vs. costs of recycling.

Conclusions on what makes economic sense in Trenton, NJ might not be the same as what makes sense in Hilo, Hawai'i.

[Cwadda]

Has anyone had any experience with opting out of credit card and insurance mail offers? I want to eliminate all of my physical junk mail.

There's a site here: https://www.optoutprescreen.com/?rf=t

[fishnfool]

All I know is that recycling saves my household  $20 a month because if we didn’t recycle we would need the larger trash cart which would double our garbage bill.

Other than that recycling is a money losing proposition. It does reduce the trash going into landfills but other than that it costs a lot to recycle most materials.

[Jack]

I suspect recycling is not economically viable on its own merit and may be a net increase in pollution and energy consumption. I'll exclude things like metal which obvious is economically viable as you can go anywhere and get paid for scrap (I have a scrap pile and take metal when it's worth a trip).

"I'll declare this thing to not be viable after excluding all the parts that make it viable."

ಠ_ಠ

C'mon now, that's just dishonest rhetoric. (Specifically, it is an intentional fallacy of composition.)

[bacchi]

Has anyone had any experience with opting out of credit card and insurance mail offers? I want to eliminate all of my physical junk mail.

There's a site here: https://www.optoutprescreen.com/?rf=t

Yes, it works very well. It makes it difficult to churn -- a targeted offer hasn't graced my mailbox since I opted out about 10 years ago.

[GuitarStv]

This question is like "Is it better to drink your coffee from a disposable foam cup every morning or buy and use the same mug everyday?"

Where the argument is that the cost to produce, transport, clean with soap and water daily, and eventual disposal results in the foam cup being the more "green" choice whether economically or based on environmental impact. 

Even if it all adds up, the intangible of not having 365 new foam cups in a landfill somewhere has to be worth something.

As a data point, my ceramic coffee mug typically is used for 3 fills per day, then gets a quick rinse with a small amount of water (hm... maybe 10-15% of mug volume?) Dishwasher once every 5-7 days.

As another data point, my glass coffee mug is used for three or four fills per day, and is never rinsed or washed.  I figure the hot water sterilizes the cup.

[Digital Dogma]

My county has a phony recycling program.   They have bins around town everyone dumps paper, cardboard, metals and glass into.   Everything goes into one container, not sorted and I am darned near sure it all just gets dumped in the landfill.  I think it's just a feel good thing having a recycling program going and probably opens the county up to get some grants, etc.?

Are you certain that everything is as it appears?

My city uses a truck that has dual containers inside, depending on which lever they pull the recyclables go into a recyclable bin, or a trash bin if they're problematic (food waste, oil, foil or plastic sheeting inside, etc). They pick up trash with the same truck. You can imagine what people were thinking when their sorted material and trash go down the same chute on pickup day - "Why am I bothering to segregate my trash when they all go to the same place?".

IMO its worth the added cost to recycle, dumping trash is no longer an option for sustainability purposes. Incinerating trash is a start, but we've got to come up with a better method of packaging and containing material if we're going to keep up a convenience and disposable technology society.

[GetItRight]

I suspect recycling is not economically viable on its own merit and may be a net increase in pollution and energy consumption. I'll exclude things like metal which obvious is economically viable as you can go anywhere and get paid for scrap (I have a scrap pile and take metal when it's worth a trip).

"I'll declare this thing to not be viable after excluding all the parts that make it viable."

ಠ_ಠ

C'mon now, that's just dishonest rhetoric. (Specifically, it is an intentional fallacy of composition.)

Let me rephrase: I suspect recycling everything that is commonly recycled, plastic being a prime example, is not economically viable...

Things that are economically viable to recycle, such as most metals (even with scrap prices way down) people will pay you for or at least pick up from you for free if the margin on it is small. I've never seen or heard anyone offering me money for plastic and glass, though I do pay the government to dispose of it for me, hence it's not economically viable.

I suspect some day it will be economically viable to recycle plastic at least, when oil prices are higher again and/or when better technology is developed to more cheaply and easily turn the plastic into something usable or better yet back into the same type of plastic to be molded into whatever new container. This is why I suggested a segregated landfill may be a good idea as recovery of plastics would be much cheaper and easier when it's packed more densely with little or no other material. It could be an investment in the future, though a bit of a gamble as to if or when that plot of landfill becomes relatively valuable.

[hybrid]

My county has a phony recycling program.   They have bins around town everyone dumps paper, cardboard, metals and glass into.   Everything goes into one container, not sorted and I am darned near sure it all just gets dumped in the landfill.  I think it's just a feel good thing having a recycling program going and probably opens the county up to get some grants, etc.?

Are you certain that everything is as it appears?

My city uses a truck that has dual containers inside, depending on which lever they pull the recyclables go into a recyclable bin, or a trash bin if they're problematic (food waste, oil, foil or plastic sheeting inside, etc). They pick up trash with the same truck. You can imagine what people were thinking when their sorted material and trash go down the same chute on pickup day - "Why am I bothering to segregate my trash when they all go to the same place?".

IMO its worth the added cost to recycle, dumping trash is no longer an option for sustainability purposes. Incinerating trash is a start, but we've got to come up with a better method of packaging and containing material if we're going to keep up a convenience and disposable technology society.

Our municipality does not require sorting, the recycling facility has special machines that are capable of the majority of that task. I have a 96 gallon rolling container and when my daughter brings hers over we typically have it filled by the time the once every two week pickup occurs.

[nereo]

I suspect recycling is not economically viable on its own merit and may be a net increase in pollution and energy consumption. I'll exclude things like metal which obvious is economically viable as you can go anywhere and get paid for scrap (I have a scrap pile and take metal when it's worth a trip).

"I'll declare this thing to not be viable after excluding all the parts that make it viable."

ಠ_ಠ

C'mon now, that's just dishonest rhetoric. (Specifically, it is an intentional fallacy of composition.)

Let me rephrase: I suspect recycling everything that is commonly recycled, plastic being a prime example, is not economically viable...

Things that are economically viable to recycle, such as most metals (even with scrap prices way down) people will pay you for or at least pick up from you for free if the margin on it is small. I've never seen or heard anyone offering me money for plastic and glass, though I do pay the government to dispose of it for me, hence it's not economically viable.

A big part of whether its economically viable is the cost you place on additional oil extraction (beyond the simple per-barrel price) and the cost you place on continued sequestration of plastics in a landfill.  And I'm not coming at this from a bleeding-heart environmentalist's standpoint; sometimes the energy required to recycle some materials outpaces the energy required to make new ones. But OTOH plastics will persist for hundreds of generations, getting more and more dangerous as they become smaller and smaller particles.

[GuitarStv]

I suspect recycling is not economically viable on its own merit and may be a net increase in pollution and energy consumption. I'll exclude things like metal which obvious is economically viable as you can go anywhere and get paid for scrap (I have a scrap pile and take metal when it's worth a trip).

"I'll declare this thing to not be viable after excluding all the parts that make it viable."

ಠ_ಠ

C'mon now, that's just dishonest rhetoric. (Specifically, it is an intentional fallacy of composition.)

Let me rephrase: I suspect recycling everything that is commonly recycled, plastic being a prime example, is not economically viable...

Things that are economically viable to recycle, such as most metals (even with scrap prices way down) people will pay you for or at least pick up from you for free if the margin on it is small. I've never seen or heard anyone offering me money for plastic and glass, though I do pay the government to dispose of it for me, hence it's not economically viable.

A big part of whether its economically viable is the cost you place on additional oil extraction (beyond the simple per-barrel price) and the cost you place on continued sequestration of plastics in a landfill.  And I'm not coming at this from a bleeding-heart environmentalist's standpoint; sometimes the energy required to recycle some materials outpaces the energy required to make new ones. But OTOH plastics will persist for hundreds of generations, getting more and more dangerous as they become smaller and smaller particles.

+1

It's quite costly to treat toxic waste too . . . but we've generally agreed that just dumping it in rivers is a bad idea.

[libertarian4321]

This question is like "Is it better to drink your coffee from a disposable foam cup every morning or buy and use the same mug everyday?"

Where the argument is that the cost to produce, transport, clean with soap and water daily, and eventual disposal results in the foam cup being the more "green" choice whether economically or based on environmental impact. 

Even if it all adds up, the intangible of not having 365 new foam cups in a landfill somewhere has to be worth something.

I assure you, swishing a little water in your cup at the end of the work day (you really don't need to soap it or scrub it) is a far better option both economically and environmentally than using 4 styrofoam cups (or even 1) every day.

Plus, of course, that landfill thing you mentioned is not good.

[arebelspy]

Wow. Pretty shocked at the responses.

So its clear to me that reduce and reusing are primary objectives and recycling has a spectrum of utility dependent upon the product.

Why would that shock you?  That seems obvious to me.  What did you think before?

[2buttons]

I honestly thought everyone was going to side with my wife on recycling everything, and I was going to get a lesson in being wrong.

[arebelspy]

I honestly thought everyone was going to side with my wife on recycling everything, and I was going to get a lesson in being wrong.

What, exactly, don't you want to do with recycling?

As you said, its usefulness depends on the product.  If they'll pay you to recycle it (e.g. soda cans), it's worth recycling (free)--i.e. it's not a net loss.  Stuff like paper?  Probably harming the environment to recycle it, rather than just bury it and plant new trees.

Go watch Penn and Teller's Bullshit episode on recycling.

All that being said, you should still mostly recycle, since the resources are being used anyways to gather the stuff that's worth it.   The recycling truck still drives by your house, so unless the program is stopped in your city, it's worth using since it's already a sunk cost, and at that point it's better to use it than have it go to waste.

In the end, your wife may not be doing it for the right reasons, scientifically, but is still doing the right action, IMO.

[MrRealEstate]

My city makes money from postconsumer plastics recycling. (I was surprised too.) Cardboard is also profitable to recycle.

Similar to all other commodities the costs fluctuate. When I was in HS and college I could make a few hundred dollars turning in scrap metal from my dad's business. Since then the price is 10-20% of what it used to be.

Also cardboard is an odd one. For 3/12 months the factory I work at lost money on cardboard recycling because the price per ton didn't cover our cost to have the containers picked up. We're working on converting to a cardboard baling system so we can hold our cardboard if we're going to lose money and let it go as long as it's a break even transaction.

[Emg03063]

You can be a recycling skeptic and still recycle.  If you have curbside collection, the only marginal cost you really need to consider is the cost of walking the extra foot (or whatever it is) from your trash bin to the recycling bin.  Unless you happen to weigh a couple of tons, the extra energy associated with that extra movement should be negligible.  You can argue that it's not worth the effort of the trucks and system, but since they're running anyway, it's not relevant to your actions unless you're planning to mount a campaign for their elimination, in which case it still probably makes sense to recycle in the meantime.  If you have to drive to a recycling depot, you can factor in the extra cost of your trip, less the extra cost of the additional volume of recyclables into the trash, but unless recycling is dramatically inconvenient to you, the efforts required to try to justify not doing it are pretty tortured.  At any rate, why should the burden of proof rest on a bunch of randos on the internet who know nothing about your personal recycling situation?  If you feel it's bad to recycle, why not make the case against it?

[arebelspy]

You can be a recycling skeptic and still recycle.  If you have curbside collection, the only marginal cost you really need to consider is the cost of walking the extra foot (or whatever it is) from your trash bin to the recycling bin.  Unless you happen to weigh a couple of tons, the extra energy associated with that extra movement should be negligible.  You can argue that it's not worth the effort of the trucks and system, but since they're running anyway, it's not relevant to your actions unless you're planning to mount a campaign for their elimination, in which case it still probably makes sense to recycle in the meantime.

This is what I was trying to say in the last two paragraphs of my previous post (three posts up), this was just said much more elegantly than I was able to.  :)

[2buttons]

It's not a ton, but it takes time to wash, separate, and deal with dragging different barrels/containers down the drive way and back. Additionally, while water is cheap, I am having to rinse out bottles and cans.

All of these have a cost associated rather than just pitching it all in one barrel, and skeptical that roi is worth it both personally and in the commons.

[ikonomore]

I just read this article from Forbes.  Basically says they make money from most material but glass costs them money.  They love aluminum.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/2016/09/14/rethinking-recycling-with-waste-management-ceo-david-steiner/#85990ba67aed

[2buttons]

It's not a ton, but it takes time to wash, separate, and deal with dragging different barrels/containers down the drive way and back. Additionally, while water is cheap, I am having to rinse out bottles and cans.

All of these have a cost associated rather than just pitching it all in one barrel, and skeptical that roi is worth it both personally and in the commons.

This seems like a really negative attitude to me - I feel that if you are choosing to buy these things and bring them into your home, you have a responsibility to dispose of them in the most ethical way available to you. Again, I would personally avoid bringing them home in the first place if possible.

I'm not sure how it's negative. It's basic economics. There is a cost associated with everything. The real question is would I pay more in taxes for a landfill if I didn't recycle, because other than judgement from this board and friends and family the cost to pitch everything is 0.

Is it the most ethical way? That's my whole point. I'm not sure that it is. what if you are burning more energy than it's worth to recycle?

Sorry, but I tend to question social norms. I think people go along to get along too often and don't question status quo. 

[2buttons]

I just read this article from Forbes.  Basically says they make money from most material but glass costs them money.  They love aluminum.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/2016/09/14/rethinking-recycling-with-waste-management-ceo-david-steiner/#85990ba67aed

Fascinating. It's big biz.

[2buttons]

What if recycling does more long term environmental or social damage through the byproducts of recycling than not recycling?

I am not saying I am walking through Walmart being a hyper consumer and burning styrofoam while slugging back a big gulp, I am saying I am not convinced it's worth it, and i don't seem to be alone, even among environmentalists.

[2buttons]

Right. If I am following correctly, You believe even if flawed still better than not. I am more in the camp of is it worth it in the first place.

[Cranky]

I honestly thought everyone was going to side with my wife on recycling everything, and I was going to get a lesson in being wrong.

No, I do think you should recycle everything. You should just buy less stuff *first*, and then you'll have less stuff to recycle, or toss into the trash.

Recycling is the easiest thing ever. Most things that need rinsed out just go into the dishwasher along with the dinner dishes. It's no harder to put stuff into the recycling bin than it is to put it in the trash bin.

(I do stall about hauling the compost out when it's really cold, I admit.)

[TomTX]

I honestly thought everyone was going to side with my wife on recycling everything, and I was going to get a lesson in being wrong.

No, I do think you should recycle everything. You should just buy less stuff *first*, and then you'll have less stuff to recycle, or toss into the trash.

Recycling is the easiest thing ever. Most things that need rinsed out just go into the dishwasher along with the dinner dishes. It's no harder to put stuff into the recycling bin than it is to put it in the trash bin.

(I do stall about hauling the compost out when it's really cold, I admit.)

Don't forget re-use!

We've been using the same set of Gatorade G2 bottles every day literally for years for bottling our home-made tea. Obtained free from a friend who drinks the stuff ;)

We drink a lot of unsweetened tea, and bottled drinks are convenient. Making and bottling ourselves is very cheap.

[2buttons]

I honestly thought everyone was going to side with my wife on recycling everything, and I was going to get a lesson in being wrong.

No, I do think you should recycle everything. You should just buy less stuff *first*, and then you'll have less stuff to recycle, or toss into the trash.

Recycling is the easiest thing ever. Most things that need rinsed out just go into the dishwasher along with the dinner dishes. It's no harder to put stuff into the recycling bin than it is to put it in the trash bin.

(I do stall about hauling the compost out when it's really cold, I admit.)

You put recyclables in the dishwasher?

[Mr Dorothy Dollar]

Right. If I am following correctly, You believe even if flawed still better than not. I am more in the camp of is it worth it in the first place.

Your cost here is moving your hand to a position over a different bin. Yes, recycling is not perfect, but this cost that you talk about is practically nothing for you. We are to convince you to conform not that the whole system is perfect. As to recycling further driving consumption, you are on MMM. I doubt recycling drives your consumption as you are on MMM. Threfore, you should recycle because it involves minimal effort and will not affect your consumerism because you are MMM.