Is recycling what it's made out to be?
Good thing or feel good thing? It's complicated.
Today’s Science Friday video and podcast focused on recycling. It was a reader request from my old friend Stephen Talleur, who asked if recycling was really better than just taking things to a landfill. It’s an interesting question, and the answer is that it’s complicated.
Science Friday is for paid subscribers, but since this is an important issue, I wanted to just run down my conclusions for everyone else. They are:
A big problem with recycling is that most people are not great at doing it. That makes mechanical sorting a necessity.
There are few uniform standards for what may and may not be recycled across the country.
Paper (to a point), glass, and metals are easily recyclable. Most plastics are not. This is a common recycling error. Plastics are not really made to be recycled. The ones that can be recycled are degraded after recycling, which limits their use. There are markets for some recycled plastics.
Many items that are placed in recycle bins end up in landfills or incinerators anyway, often after being transported long distances to third-world countries.
The transportation of recyclables is an issue. In the best scenarios, it’s more than a trip to a landfill; in the worst, it’s a lot more.
Waste management is a sketchy industry. It’s very difficult to make money doing things the right way.
The best form of recycling is to simply consume less.
So the answer to Steve’s question is that it depends. For some items, recycling works great; for others, not so much. It also depends on where you live. In the fullness of time, I think that we’ll get better at recycling, but for now, it’s a decidedly mixed bag.
For more, check out today’s Science Friday.
Associated Press and Idaho Press Club-winning columnist Martin Hackworth of Pocatello is a physicist, writer, and retired Idaho State University faculty member who now spends his time with family, riding bicycles and motorcycles, and arranging and playing music. Follow him on Twitter @MartinHackworth and on Substack at martinhackworthsubstack.com
Been in the waste/recycling business most of my career. Installed systems like the one in the picture that can sort and process varieties of materials. Early on recycling was mandated in many locales, before there was any demand, so pretty soon there was a large supply, and no one wanted the product generated. A lot of recycling went to the landfill and likely still does. Cardboard is an exception, and the plastic grocery bags that are now being outlawed were heavily recycled and used for Trex lumber. Today most municipalities still mandate recycling, which is paid for by residents/customers. Steel and metals are likely the highest value recyclables, and have been for years without any mandate, as there is strong demand. Great article!
Economics suggests that recycling doesn’t make much sense in a world that is not experiencing scarcity. If recycling made economic sense, the average person would not have to be forced by government action to recycle. In reality, recycling makes so little economic sense that almost all recycling ends up in land fills or shipped to china.