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Recycling in America

economist.com

11–20 of 77 posts

Re: Recycling in America

#11
post #6

"Most recycled materials should be cheaper than virgin commodities" Surprisingly this just isn't true. It takes a lot of work and chemicals to clean inks and glues out of paper for recycling. Penn & Teller looked into this in an episode of Bullshit! a while back - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rExEVZlQia4 Aluminum and clear glass are very efficient to recycle, plastics and colored glass depend on commodity prices,…

I would believe it. If the problem really is a supply/demand imbalance, the market should correct it. But nobody will pay me for my used plastic bottles.

Re: Recycling in America

#12

Will never forget how I (German) walked into a Safeway in San Francisco with my bag full of bottles and asked the cashier where the deposit-machine is. She had absolutely no clue what I was talking about.

They just have a weird implementation of the redemption: http://www.calrecycle.ca.gov/BevContainer/Recyclers/Director... (I see California on all the returnables from my state (which requires stores accept any that they sell), so I wondered what you were talking about)

[deleted]

Re: Recycling in America

#13

America is way behind from living overseas for 3 years. I have to pay extra to recycle, which I do not think is correct. Should be more like some areas in Germany where you pay for the amount of trash you have(weight), the more you throw away the more you pay -> encourages recycling! I also work for a brewery and it is sad that none will re-use bottles in the united states, all beer goes into brand new bottles :(

>I have to pay extra to recycle, which I do not think is correct. what. Who's charging you? Local government?

In my city, trash service is handled by private companies. I currently pay +$15/quarter for a cart for recyclables.

Re: Recycling in America

#14

Will never forget how I (German) walked into a Safeway in San Francisco with my bag full of bottles and asked the cashier where the deposit-machine is. She had absolutely no clue what I was talking about.

East Coast has reverse vending machines (bottle deposit machines) to put the bottles in. It reads the barcode - at least all places I've even lived in the East have them. When I was in California visiting family we had to go to a recycling center to get them weighed. The policies are regional.

I like California's policy so much better cause I buy a lot of beer that gets rejected in the reverse vending machines.

Re: Recycling in America

#15
post #7

Will never forget how I (German) walked into a Safeway in San Francisco with my bag full of bottles and asked the cashier where the deposit-machine is. She had absolutely no clue what I was talking about.

New York has those bottle in/ cash out machines. If you have a bottle that the store doesn't sell it would reject it. Recycling is very regional. Some states don't have bottle deposits. Where I live now, they gave up on the rules that nobody followed (plastic # types in particular) and have "single stream" where everything that might be recyclable goes to one plant and is sorted by machines/people. I remember having…

Haha you are absolutely right about the bag thing. Also people behind the cashier putting your stuff into bags was new to me (and convenient).

Re: Recycling in America

#16
post #7

Will never forget how I (German) walked into a Safeway in San Francisco with my bag full of bottles and asked the cashier where the deposit-machine is. She had absolutely no clue what I was talking about.

New York has those bottle in/ cash out machines. If you have a bottle that the store doesn't sell it would reject it. Recycling is very regional. Some states don't have bottle deposits. Where I live now, they gave up on the rules that nobody followed (plastic # types in particular) and have "single stream" where everything that might be recyclable goes to one plant and is sorted by machines/people. I remember having…

The majority of states lack bottle deposits, unfortunately. If more states added bottle deposit rates of 5 or 10 cents then their recycling rates would increase[1].

[1] http://www.bottlebill.org/about/benefits/waste.htm

Re: Recycling in America

#17

Will never forget how I (German) walked into a Safeway in San Francisco with my bag full of bottles and asked the cashier where the deposit-machine is. She had absolutely no clue what I was talking about.

If you were actually at the safeway in sf then the answer is that the bottle machine is in the parking lot. The one with the big queue of hobos and crazy people.

Re: Recycling in America

#18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I have to pay extra to recycle, which I do not think is correct. what. Who's charging you? Local government?

In many municipalities, they contract trash and recycling collection out to private companies. Many times those companies charge separately for recycling collection.

The joys of privatisation.

Re: Recycling in America

#19

America is way behind from living overseas for 3 years. I have to pay extra to recycle, which I do not think is correct. Should be more like some areas in Germany where you pay for the amount of trash you have(weight), the more you throw away the more you pay -> encourages recycling! I also work for a brewery and it is sad that none will re-use bottles in the united states, all beer goes into brand new bottles :(

Yep. This happened in St. Louis county a few years ago. They gave all contracts to one company "to reduce costs" and made the payment mandatory for recycling whether you used it or not.

I was forced to pay people to take my recycling, which I never had any of because I take it to the recycling center and get around 35-40 cents a pound.

Re: Recycling in America

#20
This is the money quote: Coca-Cola committed to using at least 25% recycled plastic in its containers by 2015, but revised this downwards owing to scarce supply and high costs.

There is no financial incentive to use recycled goods. They cost more than 'fresh' goods, they require additional processing, they add risk from material contamination (not biologic, structural and chemical). There are a dozen different reasons for this but much of the blame can be laid at the feet of the amazingly interlinked municipal waste management structure.

Here is a situation where you could hire anyone from students, to sex-offender ex-Cons, to the mentally impaired to work at a recycling plant pre-processing material for effective recycling, thus providing jobs for anyone willing to work. They get paid and perhaps feel good about helping the environment, and the supply of recycled material goes up and helps push the price down on the spot market.

Financially you are going to lose taxpayer money running those plants because it is cheaper to make this stuff fresh, but its perhaps a better investment than other assistance programs.

[1] http://www.sec.gov/news/headlines/wastemgmt6.htm

[2] http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/22/us/mayor-and-trash-hauling...

[3] "Landfill company sued over bribery case" http://www.wwltv.com/story/news/2014/08/29/14405720/

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