Five things you need to know about recycling

This article was first published in the Skaha Matters Newsletter.

 
1. Those little recycling icons on plastic do not mean that the plastic can be recycled. When plastic recycling started, the first hurdle was to know what KIND of plastic it was. To this day, number seven is a catch-all for non-recyclable plastic.

2. There is no such thing as “standard recycling”, there is only “local recycling”. The answer to the question “Is this X recyclable?” is another question “Where are you collecting X?”. Each city weighs the costs and benefits of adding another category to what they recycle. If you live near a port city with container shipping you have low transportation costs=more recycling. If you are a large city producing reliable amounts of HDPE plastic you can find buyers ($300/ton). If you are small city with half a ton to get rid of, you would be lucky to find someone to take it off your hands without charging you.

3. Recycling costs money rather than makes money. We think since aluminum and cardboard are worth money, the city should make money from recycling. As of June 2018, aluminium cans were worth $800/ton and cardboard was worth $120/ton and most places pay money to ensure their plastic gets recycled. These markets fluctuate, so you can’t count on aluminium paying for plastic. Add transportation costs and labor and you realize that recycling is a commitment to the environment which is paid for out of tax dollars.

4. You should strive to get a “B” grade. Think of the items that can be recycled in your area. That’s 100%. Your goal should be to recycle 80%. Why? Adding even a tiny amount of extra items (“this looks like metal”, “there’s no reason to throw caps away”, “bags are plastic too”) contaminates the load. There is a special name for a load that contains 105% of what’s locally recyclable. It’s called “garbage”. Either the entire load goes to the landfill, or someone making $15/hour has to remove each not-recyclable-here item. High achievers in recycling aren’t doing their city or their planet any favors.

5. Upcycling can be cool, it can be art, it can be fashion, but it doesn’t help the environment. The basic problem is scale -- we drink thousands of juice pouches every year, but we don’t need more than one really cool purse made of juice boxes. The problem of too much stuff overwhelms the value of turning stuff into items that are to be treasured.


Articles on Teaspoon Energy by Kristy Dyer is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License You can reprint it for free, as-is.