zerograv – mar 2019 – there be no recycling here

My blog averages around 10 readers a month, however last month’s article (see ‘there be no shortcuts here‘) had ~40 unique readers, and so I am reusing the catchy title this month in an attempt to generate similar results.  Haha hey this is already off to a good start, coincidentally threw in the word ‘reusing’, and that is what this month’s topic is all about – Reduce, reuse, recycle.

I happened to catch a world news special report earlier in the year, it was all about recycling and global impact, and it really caught my attention.  Apparently a ton of trash/junk/waste (or many hundreds of thousands of metrics tons to be literal) is not actually processed by the recycling companies here who collect and sort it.  Rather it is shipped off to foreign countries, mostly in Asia, where often times it just piles up into heaps of debris and pollutes local rivers, festers for years at a time, or creates massive rings of plastic floating in the ocean.  The pictures shown in the news report were astounding, literally just mounds of garbage (and ‘recyclables’) piled up.  In other words, there is no recycling actually going on.

On top of that (and one of the drivers for the report) is the fact that China is no longer accepting imported scrap (i.e. trash), which has left the US scrambling to figure out alternatives.

Take a step back, in the USA we have the EPA on a federal level which among many of its responsibilities sets standards for the handling of waste, hazardous materials, and promotes recycling programs.  Then on a state or town level our communities each have their own trash removal and recycling services.  All great stuff – I personally feel very good about always separating the trash from recyclables (blue bin and green bin), and making sure as much as possible gets into that recycling bin.  I know many other folks feel the same way as displayed by the success and year-over-year improvements in recycling programs across the country.

Now to think all of this is for naught, that recycled waste is being sent overseas or dumped into the ocean rather than being processed locally, is very dismaying.  I am not well-informed enough to point fingers however here are a few things I would question:

• For the US companies outsourcing the processing of recycled materials and/or trash to foreign countries, have they actually audited those recycling sites and held them accountable to strict standards of performance?  Outsourcing does not mean the customer looks the other way.
• And vice versa, the service provider should not say they are going to do something and then not have the infrastructure in place or the intent to make it happen.
• Just because something makes economical sense, does not mean an organization should automatically do it.  It is more important to consider the environment, people’s health, and overall quality best practices.  Yes, doing the right thing often does cost more upfront, however it will save a lot of headaches and unforeseen issues in the long-run.  Quality over quantity.
• Who is holding who accountable in this major global issue.  Anyone?  Has the issue become too complex for the government to put the right fixes in place?
• As consumerism grows in the US (see my amazon, whatever article), the amount of packaging being produced, recycled/trashed, has grown exponentially, which only makes the lack of actual recycling that much more dire.

I really don’t have much knowledge in this space, so please feel free to leave a comment if I am missing or overlooking anything big.  I want to learn more here and be part of the solution.

A few other related items:  I went food shopping tonight and had everything double-bagged in plastic.  And I had two iced coffees today both in plastic cups.  And I ordered some household items from amazon earlier this afternoon.  So by my own actions I am actually part of the problem…

And yet, this fanciful item called ‘plastic’ seems to be a common theme…

There be no recycling here, just trash and waste everywhere.

– zero –