Day 7 of 20: Garbage 101

A colleague of mine recently contacted our local waste management company to ask whether certain items are recyclable since the company's recycling flyer wasn't clear. His goal is to label trash cans and recycling bins with pictures so that people will recycle more of their waste when appropriate. 

The items he asked about included:
· Waxed hot cups
· Waxed cold cups
· Drinking straws
· Paper napkins (clean/used)
· Paper towels (clean/used)
· Empty sugar packets
· Empty single serving creamers
· Plastic utensils (clean/used)
· Sugar Cane Pulp tableware (clean/used)
· Birch stir sticks
· Plastic bags/films
 
The company's response?  All items listed in your email below will go with normal trash collection.

Trash collection is "normal".  When did that become the case?  

The Association of Science-Technology Centers Inc. and the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service created a fascinating Garbage Timeline.  

From the Garbage Timeline

Did you know that newspapers were once printed on rags? That packaging was originally created to prevent theft? That paper towels were accidentally created by "an unexpectedly thick run of toilet paper"? Or that polystyrene - remember from our plastic forks - was created in 1930?  

The Garbage Timeline suggests that in the U.S., garbage collection became a regular practice for four out of five cities surveyed by M.I.T. near the turn of the 20th century. Waste management is beneficial because it prevents the spread of disease. In 1889, however, garbage dump sites were already problematic (according to the Health Officer's report in Washington, D.C.): 

"Appropriate places for [refuse] are becoming scarcer year by year, and the question as to some other method of disposal...must soon confront us. Already the inhabitants in proximity to the public dumps are beginning to complain."

 
The Garbage Timeline also highlights the dawn of compulsory recycling: Rhode Island was the first state to enact it in 1986. Within four years, 26 other U.S. States had followed suit. 

Today, however, our recycling lulls us into a false sense of environmental sustainability. For example, according to the Earth911 site, only 25% of glass is recycled or down-cycled.  Worse, only 9% of plastic is recycled, according to an Environmental Protection Agency report in 2012. The rest goes to landfill.

So what does this mean?  

You're probably familiar with the motto - Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.  

Retrieved from the U.S. Department of Commerce Blog

Notice that "recycle" is listed third. Reducing consumption, then reusing what we do consume, are supposed to come before throwing stuff into the recycling bin and calling ourselves 'green'. 

How does that work though?  Stuff today is not made to last like it once was. Planned obsolescence is partly what hooks us.  

"Our economy is such that we cannot 'afford' to take care of things: labor is expensive, time is expensive, money is expensive, but materials - the stuff of creation - are so cheap that we cannot afford to take care of them."  -Wendell Berry (1991)

Here are some of the things I've done:

Reduce: Discern between needs and wants. This is also money-saving because it reduces instances of "impulse buying". The Discussion Course on Voluntary Simplicity is something you can do with a group of friends or family. The Natural Step course may also be available near you. I've done both, and have learned a lot while meeting interesting and knowledgeable people along the way. 

Reuse: I've often been able to find what I need at garage and moving sales and second-hand stores. For 10+ years, I've also attended and hosted "clothing swap parties" where I've gotten some of my favorite articles of clothing from other people's 'donation bag'. (After the party, everything not chosen is still donated to non-profit clothing resale stores.) Another method is finding things that are free. For example, I found my dining room table on the curb. Someone had thrown it out, despite that it was in good shape. It needed to be refinished, but it's sturdy and the perfect size.  

Recycle: Finding out what's recyclable is critical to recycling well. I didn't know until just now, for example, that pizza boxes can often be recycled where I live. My municipality suggests recycling the clean portion of pizza boxes and tossing the parts with grease and food.  This is good news, since I really like my local pizza shop and am not so sure that any pizza I'd make from scratch would be as good.  Also, sometimes there are drop-off sites for difficult-to-recycle items. I can't put styrofoam in my recycling bin, but if I have to use it, there is a place I can take it to be recycled.

If you've made it this far and are hungry for more, here's the 1965 Solid Waste Disposal Act, amended in 2002.

Happy reading.