Waste to Wealth

If you read accounts of recycling in the mass media, you may be convinced that recycling is on its deathbed after a 45-year run. Reality is more complex and more encouraging. Recycling is not dying. The recycling movement born in the late 1960s and joined by the anti-garbage incineration movement in the late 1970s has captured the hearts and minds of the U.S. public and it is not losing ground. What is challenging is the recycling model offered by consolidated garbage hauling companies. Actual recycling is about to get a big stimulus from the recent restrictions on exporting materials to China. Recycling is reacting to a crisis that is not of its own making but for which it has solutions.… Read More

For recycling to break through the 35 percent recycling level, where we have stagnated for a decade, private and municipal investments need to focus on infrastructure that has a proven track record. These include investment in dual stream and properly scaled single stream processing, distributed composting, unit pricing and repair and reuse infrastructures.… Read More