Progess Report on Recycling

According to the Environmental Protection Agency:

In 2007, U.S. residents, businesses, and institutions produced more than 254 million tons of MSW, which is approximately 4.6 pounds of waste per person per day.

Currently, in the United States, 33.4 percent is recovered and recycled or composted, 12.6 percent is burned at combustion facilities, and the remaining 54 percent is disposed of in landfills.

Recycling, including composting, diverted 85 million tons of material away from disposal in 2007, up from 15 million tons in 1980, when the recycle rate was just 10% and 90% of MSW was being combusted with energy recovery or disposed of by landfilling.

Typical materials that are recycled include batteries, recycled at a rate of 99%, paper and paperboard at 55%, and yard trimmings at 64%.

So the good news is that the recycling rate increased from 10% to 33% from 1980 to 2007, up from 28% in 2005.

The bad news is that more than half of the solid waste the United States produces still ends up in landfills. And we're consuming, ie producing more waste, than ever before. Even with more of us recycling, the amount of garbage we create continues to grow: in 1980 we put 135 tons of waste into landfills; in 2007, we put 169 tons of waste into landfills.

We can do better. We must do better.

PCs Left On Cost $2.8 Billion A Year

I used to leave my computer home when I left the office at the end of the day, so that it could be backed up. Not now. How could I after reading this?

U.S. organizations squander $2.8 billion a year to power unused machines, emitting about 20 million tons of carbon dioxide — roughly the equivalent of 4 million cars — according to a report to be released Wednesday.

About half of 108 million office PCs in the USA are not properly shut down at night, says the 2009 PC Energy Report, produced by 1E, an energy-management software company, and the non-profit Alliance to Save Energy. The report analyzed workplace PC power consumption in the USA, United Kingdom and Germany.

Recycling Styrofoam Packing Peanuts

I've been saving styrofoam packing peanuts for a few years now. I was tired of looking at the bags of the stuff in my truck, but couldn't bring myself to throw them away, knowing how bad stryofoam is for the environment. Since I don't send many packages that require packing, I wasn't sure what I'd do with them, until today.

EcoFindeRRR, a web tool created by SFEnvironment, a department of the City & County of San Francisco, allows you to search by zip code and find places to recycle everything from appliances to pesticides, and yes, styrofoam packing peanuts. I recycled mine at the Packaging Store.

If you don't live in San Francisco, you can recycle your styrofoam packing peanuts at one of over 1,500 Peanut Hotline collection sites in the US.

Reduce and Reuse

It looks like recycling has hit a major glitch: too much supply is chasing too little demand. This story from Sunday's New York Times ("Back at Junk Value, Recyclables Are Piling Up") reinforces the importance of reducing and reusing waste at the source.

The economic downturn has decimated the market for recycled materials like cardboard, plastic, newspaper and metals. Across the country, this junk is accumulating by the ton in the yards and warehouses of recycling contractors, which are unable to find buyers or are unwilling to sell at rock-bottom prices.

On the West Coast, for example, mixed paper is selling for $20 to $25 a ton, down from $105 in October, according to Official Board Markets, a newsletter that tracks paper prices. And recyclers say tin is worth about $5 a ton, down from $327 earlier this year. There is greater domestic demand for glass, so its price has not fallen as much.

...the economics, while they have soured, still favor recycling over landfills.

In New York City, for instance, the city is getting paid $10 for a ton of paper, down from $50 or more before October, but it has no plans to cease recycling, said Robert Lange, the city’s recycling director. In Boston, one of the hardest-hit markets, prices are down to $5 a ton, and the city expects it will soon have to pay to unload its paper. But city officials said that would still be better than paying $80 a ton to put it in a landfill.

Top Cars for Fuel Efficiency

Popular Mechanics profiles the "5 Top Retro Eco-Supercars: Best Fuel Sippers of the Past 34 Years." It says a lot about the auto industry and consumer behavior that most of these cars weren't made recently. The car companies can do better and car consumers should demand more from them.


"Original Champ, Still Contending"

Human-powered Car

This sure beats the car that Fred Flintstone had.

"Meat: Making Global Warming Worse"

Bryan Walsh writes for TIME Magazine:

"Give up meat for one day [per week] at least initially, and decrease it from there," Rajendra Pachauri told Britain's Observer newspaper. "In terms of immediacy of action and the feasibility of bringing about reductions in a short period of time, it clearly is the most attractive opportunity."


By the numbers, Pachauri is absolutely right. In a 2006 report, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) concluded that worldwide livestock farming generates 18% of the planet's greenhouse gas emissions — by comparison, all the world's cars, trains, planes and boats account for a combined 13% of greenhouse gas emissions. Much of livestock's contribution to global warming come from deforestation, as the growing demand for meat results in trees being cut down to make space for pasture or farmland to grow animal feed.

I'm pretty sure that I already have days when I don't eat meat, but its not a habit. Starting his week, I'm going to take Pachauri's advice and make Fridays meat-free. If this goes well, I will make other days meat-free.

What about you? Do you eat meat? If so, do you eat meat every day? I'd like to get your thoughts in the Comments section.

Kamikatsu, Zero-Waste Town of the Future

From The Guardian (UK):

Five years ago Kamikatsu, in south-western Japan, embarked on an ambitious environmental campaign that, if successful, could become a model for the rest of the country, and beyond. By 2020, the village’s 2,000 residents aim to eliminate the use of landfills and incinerators, and instead recycle or reuse every single item of household waste. The Guardian recently spent a day following the unlikely eco-warriors of Japan’s zero-waste village.

A $100 Cup of Coffee

This morning I stopped by my favorite coffee and donut shop in the Mission, owned by a friendly Vietnamese couple in their 50s. Or maybe they are Thai or Burmese, I can't be sure. Anyway, their coffee isn't particularly good, but the price is right, parking is usually easy to find, and they throw in a few free donut holes with every donut.

This morning I noticed that they had replaced their styrofoam coffee cups with paper ones. I made a point of mentioning to the woman, "Hey, great new cups!"

She then told me that the City of San Francisco fined them $100 for using styrofoam and that if they were caught again, the fine would be $500.

The ban on styrofoam has been in effect for over a year now, so she couldn't plead ignorance. "That's too bad," I said. "But paper cups are better than styrofoam."

"Very expensive," she said. Ok, maybe she decided that she wasn't likely to get caught, and that the savings for styrofoam were worth the risk.

"Well, why not raise your coffee price by $.05 to cover your costs?" I asked.

She laughed and then pulled out a big bag of styrofoam cups from underneath the counter. "One thousand of these cups cost $15. One thousand of those paper cups cost $50. Very expensive. Next time the fine will be $500."

I tried to reassure her that paper was better than styrofoam, and suggested that she might even want to put her business name on them.

"Yeah, [business name here]" she laughed. Right, I thought. If spending an extra three and a half cents per cup was 'very expensive,' no way was she ever going to spend money on custom printed cups.

Now I suspect that green-bashers might point to a story like mine and say, "This just proves that San Francisco isn't a business-friendly town. They put environmentalism over small business owners." Except they would probably be less civil in their language.

My response would be, how much does a styrofoam cup really cost? Sure, its cheaper than paper, but what are the externalities of styrofoam production, styrofoam consumption and styrofoam disposal? I bet its more than $.035 per cup.

The problem with pro-business, anti-environmentalist types is that they fail to consider, let alone measure, externalities. If we want to measure the true cost of something like a coffee cup, how can we ignore them?

Recycle Old CDs and DVDs

I've been collecting old damaged CDs and CD-R coasters for years now, thinking that I might one day be inspired and motivated to build something with them.



Now I've learned that CDs and DVDs can be recycled, which is a good thing since they're made of chemicals and metals that have no business being in a landfill, e.g. "aluminum, gold, silver and nickel with petroleum-derived plastics, lacquers and dyes."

To learn how to recycle your CDs and DVDs, visit Earth 911. You might also consider using the GreenDisk Technotrash Can service. The company will handle up to 20 pounds for about $7.

I haven't given up on my CD project just yet, but its good to know that I'll have something to do with my box of CD-R coasters in case I do.

Driving and Eating

Over 40 percent of greenhouse gas emissions -- 43 percent to be exact -- come from two things that most Americans do on a daily basis: driving (25%) and eating meat (18%).

Think about this the next time you head towards the drive-thru: if "we all skipped meat one day a week, it would be like taking 8 million cars off the road."