Why plastic is still ‘the last frontier’ of recycling

The Guardian has a great article up about Mike Biddle, former CEO of MBA Polymers and one of the pioneers of plastic recycling. It covers some of the persistent problems with plastics and emerging solutions in electronic waste recycling as well.

This month, Mike Biddle, the founder and longtime CEO of a pioneering plastics-recycling company called MBA Polymers, stepped down as an executive at the firm, ending more than two decades of unrelenting effort to reduce plastic waste.

Plastics, he says, remains “the last frontier of recycling.”

MBA Polymers operates recycling plants across the world that collectively reclaim over 300 million pounds of plastics each year. However, none are in the US. Our policies just haven’t caught up to the recycling market.

Biddle is disappointed that he has been unable to take the company further. He estimates that as much as 500 billion pounds of plastics are thrown away every year, only a tiny fraction of which is captured by MBA Polymers. He’s especially frustrated that the company isn’t operating in the US, the country that educated him and provided the seed money for his research.

Why can’t the company gain traction in the US? Building plants to reprocess plastics is expensive, and MBA Polymers cannot be sure it will get a large enough – and secure enough – supply of US plastic waste to justify the capital cost.

One way to secure a more predictable supply of e-waste would be to place some of the burden of collecting it on manufacturers. That’s what the EU has done. Its “extended producer responsibility” laws, which require electronics to be collected and recycled, have created a robust collection system for used cell phones, tablets, computers and other e-waste. “They primed the pump with policy,” Biddle says.

In the US, Texas and 22 other states have passed similar laws for electronic waste. We’re making progress – in fact, manufacturers collected 38 million pounds of e-waste in Texas alone last year. (Other states with stronger versions of this law are collecting far more, so we can definitely do more here.) But for plastics and packaging, we’re still way behind the curve.

Read the full article here, it’s worth a look.

Going Green this Holiday? Check “Naughty List” for Batteries

With electronic devices topping the list of Holiday gift ideas for the umpteenth year in a row, battery sales are at their peak and many “green” buyers are wondering, which brand is best for the planet?

The familiar label, “Batteries Not Included” translates to the average buyer as, “Grab the cheapest pack of batteries that fit,” but a number of considerations do impact the environment, and some brands do a better job than others to ensure that their products will not end up in landfills.

Any device that uses AA or AAA batteries – some digital cameras, gaming accessories, and remote controls – can use either a rechargeable or single-use battery. Which is better for the environment? For a number of reasons, rechargeable batteries hold the green advantage. First, an obvious benefit is that you’ll use them over and over – almost anything that is designed to be used just once and then thrown “away” is going to be bad for the planet. Next, when those rechargeable batteries finally do stop working, there are recycling programs available to keep them out of landfills. Many retailers such as Best Buy, Home Depot and Staples will take them back for recycling. This is possible because of their partnership with battery manufacturers, who actually foot the bill for rechargeable battery recycling to save local taxpayers money. Rechargeable batteries do contain more toxic materials –such as cadmium or lithium—  than their single-use counterparts, so it’s extremely important to recycle them responsibly.

Call 2 Recycle accepts rechargeable batteries for recycling funded by the Rechargeable Battery Recycling Corporation

Single-use, or “disposable” batteries no longer contain the most toxic materials, but they do contain recyclable metals, zinc and alkaline. Because there is no widespread, convenient recycling program in the U.S., single-use batteries are wasted into the landfills by the billions each year. These metals can still be hazardous when they leach into underground water sources, and all this waste costs ratepayers millions of dollars. Although single-use batteries can be recycled, battery manufacturers have not yet established the same kind of recycling program they have in place for rechargeable batteries. This is mainly due to just one company: Rayovac.

In 2011, companies such as Energizer, Duracell and Panasonic agreed to form an initiative to fund single-use battery recycling. But Rayovac withdrew and brought the efforts to a halt. The “Corporation for Battery Recycling” or CBR would have provided the same convenient recycling for single-use batteries that now exists for rechargeables, if Rayovac had not pulled out. Here in the U.S., Rayovac claims that throwing batteries in the trash to be landfilled or incinerated poses no threat to the environment. In Europe and Canada, however, Rayovac does participate in manufacturer-based recycling and hypocritically boasts its eco-consciousness. Holiday shoppers in those other countries don’t have to worry about what to do with their batteries. Bah humbug.

This holiday season, if you are shopping for gadgets, do the environment a favor and remember: “Rayovac – Recycling Not Included.”

Social media meme created by Texas Campaign for the Environment.

Please, take a moment to let Rayovac’s CEO know that you are keeping their environmental record in mind when shopping for batteries this holiday buying season, and that if they expect responsible consumers to spend money with them, they need to be responsible with their products.  Email Dave Lumley, CEO of Rayovac’s parent company Spectrum Brands at David.Lumley@spectrumbrands.com, and tell him that you want Rayovac to offer recycling, or you’ll take your business elsewhere!

Help spread this fun image and let people know about how naughty Rayovac has been when it comes to the environment and recycling.  Please, share it on social media (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc.) and let your friends and allies know: Rayovac needs to embrace—not spurn—battery recycling for its U.S. customers!

Producer TakeBack Get Results

Producer takeback recycling for computers is catching on! In 2010, the second year of the Texas Computer TakeBack Law, manufacturers recycled almost twice what they did in 2009. Now it’s clear that Texans needs similar recycling for TVs. KUT News has more:

“Computer recycling in Texas almost doubled in 2010 compared the year prior, according to the state’s environmental regulator. The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality says 24.3 million pounds of old hard drives, motherboards and various other computer parts were diverted away from landfills last year. The recycling program was created by the state legislature in 2007. House Bill 2714 requires computer manufacturers who sell in Texas to offer easy recycling programs for their brands of consumers.”

Recycling advocates are encouraged that Representative Byron Cook (R-Corsicana) and Senator Kirk Watson (D-Austin) have already re-introduced measures on producer takeback for TVs, HB 88 and SB 329 respectively. This legislation has attracted the interest of the electronics companies, electronics recyclers, charities such as Goodwill, the Christian Life Commission of the Baptist General Convention of Texas and thousands of Texans who are writing legislators every month supporting producer takeback recycling.

In addition, it’s clear that the existing Computer TakeBack Law needs more teeth. Just a few manufacturers were responsible for the vast majority of all the computer equipment recycled in Texas in 2010 under the law. Most manufacturers still aren’t doing anywhere near their fair share!

It’s time to stop squandering the benefits of recycling e-waste such as creating jobs for Texans in the recycling sector, conserving resources including rare earth metals and keeping toxins out of our landfills.

Needs Similar Recycling for TVs

An Easy “Green” New Year’s Recycling Resolution

Did the holidays bring you new gadgets? Here’s how to recycle your old ones.

Electronic gadgets were at the top of many holiday shopping lists again this year, with iPads and Kindles fueling a lot of the buying frenzy. The biggest sellers were e-readers, tablet computers, smart phones, HD TVs and video games consoles and accessories.  The Consumer Electronics Association was predicting that the average consumer would spend $232 on electronics this holiday.

So what should you do with the old stuff – the items these shiny new gadgets replaced? Or the even older ones – the dead cell phones, PDAs, and iPods stashed in your dead gadget drawer, or the old printer or TV tucked away in the basement?  It’s pretty easy to keep a recycling resolution, with the help of the Electronics TakeBack Coalition’s Guide To Recycling Your Electronics. Here are the basics, with a lot more information available on our web based Guide.

Don’t Trash Old Electronics

First, what not to do. The easiest (but worst) thing to do is to toss the old items in the trash. These gadgets contain toxic chemicals, which we don’t want seeping out of landfills and into groundwater, or getting emitted into our air from incinerators. Plus they take up a lot of room in overcrowded landfills. And many contain resources – especially metals – that can be recovered and reused.  So while trashing electronics is still legal in many states, it’s not a good idea. (Check if it’s legal in your state – it might be time to contact your state legislators about tougher laws to keep e-waste out of the trash.)

Reuse

There are many options for reusing or recycling your old electronics. If your old item still works and is pretty current, it can probably be reused. Old tube TVs are usually the exception here, but computers and phones will probably have some reuse value as whole products or parts. Many cities have local, non-profit reuse organizations, which will refurbish electronics for use in local underserved communities. You can usually find these by contacting your local county solid waste agency.  If you don’t find one, consider the National Cristina Foundation, which matches donated computers to charities and agencies, or World Computer Exchange, which sends educational institutions in developing countries the working items they request.

Recycle

If reuse is not an option, then please take it to an electronics recycler. Please make sure your old product gets to a responsible recycler – one who will actually recycle it, and not ship it off to a developing nation, where old electronics are causing terrible health and environmental harm. The best way to do that is to work with a recycler who is part of the e-Stewards network. E-Stewards recyclers adhere to the highest standards in the industry, including a firm commitment not to export non-working or untested e-waste to developing nations.

If there is no e-Steward near you, then there are many takeback programs run by the manufacturers and retailers, most of which are free. See our website’s Guide to Recycling Your Electronics for information and links to all of these programs. Some of these programs have trade-in options, which will give you money back (or credit towards purchases) for certain items, especially cell phones and laptops. The Electronics TakeBack Coalition’s Guide to Recycling Your Electronics includes details on these trade-in options as well.

– Barbara Kyle, Electronics TakeBack Coalition

Story of Electronics: watch, enjoy, share

The Story of Electronics – from the folks who made the wildly popular Story of Stuff web film – explores the high-tech revolution’s collateral damage: 6 billion tons of e-waste and counting, and other (often hidden) consequences for high tech workers, the environment and us. Watch it, then share it with your friends & family on Facebook, via e-mail and on your other social networking sites!

The new web short is raising the profile of high-tech trash worldwide, generating coverage from Discover Magazine, USA Today, The Independent and Fast Company. Help spread the word as the holiday shopping season begins: there are steps we can take today to make sure our high-tech toys don’t come with such a steep environmental price.

Plastic, Disposable UT Tower?

Even one of Austin’s best and brightest institutions is capable of a very bad idea:

More from Austin Business Journal:

“A group of University of Texas alum and environmental activists aren’t happy about plans to market H2Orange, purified water in plastic bottles shaped like UT’s iconic tower. The group is gathering July 23 at UT’s West Campus Mall on Guadalupe Street to protest the plan, saying it undermines Austin’s Zero Waste goal and the campus’ sustainability policy. Instead of using disposable containers, the group is hoping the venture will market ‘a refillable bottle with a UT logo’ as a potential alternative to raising scholarship funds, the group said.”

There are so many ecological and economic problems with bottled water, one hardly knows where to start. Plastic pollution is a serious threat to our ecosystem and although the bottles may be recyclable, there is no guarantee they won’t end up in landfills, incinerators and waterways. In fact, the “great Pacific garbage patch” is larger than Texas and growing every day. And in case you haven’t forgotten about the BP spill: 10% of domestic oil production is used to make plastic products. A great primer is the Story of Bottled Water — check it out!

Spotlight: pharmacuetical waste

Don’t flush or trash your old pills, unless you want them to end up in our drinking water! In 2008, an AP investigation found that “A vast array of pharmaceuticals – including antibiotics, anti-convulsants, mood stabilizers and sex hormones – have been found in the drinking water supplies of at least 41 million Americans.” Not good!

We’d like to see Producer TakeBack programs in place that would make it easy for anyone to return their unused pharmaceuticals. And we’re not the only ones. From the Product Policy Institute:

“The National Association of Counties (NACo), the country’s largest local government organization, has unanimously adopted a policy supporting producer responsibility for unwanted medicines. The expense of taking back unused prescription and over-the-counter drugs would be handled by the pharmaceutical industry, without relying on state or local government funding.”

This won’t be a simple solution; drug enforcement laws can be quite complicated when it comes to recovering old pills. But the principal that the manufacturers should be responsible for their waste should still apply.

In some states and cities, manufacturers are teaming up with local pharmacies and law enforcement agencies to provide free, convenient recycling locations — usually at the nearest drugstore. We’re already seeing the beginnings of such a system in Texas. Here’s a current map of local participating drugstores. Recycle away!

“Going Green” spotlights Texas Campaign for the Environment

Texas Campaign for the Environment was featured in this week’s segment of Going Green with Yolanda Green. Watch and share, please!

This is a terrific portrayal of TCE, the work we do and just a few of our allies. Major kudos to Yolanda and the Going Green team for creating such a comprehensive report. Also, thanks are due to Green Bank for sponsoring several Going Green segments and Citizens’ Environmental Coalition for suggesting TCE for this week’s show. And thanks to TCE volunteer Chris Patterson who helped collect the pictures and video!

Getting to Zero Waste…or Darn Close

Graphic: GrassRoots Recycling Network

Many believe that trash is an inevitable byproduct of modernity, as if humankind is forever doomed to bury or burn our waste because, with apologies to 90s pop sensation The Rembrandts, “That’s just the way it is, baby.” Fortunately, the way it is doesn’t necessarily equal the way it must be. In fact, you can participate in a number of exciting initiatives that currently work to bring us to Zero Waste…or darn close.

As a concept, Zero Waste embraces a “cradle-to-cradle” system, in which the products we make, sell and purchase are used to make new products rather than dumped in a landfill or burned in an incinerator. Pragmatically, Zero Waste is a set of concrete practices that mirrors nature in an effort to conserve resources, reduce trash, increase reuse and recycling, promote durability and preserve wealth. Sounds ambitious, right? Well, yes and no, especially in light of the ramifications associated with maintaining the status quo.

First, consider our current waste(ful) scheme: we extract natural resources from the earth, manufacture those resources into consumer products, ship those products all over the world in planes and boats and trucks, then buy and use them until they become obsolete and finally toss them in the garbage. This is a linear, “cradle-to-grave” approach: extract-manufacture-distribute-consume-dispose…repeat. Our present waste management regime promotes the continuous extraction of limited resources to perpetuate an unsustainable cycle. For a terrific, illustrative video on unsustainable production, see the Story of Stuff.

Second, consider the economic value of the resources that we constantly bury in the ground after short-term use: the precious metals in our trashed electronics, the easily remanufactured textiles in our clothes and furniture, the wood in our millions of tons of discarded paper—all of these have value as potential raw materials—simply disappearing into a monetary sinkhole. Garbage dump becomes money pit. Every ton of reusable materials that end up in a landfill leads to ever-more costly (both economically and environmentally) mining, logging and drilling.

Now consider a sustainable alternative, one in which products and the value (again, economically and environmentally) residing in the resources consumed to create them are not buried or burned, but instead become an entirely new, higher quality product. This is the core of Zero Waste: every material used in the production cycle functions as feedstock, a “nutrient” used to make new products. In their seminal work, Cradle to Cradle, William McDonough and Michael Braungart describe “technical nutrients” that can be utilized over and over in manufacturing processes without suffering any deterioration in quality and “biological nutrients,” organic matter which breaks down in the environment to feed living organisms and perpetuate life. Nature functions this way: the byproducts of an oak tree or a tree frog re-enter the environment to help new trees or frogs or something entirely different grow until their byproducts re-enter the system. A cycle of living, a closed loop. Zero Waste takes this bio- and ecological reality and applies it to contemporary culture.

Several fundamental principles guide Zero Waste practices; in turn, the integration of several such practices constitute a Zero Waste Plan. Companies or government entities that implement a Zero Waste Plan commit to: 1) “cradle-to-cradle” design and materials use; 2) “producer takeback” policies, in which manufacturers assume responsibility for the end-of-life care of their products; and 3) “triple bottom-line” accounting, which considers not only the economic impacts of an action but also the environmental and ethical costs of a particular manufacturing process or product design.

Right now, many individuals, cities, companies and governments are beginning to formulate and implement comprehensive Zero Waste Plans into their local and regional solid waste management systems. In fact, the entire nation of New Zealand implemented precisely this type of plan in July of this year. Diverse companies ranging from Fetzer Wine to Subaru to Xerox already divert more than 90% of their waste.

On a local level, several communities already ramped up efforts reduce waste. Austin became the first city in Texas to adopt a formal Zero Waste Plan. Dallas has expanded its single-stream recycling program citywide, resulting in huge gains in recovered material. Houston has launched an yard/tree waste mulching program that is expected to save he city $2 million each year. On the corporate front, one Toyota and GM joint manufacturing plant convinced its parts suppliers to switch from cardboard to reusable shipping containers—this step alone saves the companies an estimated $20 million a year.

At home, you can do your part to move toward Zero (or darn close). Consume less wasteful packaging by purchasing products that contain post-consumer recycled content. Compost your food and yard waste in the back yard. When remodeling, use sustainably harvested materials such as bamboo flooring and recycled glass counter-tops or tile. If you’re in the market for a new home, you can get to Zero Waste by installing several amenities such as solar or tankless water heaters, rainwater-fed washing machines, LED lighting and metal roofing. In Dallas, one eco-friendly couple is blogging their trials and tribulations with green design as they build a new home—the Labron House—from the ground up. Check out their progress at http://blog.greenlabron.com.

Jeffrey Jacoby, Staff Director, Texas Campaign for the Environment
Article originally published in September 2009 issue of House & Home Magazine

The Tale of the Trail of Trash

Photo:  Swamplot

Use it, toss it, bag it, carry it to the curb and forget about it—this is the way most of us think about trash. Out of sight, out of mind. Get the garbage as far away as possible. Even the most adventurous children hold their noses and make excuses to avoid carrying those nasty trash bags to the curb (“But, Mom, I did it last week!”). Of course, nobody wants to live next to their refuse…nor should they, given the potential problems associated with exposure to harmful bacteria, heavy metals, and chemical contamination.

So, as we push discards out of our homes and into the waste stream, precisely what is the journey garbage takes from the curb to its final resting place? The only slightly dramatized tale that follows is more grubby than epic, more nauseating than whimsical, but a tale that nevertheless must be told: the tale of the trail of our trash.

CHAPTER 1: Truckin’ Through the ’Hood
Most homeowners have seen garbage trucks methodically making their way through the neighborhood, often with very sweaty men jumping on and off to hoist bulging bags or mechanical arms lifting overflowing bins into a chasm at the rear of the truck. Thus, the journey of trash begins with the solid waste collection vehicle—or in Britain, the quaint-sounding dustbin lorry—a rolling ferry transporting garbage away from the quiet solace of the shire to a land of, well, more garbage. Once secured by the collection vehicle, trash usually meets the wrath of a compactor to make room for its malodorous brethren. After collecting and compacting about six tons, the truck departs.

CHAPTER 2: A Stop on the Way
While many trucks simply make their way to a landfill, others stop at a trash transfer station. Transfer stations are a kind of trash purgatory, a transitional space between initial collection and final disposition. These garbage depots consist of a simple slab of concrete—a tipping floor with or without walls or covering—designed to allow large trucks to dump their load into a large pile, where it is once again compacted and then packed into larger trucks destined for the landfill. As you can imagine, the stench inside and surrounding such a site often proves unbearable. All this is before the vectors—rats, raccoons, roaches and the like—enter the scene.

CHAPTER 3: A Happier Place
However, our discards occasionally meet with a different fate. Some facilities provide an area separate from the tipping floor for common recyclables, an area for brush and yard waste (used for composting), an area for building materials or furniture or appliances, etc. When the essential function of a transfer station becomes waste diversion and retrieval rather than waste compaction and disposal, our rubbish has stumbled upon a materials recovery facility (MRF)—it still stinks, but the smell is tempered by the environmental and economic benefits of recovering rather than burying items of value. Here, recyclable metals, compostable organics, intact construction materials and reusable items ranging from paint to microwaves to bed frames to bicycles are separated from the refuse. Some MRFs even reach out to artists who can find aesthetic value in the unlikeliest junk, generating economic value in the process. (A footnote on the economy of waste recovery: a recent study conducted for the City of Austin found that the Capitol Region buries in landfills about $40 million annually worth of recoverable materials.)

CHAPTER 4: An Unpleasant Grave
Unfortunately, materials recovery facilities are a rare breed in Texas and throughout much of the country, which means that the journey taken by the vast majority of our trash ends with land disposal, buried in the ground. Trucks arrive from transfer stations or neighborhoods at the landfill gate, where they are weighed, sometimes inspected by a spotter perched above the scales (checking for illegal items such as freon-filled refrigerators) and then waved on to the working face. There, trash meets with more trash meets with menacing compactors—behemoth vehicles often equipped with massive spiked metal tires and a dozer blade—load after load, hour after hour until, finally, the waste is covered with six inches of dirt (or an alternative cover) at the end of the day. This process of burying and covering garbage to prevent contact with moisture is fittingly known as dry entombment. Within this trash mountain our refuse finds its final resting place. Or does it…

EPILOGUE: The Trail of Trash…To Be Continued
A number of studies show that even modern landfills with liners eventually leak, allowing household chemicals and heavy metals to leach into soil and nearby water sources. Garbage dumps are the largest source of human-caused methane emissions, a greenhouse gas twenty-three times more potent than carbon dioxide. Researchers have found high levels of mercury in some landfill gas intended for venting. The journey of our trash may not end with its entombment—it can come back to haunt us.

ALTERNATIVE ENDING
In many ways, the tale of trash is choose-your-own-adventure rather than scripted drama. Opportunities to divert our detritus from the trash trail exist at every turn in the story: we can purchase recycled and recyclable goods and separate them prior to putting them out on the curb, extend life-span by repairing and reusing old items, donate unwanted things like clothes and furniture to Goodwill or sign up with a group like Freecycle.org. Food and yard waste can go to a compost operation. Best Buy will recycle old TVs and computers. Even styrofoam has a more suitable resting place than the landfill: some local companies collect and sort a range of materials for foam recycling. This is the happier ending of the tale of the trail of trash…the ending that leaves no trail at all.

Jeffrey Jacoby, Staff Director, Texas Campaign for the Environment
Article originally published in August 2009 issue of House & Home Magazine