Lesson 6: Waste Reduction and Recycling

Objective: To describe general recycling and reductior topics including its history and the arguments for and against it.

Goals:

  • Discuss industrial advantages associated with recycling and reduction.
  • Explain the economic history of recycling in the US.
  • Explain what is required to have a successful recycling program and how it can be achieved.
  • Discuss arguments for and against recycling.

Introduction

Terminology:

Reduction - reduction in generation

  • reduction in amount of material
  • increase the lifetime
  • eliminate the need

Reuse - No transformation

Recycle - Use of the material as a source raw material, involves physical transformation

Recovery - Process to recover useful material from mixed waste (energy is an example)

Recyclable materials include - construction wastes, tires, aluminum cans, metals, furnishings and clothing, plastics, yard wastes, glass, animal wastes, paper products

United States

Mandated reductions:

  • 25% by 1995 (was met)
  • 30% by 2000 (was met)
  • 35% by 2005

Waste Reduction and Recovery Rate (US MSW – 1998)

Million tons / %
Waste Generation (before Reduction/Recovery) / 287
Waste Reduced / 55 / 19
Waste Recycled / 53 / 18
Waste Composted / 17 / 5.9
WTE / 34 / 12
Total Reduced/Recovered / 159 / 55

Economics and Recycling

Market History

Initially, the market resisted expanding

  • Recession stopped factory expansion and caused production cutback
  • Export markets were glutted and dried up
  • Manufacturers of virgin materials decreased price to the same as or less than recycled (glass, paper cheap raw materials)
  • Environmental movement had reduced packaging, a primary user of recycled paper
  • Lack of standards/specifications to ensure the quality of recovered material made consumers wary
  • Federal tax code subsidies use of some virgin materials through tax breaks, most of these tax breaks have been removed.

Market stimulated

  • Prices for recovered materials sky-rocketed due to increased demand for finished products with a recovered material content
  • Industry responded by increasing plant capacities and building new plants
  • Municipalities responded by increasing the amount of materials collected by existing recycling programs and implementing new ones.
  • Resulted in the misconception that the purpose of recycling was to generate revenues.

Market shifted

  • Lots of finished goods but lessened demand for them. Plants reduced or stopped production. Demand for recovered materials decreased and prices fell.
  • Paper drop related to: decrease in exports, inexpensive pulp products, tech probs w/ deinking plants, change in government procurement standards, trickle down effect of material already in the system, end-users using less recovered paper in process (newspapers decreased size), greed inflated prices, and increased supply of recovered paper
  • Plastics drop related to: decrease in virgin and off-spec resin prices, oversupply of recovered plastics, and difficulties in exporting to China (traditionally a large consumer of recovered plastics).
  • Metals (Al and Cu) drop related to: scandal with a Japanese trading firm which controls copper prices, Al prices fell in conjunction with fall in copper prices.

Obstacles to Recycling

  • Location of wastes
  • Uncertainty of supply
  • Administrative and institutional constraints
  • Legal restrictions
  • Uncertain markets
  • Technical challenges to recycling
  • Changes in materials (i.e. light weighting)
  • Too many items in waste

Supply and Demand

Price of recovered materials is cyclical, international commodity that responds to international market factors, demand & supply is major factor.

  • Supply and demand
  • Availability of recycled materials exceeding demand thus supply has a low price
  • Cost of collection and processing of recyclables offset by
  • Revenues, un-reliable due to market forces and demand cycles
  • Avoided costs, collection and disposal
  • Mandatory programs are often not supported by regulations and incentives to help create/develop market
  • Geographic distance between source and consumer drives costs up
  • In some cases materials have been separated for recovery and were then landfilled or incinerated due to a lack of demand
  • In 1991, recycled aluminum prices were forced down significantly due to the Soviet Union dumping bauxite on the international market to get hard currency.

Ingredients for a successful recycling program:

  • Source/supply of recovered material as well as the ability to process and deliver the recovered material
  • Recovered materials must be supplied in the quantity and quality desired by processors
  • Facility to remanufacture recovered materials into a saleable product
  • Demand for finished product - most important (if there is a demand there will be a supply)

Note: Recycling Will Cost: most programs are subsidized and could not support themselves. But, the $ benefit associated with prolonged landfill life is generally not applied to the balance sheet. Some feel that only recycling cost effective materials can be justified. If it were cost effective, industry would already be doing it.

SWANA Recommendations to Increase Reduction/Recovery

  • Encourage more extensive product stewardship by product designers, manufacturers retailers, and consumers
  • Expand efforts by federal, state, and provincial governments to develop markets for recycled materials and recovered energy
  • Provide financial incentives for investments in recycling, composting and the use of recovered materials
  • Include WTE and conversion technologies in renewable portfolio standards and green power programs
  • Encourage the recovery and use of landfill gas by reinstating federal tax credits and through renewable portfolio standards and green power programs
  • Support technology transfer and research efforts that have the potential to increase waste recovery rates

Major Recyclables

  • PaperU.S. reached a 50.3 percent paper recovery rate in 2003. This shows progress in the recycling sector, as the recovery goal for 2012 was 55%. Although the U.S. recovered 50 million tons of paper, allowing 37 percent of all paper products to be created from recycled paper, the recovery market still faces major obstacles. Contamination issues due to single stream collection systems and increasing demand overseas are just two of the issues paper recovery is facing as
  • It has been recently reported that the recovery rates for aluminum cans has dropped to 44% in 2003 (lowest since 1980). More than one trillion cans have been thrown in the trash since 1972
  • Plastic bottle recycling has dropped to 35.6%
  • Glass bottle recycling has dropped to 19.1%.

Page last updated July 2004 by Dr. Reinhart