Why is recycling still so inconvenient?

Question

It is the year 2008 and paper, plastic, aluminum, and glass are still all thrown in the same bag and buried in a landfill. I try to recycle but it is a bigger job than it should be. Shouldn't recycling be required?

Answer 1

That's a good question to ask yourself -- why are you not required to recycle? Why aren't your neighbors?

You need to get your community to put a recycling program into place. Try writing to your local representative, mayor and especially the local newspaper and ask why nothing has been done yet.

I live in New York City, which generates 14,000 tons of trash every day. Even here, bottles are separated from newspaper and cardboard in plastic bags or bundled, and the "trash" goes in a regular trash can. Usually the building superintendent provides receptacles and does any final sorting before it all goes to the curb.

In other cities I've lived in, every home gets two buckets in addition to their garbage can: one for plastic, glass and metal, and another for paper. Many places also accept paper lawn and leaf bags, which are composted.

Answer 2

The first "R" in the motto is REDUCE.   Reduce the amount you consume and recycling isn't that big a deal.   REUSE There ain't no such thing as garbage.   "Oh, its broken"...FIX IT We have glues that hold on "shuttle tiles" so you should be able to find something to do the repair.

   If you can go thru the inconvenience of going to the store and purchasing the item, what is a little inconvenience in recycling it?  Unless you can think of a better system.    THEY are all ears to workable solutions.

Answer 3

Do not try to recycle.DO IT.If you are trying then you are simply being lazy.It is inconvenient for those who are unwilling to invest an effort in saving the planet that gave them life and sustains them.Man can do anything if he really wants to.Separate your waste by type and dispose of it in the nearby recycling containers.Use the organic waste to fertilize your plants.

You dont need several trash cans.Just having 4 small cans is enough to do your part on keeping the nature clean.One for paper.One for plastic bottles.One for used batteries.One for various waste.

If you still do not have room in your apartment remove an item that you do not need and you will have room.Use your brain unless it is too "inconvenient".

Answer 4

Recycling IS required in some states and cities.  In these cities, the sanitation workers (garbagemen) will not pick up your trash if it has recyclables in it.  These cities and states have curbside recycling.  For a few extra dollars a month, residents place recyclables into different curbside containers for pickup.  This is the most "convenient" way to recycle.

If you want convenient curbside recycling, contact your city council, mayor, elected official, etc., that is responsible for the government of your city.  Encourage others to do this also.  If your elected officials know you want curbside recycling, they will do their best to start it.

My husband and I started a recycling center in the town where we live.  It took about 9 months of e-mails, letters, petitions, and attending city council meetings.  We're hoping to get curbside recycling voted on in another year or so.

As another poster mentioned, it's more convenient to just throw your trash beside the road and keep driving.  That's why there's so much garbage everywhere.  I spent every Saturday, free of charge, at the city recycling center helping the citizens of my city recycle their paper, plastic, aluminum, tin, steel, cardboard, and paper.

As Kermit The Frog says, "It isn't easy being green."

Answer 5

Being clean is always less convenient than being messy. Throwing trash on the ground or floor is less convenient than putting it in the waste basket. Emptying the waste basket is less convenient than just letting it overflow. Sorting trash into paper, plastic, glass, and other special categories is less convenient that just throwing it all in one big pile.

That is just the way it is and will forever be. If you try to tell people to do the extra work to recycle while at the same time telling them that it is simple or easy or no effort, they will just get mad at you. It IS more work and it IS more effort. It always will be.

Answer 6

There are several strands to this one.  Probably the most important for you is to find a place which will take the recycled stuff.  Councils seem very variable on this one.  In our area (North Devon) HDPE - i.e. plastic milk bottles -  are accepted, where in Redhill, Surrey, they aren't.  This quite possibly has to do with finding a firm who will take this plastic, although why North Devon can do this, and Surrey can't, frankly puzzles me.

Another point is just how much political will there is to do this, and, again, things seem very different in different areas, although this is improving steadily.  Recycling involves ordinary people as well as councils, of course, and, again, watching the way some (young, sadly,) drivers simply toss their trash out of the car window onto a country road makes me doubt that some will ever get the point.

But probably the major problem is in the packaging itself.  It is important to recognise that in order for things to be recycled they must be in a fairly 'pure' state, i.e. cardboard cannot be mixed in with plastic and vice-versa.

Unfortunately manufacturers and many retailers really don't help here.  Drinks packaging is one of the best illustrations here.  Ordinary drinks bottles are OK, their plastic being relatively free of of other potentially contaminating materials.  Cardboard squash cartons are the exact opposite, the cardboard being interlayered with polythene and, often, aluminium foil, and then having a plastic pouring closure as well.  These are all but impossible to recycle.

Finally there is the issue of transport.  If it costs more to transport the recycling material to a plant which can process it then economically it makes no sense to do this.  Whether it is seen to make environmental sense is another matter of course, but this all swings around the price we put on clean air, water and natural resources, and, historically, much of this traditionally is deemed to be free.  That attitude, sensibly, is changing, if too slowly in my opinion.

Answer 7

im a big eco-freak. I recycle as much as i can but i hate it cuz you always have to think about it. Here's a website that shows a list of stuff i never thought to recycle:

http://www.dumblittleman.com/2007/10/ite...

Answer 8

I know! I am trying so hard to recycle! I have made it even harder on myself by volunteering to recycle my coworkers stuff too. I would cringe when they would throw their cans and water bottles in the trash. No I have to drive 15 minutes to the nearest recycle bin. My parents get curbside pick up of their recyclables I wish all cities would do it. It would make it so much easier to recycle.

Answer 9

Your best bet is to avoid buying goods with unrecyclable wrappings/materials, etc. Limit your use of plastic, foil, stop drinking beer and soda out of cans. That's a better answer.

Answer 10

Yeah, we have to drive 45 minutes to get to ours.  Supposedly there is one closer but I have never seen it.  Pretty much the only things you can recycle are cans and cardboard, too.  We still do it but we wait till we have a lot.

Answer 11

I like what Ireland did-- charged a 33 cent tax per plastic grocery bag. Use of the bags went down by 94% in a week!

Answer 12

I take it you are not from the UK.  We have to recycle as much as possible (EU regulations) and the local councils have cut down the general household waste collections (anything that cannot be recycled) to every two weeks.  This certainly focuses the household onto recycling as if we don't separate out paper, card, plastic, cans and garden waste we will  have an overflowing wheelie bin.  It is inconvenient because yes, it does take more time and you have to think instead of just throwing everything into the wheelie.  They can inspect your bin at any time and fine you if you are not doing things correctly.