Why recycled products cost more?

Question

Why recycled products sometimes even cost more? I think it may due to the labor and the style. Even so, high prices just discourage people from going green.

Answer 1

Some people think they are going green by NOT recycling.  It is certainly arguable.   What is the energy cost for collecting plastic bottles, shipping them, melting them into new materials with the knowledge that the plastic will be weaker than "virgin" plastic.

It may be better, it may be worse but it's certainly not a slam dunk decision.

Answer 2

Recycling is actually wasteful and just the opposite of green, except with certain materials.

Obviously, steel and aluminum are well worth the effort, but paper, plastic, and glass actually end up using more energy than they're worth. One of my former clients is a large waste company which does a huge business in recycling. They operate a large fleet of trucks (each of which cost over $200k)

which make multiple trips, from collection points to a recycling center, then from the recycling centers to the respective plants where the materials are recycled.

Of course, there is also the time, effort, and gas spent in hauling the stuff to the collection points.

The paper recycling mills must remove as much dye as possible from the paper, and the process creates some horrible caustic waste, which must be discarded...

In the end, the energy costs and extra pollution created far outstrips any percieved benefit... but people *feel* good about recycling, and it's a political hot button, so it goes on.

Paper mills are using trees planted specifically for the purpose of harvesting for paper, and we're suffering no shortage of this type of tree. While old growth forests remain valuable for obvious reasons, trying to protect pulp forests is kinda like recycling carrots to protect the ones in the garden.

Answer 3

They cost more because manufacturers don't mass produce many recycled products due to a lower demand than non-recycled products. Also there are less resources to make recycled products in some cases leading to higher prices.

Answer 4

Because it is harder to recycle than make new stuff. More work. More effort. More time. Lower wages would make the cost of both new and recycled products go down and the recycled products would STILL cost more.

Answer 5

recycled items generally maintain their process stream within the borders of The US....hence higher wages for the workers

virtually everything else is from china.......hence lower wages...and environmental controls

Answer 6

methinks you are starting to catch on to this "green' thing son...but uh, if you REALLY want to know who is going to profit from this current environmental hysteria, i suggest you give al (the inconvenient goof) gore a call and ask him...i'm SURE he'll be happy to answer all your burning questions...lol...

Answer 7

that is true that is does cost more. The reason why is that people to sort out the waste to see what can be recycled. Another things is that more people are needed and new equipment is needed for the recycling. Getting new resources from the earth is much easy but eventually the Earth cannot have unlimited resources for us so recycling would eventually have to be a must.

Answer 8

The costs are higher, because it takes more energy, time, and personnel to collect those items.

For example, It is easier and quicker just to get a few hundred gallons of oil to make plastic bottles than to  go out, collect, clean, etc etc etc, used ones.

Same thing can be said of other items.

I think the soft drink companies need to switch back to glass bottles instead of plastic. Sand (which is used to made glass) is the most abundant item on the Earth, and you get numerous uses out of each bottle.

This would help with real recycling and I am sure it could help with the high cost of oil.