Recycling doesn't save energy or money...??

Question

Please pardon the inflamatory start to this question, I just want a good amount of feedback. Has anyone here ever seen the Penn & Teller "Bulls**t" episode concerning recycling? If even half of the information they provided was accurate, it would certainly make you reconsider how important recylcing is. The funniest thing they mentioned was recylcing paper and how recylcling paper actually means LESS trees, not more trees. More than 90% of the paper produced in the world comes from trees on tree farms. They plant tree for the specific purpose of turning them into paper, they aren't going into the rain forests and cutting down trees for paper. Trees are a renewable resource, we plant them, grow them, and make paper out of them. If you recycle paper, that mean they plant LESS trees to make new paper. Not to mention all of the energy use and polution caused by the processes involved in cleaning up recycled paper for reuse. This is just one of the points the show hits on.

The show then goes own to talk about how many billions of dollars recylcing COSTS the US, if it was saving so many resources you would think it would be saving the country money, not costing us money. Anyway, I am not claiming that the show is completely accurate or that recycling is bad or unnecessary. I just wanted some feedback from people, do you think it's possible that recycling may not be such a good idea, at least not until we can make sure it is actually saving resources and money?

Sharon, your response is exactly the kind of response I expect, and you very well may be right. My point with this question is that most people, like yourself, are so gung-ho about recycling that you never even considered the POSSIBILITY that it isn't helping anything, and may in fact be hurting. Do you think it is POSSIBLE that recycling in its current form is not beneficial?

Funny you should mention aluminum, country. The Penn & Teller show made a point to state that recycling is cost effective in certain areas, aluminum especially. This was a serious show, not them being comedians, but they do add humor to the whole thing. With aluminum, they pointed out, that's why bums collect aluminum cans, there's money in it, it's cost effective to recycle alumunium. Those of you open to the possibility that recycling may not be all that effective should check it out on Youtube.

Answer 1

There's definately some truth in the argument that recycling, as it is done today, isn't cost effective.

First of all, though, we need to take aluminum cans out of the question. Because 95% of the aluminum in a can is recylced, everyone agrees that it's cost efficient. And because almost everyone seems to recycle these, there's plenty of recyclable supply.

The cost worthiness of recycling some other materials (glass, paper) can be debated, and has been. Consider, though, that we are still getting people "trained" to recycle. One could make the argument that trucks that pick up and transport plastics and paper are generating pollution themselves and that is true. It will be worthwhile, though, when everyone gets on board. Consider suburban Chicago, where Waste Management picks up all recycling once a week. The truck is going by my house whether I recycle or not. So the best thing to do is recylce! When people begin to recycle paper, plastic, and glass as often as they do aluminum, then the payback will be greater.

And of course, besides the cost, there's the whole subject of landfills. Even if recycling, over all, costs more, doesn't it make sense to do it rather than put more trash in landfills?

Remember, too, the biggest way we can "recycle" is not to use the products to begin with! Don't use paper plates and plastic forks - use and clean permanent plates. Don't buy bottled water - buy a water bottle and refill it.

One test is to compare the amount of rubbish each week with the amount of recycling. I bet if you weighed both, my recycling is just a little less than my rubbish!

Answer 2

According to that scenario hunting is sport and conservation is expensive. I disagree.

Hunting will be sport when the animals have equivalent weapons and know how to use them, conservation will be economic when money becomes more than a measure of human labour costs.

If the trees could pay money to avoid being cut down there would be a lot more trees. A fundamental flaw of Shallow Ecology economics.

If people wish to compare things honestly and accurately they should first create a level playing field.

Ask yourself these questions:

"Do 100,000 saplings = 1,000 fully grown trees?"

"When a forest is clear cut for lumber or pulp, how long does it take the entire ecosystem (animals, insects, fungi and bacteria) to recover, if ever?"

"Industrialized tree farming may be cheaper in $s than recycling, but what is the true cost of that decision?"

Answer 3

For some things, recycling may not be cost effective using current technology. For other things, like recycling aluminum cans it is very cost effective. You don't just dig a hole in the ground and pull up a new pop can, it takes a lot of energy to dig the hole, transport the ore, smelt the ore, and form the aluminum can. Much more efficient to take a used aluminum can and melt it back down to form new cans.
Also one of the primary reasons for recycling it to save on landfill space which for some reason noone seems to want in their back yard.

Answer 4

I have invented a new type of break-through, cost-effective alternative fuel that will solve all of America's energy problems, and can be used for home energy, transportation applications, solving the energy requirements of the recycling process as you have mentioned, and more. The fuel is 100% renewable, as well as being pure and clean-burning so it is completely environmentally friendly. The fuel is called Optimism (TM). Already we have set up 100% environmentally friendly Optimism Farms (TM) in southern California where people gather together in a circle, join hands, and generate Optimism (TM). This Optimism (TM) can be then transmitted over the power lines to homes, cars, and anything else that is plugged into the power grid. It is completely cost effective because Optimism (TM) can be generated quickly and cheaply. This type of solution is guaranteed to supplant the dirty natural energy power plants that Sharon has already mentioned. Welcome to the 21st century!!! We even envision that in the future there will be no need even for the power lines and power poles that litter the American landscape; people will be able to sit in their cars or at home and generate their own personal Optimism (TM) fields that will power all electrical devices within reach.

Answer 5

Wow, where to start? Recycling paper means less trees because we will plant less? We use trees for more than paper. Lumber to build, remodel, etc. I have never seen the "Penn & Teller" show, but I am sure they have never seen how the Amazon rain forest is disappearing at an alarming rate. They probably haven't heard about how the current administration opening up our National Forest (means it belongs to all of us) for logging. How much energy does that big equipment use to go in there and chop it all down? Yes, it takes some energy to recycle paper; but we all need to do it. We need to all plant trees and we need to stop the efforts of our government which are making matters worse!

Okay, devil's advocate... we throw everything away. We save billions of dollars in money we are wasting on recycling. We spend billions of dollars cutting down the remaining trees and drilling underneath them for any natural (dirty) energy that might be in the ground underneath them. We still spend money and ruin our environment for many species of animals in the short term and for ourselves in the long term. We plant trees that take a hundred years to grow to any size that we could possibly use... hoping they are enough to clean our air a little. In the meantime, we have landfills overflowing into our back yards!

Answer 6

Where do you come up with that? it takes a tenth the energy to use recycled, steel/ aluminum/ glass/ paper, as it does to make new, not to mention what stays out of the land fills, not just in space but in toxic chemicals. You know you can make insanity sound plausible, if you happen to be insane.

Answer 7

I heard a recycling expert estimate that if the whole world recycles properly then I would solve our current climate change predicament, period.

Comedians either poke fun at themselves and thier culture, minorities, or the establishment. You're not meant to take it that seriously, It's just a bit of light relief from everyday responsibilities.

Answer 8

Recycling saves space in land fills. And for some things, like batteries, it keeps toxic chemicals from entering the natural environment. But I agree it does not save energy or money.

Answer 9

What we need is clean electric power to start with. Without the clean power nothing is done cleanly.

Go to www.uspto.gov and enter patent number 5,430,333.

There you will see pollution free electric power able to be built to be more than 1000 times that of our largest Nuclear Reactor!

Plant Vogtle, our last Nuclear Reactor makes only 930 megawatts.

The first generation “baby” power plants from this new technology makes 1000 megawatts.

Vogtle cost $10 billion, 30 years ago.

These new power plants cost $2.5 billion in today’s money.

Vogtle is about to be retired, as are all our other Nuclear plants.

All the fueled power plants only have about a 30 life span.

The power plant design you will see at patent office site live well over 100 years.

They burn NO fuel what so ever!

It costs more to demolish a Nuclear plant than to build one new!

The spent Nuclear fuel has a 25,000 year storage problem with no solution yet, and a tremendous cost that defies accurate estimation due to the very long time frame.

Nuclear power has been estimated to cost more $50.00 per kilowatt hour when the demolition and storage costs are applied.

Guess who gets to foot that bill, the tax payer!

Being fuel-less the design you see at the patent office has a cost of about 3 cents per kilowatt hour.

Coal fired power plants make 8 lbs of air pollution to run 100 watt light bulb for an hour.

There are NO cost estimations for the clean up of all that pollution.

We keep seeing in the news about coal miners dieing in cave-ins.

With the high cost of electric power being hidden for so long by our politicians using their abysmally poor judgment to allow this to happen in the first place. Then compounding the problem with their constant lying about it to all of us, and the problem now coming to light despite their best efforts to lie and hide it. We are now stuck with the costs of their abysmally poor judgment after their being “paid” by big power to lie to us about the scope of this problem for decades.

Call all your elected official state, local, and federal. Tell them you want the pollution free electric power you saw at the patent office web site! Tell them to get off their assets and get moving on making pollution free and cheaper electric power happen ASAP!

Or swallow their lies so more until our nation is so polluted our children die younger than ever before. Cancer is running rampant everywhere, it comes from all the pollution our elected officials are allowing to be spewed into “our” environment every day. It time to put pollution into it’s proper place, “THE PAST”!

We now have the technology, we can build it, it’s 100% clean, and the electric power is cheaper than ANY fueled power plant.

Answer 10

saves lifes and the world