Some Recycling Is Now Being Re-Routed To Landfills (wral.com)

"Thousands of tons of material left curbside for recycling in dozens of U.S. cities and towns -- including several in Oregon -- have gone to landfills," reports the New York Times. Slashdot reader schwit1 summarizes their report: One big reason: China has essentially shut the door to U.S. recyclables. The Times notes that about a third of recyclables gets shipped abroad, with China the biggest importer. But starting this year, China imposed strict rules on what it will accept, effectively banning most of it. That, the Times reports, has forced many recycling companies who can't find other takers to dump recyclables into landfills.
"Recyclers in Canada, Australia, Britain, Germany and other parts of Europe have also scrambled to find alternatives," reports the Times, though most major U.S. cities aren't affected, and countries like India, Vietnam and Indonesia are now importing more materials.

But at least some recycling companies are simply stockpiling material, "while looking for new processors, or hoping that China reconsiders its policy."

Comments

Re:Just now?

[Zontar The Mindless]

Stalin was a Georgian. Let's nuke Atlanta.

Recycling in NZ used to work...

[ClarkMills]

When recycling started big time here in NZ we had open recycling crates that were great, everyone could see what was in the bin, not so good for privacy [you drink too much wine]. Later they changed them to larger lidded wheelie bins and then the recycling content was degraded significantly as no-one could see the crap that was being put in there. No doubt China didn't appreciate the hugely lowered quality of recycling material that they were getting.

I suspect we're not the only country that is guilty of this...

Let's be clear...

[argStyopa]

...China wasn't taking it because it's some sort of a utopia of recycling.

This story makes it sound like because of Trump, recycling isn't happening any more. Recycling (of these items that are no longer going to China) WAS NEVER ACTUALLY HAPPENING. It was being taken out of the sight of effete righteous dilettante Westerners who didn't want to *actually* deal with the hard choices of their 'recycling life style'...and essentially being dumped around the corner in the poor people's neighborhood.

The US is *awash* in recycled paper and plastics. Nobody wants them. Nobody can use them. Even National Geographic, the MOST self-righteously environmental organization, prints its magazine on virgin clay-coated paper, justifying its choice to refuse recycled base by its mission to deliver stunning photography being more important than the small amount of recycled paper it might consume. (Until very recently it wasn't really even recyclable after.
That's rationalized HOGWASH.

Re:Let's be clear...

[GerryGilmore]

You're almost half-right. The Economist magazine has been following this closely. China has long been one of the main destinations for plastic and - especially - paper refuse from western countries. They recycle it into new cardboard packaging for the next round of shipped goods.
Likewise plastic waste is recycled into other plastics. They *could* do that pretty efficiently until recently as their labor costs have risen.
A positive side-effect for them is to watch us squirm under the weight of our own waste.

Re:Just now?

[PPH]

Yeah. And Hitler was Austrian.

G'day, mate!

Yeah, blame China

[execthis]

China rejects the extremely low-grade American "recyclables" that are very poorly separated from other forms of waste.

Blame China for large amounts being subsequently sent to landfills.

Bullshit.

I have personally witnessed materials placed in recycling bins at a company I worked at in the Bay Area being collected by a non-recycling, waste truck.

Visit any business' waste dumpster in the Bay Area and you will see more recyclable materials than other types of waste.

Recycling is mostly a lie. It's a way for politicians to score green points.

Re:Yeah, blame China

[Mashiki]

Recycling in Germany isn't very different then recycling in Canada. We have electronics waste funds and all the other stuff, but you can easily find with a bit of digging the number of companies in Germany shipping e-waste right to China, Vietnam, and other poor 3rd world countries for disposal. You're laboring under the delusion that there's some difference, there isn't. It was simply fools told by idiots that it was a good idea, leading idiots and fools to make everyone feel good, and people ahead of the curve to ship the waste and "make it someone else's problem." American recycling is just out in the open, other countries are simply putting a shiny bit of polish on all that garbage.

Its the same environmentalists that screech for recycling, that protest waste-to-energy plants, or waste separation facilities being built at all. Or environmental groups tying up the building of them for literal decades in court, or environmental regulations. In turn, those companies "deal" with the waste by sending it to 3rd party companies aka put on a ship and sent to the asshole of nowhere. This isn't any different then them telling you windmills and solar panels are REALLY GOOD for the environment, until you do the research yourself and find that the materials going into making it do far more damage to the environment then say, building a nuclear power plant.

Re:Yeah, blame China

[WorBlux]

The stuff that's really valuable (metals) doesn't get consumed, and honestly it takes about as much energy to make plastic as you get out of burning it. And you don't need a huge supply chain to do it, you can dispose of waste locally and cleanly. Thow in the sewer solids while you're at it.

Re:All these refined materials

[jwhyche]

I'm thinking one day there will be a booming mining industry at many city dumps.

Re:Problem with letting policy lead the market

[Mashiki]

Not quite true. Steel is cheaply recyclable and easy to sort. Aluminum is very easy to sort, and has the most profitability. Plastic on the other hand? Plastic it's cheaper to make more then recycle it. Most plastic in Canada is mixed with car tires at cement factories to make clink. Same in the US, especially since you guys like cement highways far more then we do up here.

Paper? Forget it. Should be burned or dumped into pits for methane gas retrieval, and used for power. Cheaper and more environmentally friendly to plant more trees. Then breaking it down, de-inking, re-bleaching, and reprocessing it.

Electronics? That's a hard one, especially with all the lead. Switching to tin didn't do us any favors in that one either. Simply more e-waste as electronics fail at a higher rate.

Re:All these refined materials

[jwhyche]

I bet there is a lot of gold from old computers tossed into dumps

Yes, I remember going through the city dump when I was kid. I was a small town so there was basically no rules on what you could or couldn't dump there. One of the thing that I remember was the amount of copper there. Copper pipes and copper wire. So yeah, there is a lot of heavy metals in these old dumps.