There is No Guarantee That the Products You Recycle Are Actually Recycled, the UK Watchdog Warns (bbc.co.uk)

An anonymous reader shares a report: The National Audit Office (NAO) says over half of the packaging reported as recycled is actually being sent abroad to be processed. As a result, it says, the government has little idea of whether the recyclables are getting turned into new products, buried in landfill or burned. While an illusion of success has been created by the UK's system for recycling packaging, the NAO says, the reality may be quite different. Its report finds that: The government has turned a blind eye to underlying problems with the waste system. Firms may be over-stating the amount they are recycling. The Environment Agency has only carried out 40% of the recycling checks it planned to.

Comments

Nothing new here

[mi]

This is a known problem in the States too. NYC, in particular, sends over half of its "recyclables" to landfill anyway. But, not to worry, they still fine people for failing to sort their trash — whether it helps environment or not, whatever increases the government's power over the subjects is a good thing, is not it?

Re: Recycling theater is ubiquitous.

[Mashiki]

It's been cheaper to burn paper/cardboard since the day environmentalists started screeching that paper kills trees and plastic is better. Welcome to 1979 by the way. To recycle paper you have to deink, rebleach, and break whatever it was into base fiber then re-gunkify the entire mess all over again. Even then, most places avoid it because rebonding the fibers makes for weaker paper or requires resins to stop it from degrading quickly. W2E facilities are a better option in many if not all cases. Again, thank environmentalists for their rabid bleating that said facilities are really really really really really bad. Never mind that the heavy ash can be used a clinker(for cement and drywall) or anything. Just don't let them know that we burn nearly all the tires in use for clinker and fuel for cement plant kilns or anything, or they'd go brain dead stupid.

Which reminds me of an example of environmental stupidity from here in Ontario. Pipeline running from Sarina to Montreal, oh there was no problem with the pipeline being used currently. The problem came from them wanting to reverse the direction of flow, and reduce the operating pressure because of it's age. It was replaced with a newer pipeline about a decade ago, so having two redundant pipelines flowing in the same direction was a waste of money. The response? Endless screeching by environmentalists about how it was an environmental catastrophe and would poison all of southern ontario, not exaggerating on that one. It was pushed heavily by environmentalists as true. But razing a stand of old growth maples, oaks, and other broadleafs to put up gigantic fucking windmills? Perfectly okay. It was the hunting associations that blocked that one, because they'd been reintroducing wild turkey, pheasants and hawks to the area.