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Recycling: Is it a Con?

  • 11-03-2020 10:36am
    #1
    Registered Users Posts: 3,133 ✭✭✭


    CHANNEL 5 TV
    Recycling: Is It a Con?

    Paul Connolly and Jean Johansson investigate potential swindles. Are councils and the big name supermarkets being as environmentally friendly as they claim?

    Channel 5 tonight, for those of you who have Free To Air (FTA) Television, or FREESAT Television.

    Today 11/March 2020, Time: 8:00 pm - 8:59 pm


Comments

  • Registered Users Posts: 442 ✭✭eastie17


    Kinda, I know of a bin company in the south who bale all the recycling together irrespective of clean, dirty etc and it goes on, literally, the slow boat to china.


  • Registered Users Posts: 28,668 ✭✭✭✭HeidiHeidi


    eastie17 wrote: »
    Kinda, I know of a bin company in the south who bale all the recycling together irrespective of clean, dirty etc and it goes on, literally, the slow boat to china.

    I thought China had stopped taking "recycling" from the West a few years ago?

    I too wonder about it all.... I bring mine to a waste facility where I can throw plastics and paper and metals all together, another one I occasionally go to separates plastics from paper from tin/alu...... and I saw all the lovely colour-separated glass bins locally being dumped by crane into the giant skip lorry (the skip may have been internally divided, but I seriously doubt it).

    Would make one very sceptical about it all, really.....


  • Registered Users Posts: 12,363 ✭✭✭✭Del.Monte


    Recycling is a badly organised shambles despite what the Repak people would have you believe. Apart from anything else, immediate urgent action to ban all sorts of plastics, place deposits on tins, bottles etc. is needed.


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,996 ✭✭✭two wheels good


    I typed a reply starting in a positive tone but after a few paragraphs I was too dejected and overwhelmed.

    I don't think it's a con. There are genuine companies operating in the industry and they are effective. But there are unscupulous dealers involved too.

    Generally I think the scale of recycling is so far behind the the scale of consumption that at best the result can never be termed a success. But what's the alternative?


  • Registered Users Posts: 14,086 ✭✭✭✭elperello


    Recycle is the last option of the three Rs

    Reduce , Reuse , Recycle

    Only when you have applied the first two options to everything you buy should you use the third.

    Not saying it's easy but every little bit helps.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 35,346 ✭✭✭✭BorneTobyWilde


    Recycling is usually sorted by machines for the valuables, ie tin cans, aluminium cans, cardboard, newspaper, ect, rest is baled and shipped out to sweden to power their power station, or used in our own waste to energy stations.

    Anything that burns is great for making power.


  • Registered Users Posts: 472 ✭✭MintyMagnum


    elperello wrote: »
    Recycle is the last option of the three Rs

    Reduce , Reuse , Recycle

    Only when you have applied the first two options to everything you buy should you use the third.

    Not saying it's easy but every little bit helps.

    Fourth R ... Refuse

    If you can refuse to buy unnecessary stuff in the first place you don't have to worry about the other three Rs


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,996 ✭✭✭two wheels good


    Fourth R ... Refuse

    If you can refuse to buy unnecessary stuff in the first place you don't have to worry about the other three Rs

    I learned that additional R from this forum.
    I think a large segment of the population pay no attention to the first three R's and believe they can consume at will as long as they implement the final R - Recycle.
    I've always liked vintage - before it was called vintage.

    The economy is constructed around mass over-consumption.
    "It is easier to imagine an end to the world than an end to capitalism."
    Articles on mass extinctions and bio-diversity collapse are more frequent and more worrying.
    How pessimistic will I be after a few weeks of cabin fever?


  • Registered Users Posts: 14,086 ✭✭✭✭elperello


    Fourth R ... Refuse

    If you can refuse to buy unnecessary stuff in the first place you don't have to worry about the other three Rs

    Absolutely.
    Buy less crap :)


  • Registered Users Posts: 12,363 ✭✭✭✭Del.Monte


    elperello wrote: »
    Absolutely.
    Buy less crap :)


    And pick up less crap - years ago I was beating this into my kids. Thinking specifically of Argos, Ken Black catalogues and the like.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 13,981 ✭✭✭✭Johnboy1951


    I am saddened by the lack of facilities for the re-use of otherwise discarded material/devices.
    Lots of functional electric/electronic equipment is deliberately broken up for the precious metals from circuit boards etc.
    They could easily be re-purposed/reused but I guess the recycle centres would lose a revenue stream.

    I would like to see mandated that each recycle centre have a re-use section for a range of stuff, and only after some period of time there would that 'rubbish' be moved into the recycle centre proper.
    Prior to that people should be encouraged to reuse what is there and drop it back when no longer of use.


  • Registered Users Posts: 7,719 ✭✭✭Grumpypants


    HeidiHeidi wrote: »
    I thought China had stopped taking "recycling" from the West a few years ago?

    I too wonder about it all.... I bring mine to a waste facility where I can throw plastics and paper and metals all together, another one I occasionally go to separates plastics from paper from tin/alu...... and I saw all the lovely colour-separated glass bins locally being dumped by crane into the giant skip lorry (the skip may have been internally divided, but I seriously doubt it).

    Would make one very sceptical about it all, really.....

    It used to go to China on big dirty boats, now it goes to poor Asian countries and just gets dumped, ends up falling into the water and destroying the environment.

    When you weight it all up a landfill here prob has less impact overall. But sure once we can't see it it's not happening.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 10 Fiatx19


    Recycling is a con in my opinion. We used to have one council truck collect the waste. Now we have 9 trucks, 3 different waste companies with general, recycling and compost.

    The recycling used to be sent to the far East to be thrown in the sea to destroy marine life. Now it's probably going into landfill.

    The only way to solve the problem is to stop manufacturers/shops wrapping things in so much packaging but that's not happening...


  • Registered Users Posts: 28,703 ✭✭✭✭Wanderer78


    Fiatx19 wrote:
    Recycling is a con in my opinion. We used to have one council truck collect the waste. Now we have 9 trucks, 3 different waste companies with general, recycling and compost.


    I wouldn't say it's a con, but waste certainly is a big problem, I'd imagine we re consuming far more nowadays with the increase in availability of goods, but I do see your point in the increase in the amount of waste trucks, that alone is probably offsetting any environmental savings done by recycling. I think you d be naive to think all recyclables are actually recycled, but I'd imagine some are. I'd also completely agree with putting pressure on our producers of our goods, to reduce the overall amount of materials produced, particularly harmful single use plastics


  • Registered Users Posts: 3,205 ✭✭✭cruizer101


    Fourth R ... Refuse

    If you can refuse to buy unnecessary stuff in the first place you don't have to worry about the other three Rs

    Surely that is covered by reduce. Reduce mean to reduce your consumption of waste materials by not consuming/buying them in the first place.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 78 ✭✭scoobydude


    Del.Monte wrote: »
    And pick up less crap - years ago I was beating this into my kids. Thinking specifically of Argos, Ken Black catalogues and the like.

    It's all amazon and pennies now. Society has taken a disposable view of everything due to the low money cost. But people need to factor in the environmental cost of getting some €3 trinket from the internet flown to them from China.


  • Registered Users Posts: 13,981 ✭✭✭✭Johnboy1951


    If each country was 'forced' to deal with their own waste internally, or in conjunction with another approved outside entity, having first done initial processing (separated the waste into the required types etrc.), then things could improve drastically.

    So for Ireland, as an example, we would have to treat our own waste 'in house' or sell our plastic waste to some approved facility outside our borders.

    This would no doubt encourage import tariffs on products with excess packaging, that costs us to process. By this means manufacturers would be 'financially encouraged' to alter their packaging to something with less environmental impact.

    The same format could be used for each type of waste and introduced one by one over time.

    Such a scheme would of course require that all EU (and associated) countries accept it and agree to comply.

    At present, as far as I am aware, once the waste leaves the control of the collectors of the waste, there is no assurance from or responsibility on, the collectors that the waste is treated correctly and in an environmentally friendly fashion at its destination.

    Such as this could help reduce the present damage being caused in countries who accept waste without having proper treatment in place for it.


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,996 ✭✭✭two wheels good


    Fiatx19 wrote: »
    Recycling is a con in my opinion. We used to have one council truck collect the waste. Now we have 9 trucks, 3 different waste companies with general, recycling and compost.

    That's more a comment on the efficiency of collection - and the privatisation of council services.

    I've no doubt that the recycling of cans, metal and glass is very effective. Because they have a reliable monetary value.
    Recycling aluminium material is particularly benefitial - environmental damage of mining, huge energy saving of recycling alu instead of manufacture from raw materials.
    Recycling of some clean sorted plastics is effective. Drinks manufacturers agreed to use more recycled material but are dragging their feet.
    Fiatx19 wrote: »
    The recycling used to be sent to the far East to be thrown in the sea to destroy marine life. Now it's probably going into landfill.
    I think that's unfair criticism of those countries. They don't want waste; they want recyclable material. They have a lot of problems with unscupulous dealers in developed countries sending contaminated recyclables abroad. And their own local dodgy dealers too of course.


  • Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 19,257 Mod ✭✭✭✭Sam Russell


    elperello wrote: »
    Recycle is the last option of the three Rs

    Reduce , Reuse , Recycle

    Only when you have applied the first two options to everything you buy should you use the third.

    Not saying it's easy but every little bit helps.

    There are FOUR Rs not three.

    Refuse - verb - do not take it in the first place.

    Reduce - verb - take less of it, or take it less often.

    Recycle - verb - send to get the matter repurposed for reuse, either by changing it into something useful, or reformed in new versions as is cardboard, tin cans, and some plastics. Aluminium is typically recycled in to new aluminium by 98% of the input material. Glass can be recycled at a very high level - some old glass is needed to make new glass, and the more old glass makes the new glass cheaper.

    Refuse - noun - the stuff that gets sent to the incinerator or landfill. This is the worst option, and needs be avoided.

    It is better to try to do the first and so on down the list, with landfill being the worst of the worst and it should be avoided at much as possible.


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