Re: 50% recycling is NOT enuff!
STEVESUESS@aol.com
Fri, 22 Jan 1999 16:15:20 -0500
It has been pointed out to me that GRN members support the ZERO WASTE
goal, but have a problem with the 2005 deadline.
For this reason the GRN letter to the EPA changed its goal from ZERO
WASTE to 50%???????
To me this is like saying that we can't afford a new car to replace our
old falling apart one, so we'll just go out and get another even older nd
more falling apart one!
As I said in last nights diatribe: The ZERO WASTE goal is a given, let
us not change that because then we will be getting off tract and losing our
way just as those organization we are dissatisfied have done! Instead we mut
stay on the cutting edge: Promote ZERO WASTE as the long term goal and open
up the dialog on the how to do this! We all understand that our current way
of doing business will not achieve ZERO WASTE, and more and more of us are
realizing that our current 35-50% goals may well incur high costs that lead
to the kind of backlash typified by the Tierney NY Times article. More and
more Californians are beginning to argue in favor of rolling back our 50%
recycling goal, and in cases they have very good arguments for doing so!
So I repeat: Our goal is ZERO WASTE, and we CANNOT lose sight of that!
Our mission is to figure out how to get there in a cost effective,
sustainable, and politically viable manner. I suspect we will need a
dramatic cultural and economic paradigm shift to make this
happen.....something along the line of Hawkins ideas. I also am convinced
that the public is far more ready for this than is the political
establishment!