RE: [greenyes] Re: recycling?

[Nicky Scott <NScott@no.address>]

My next door neighbour who is an avid Telegraph reader (British right wing
broadsheet) is always shoving antirecycling peices into my mailbox .
You are right we must counter them vigourously.
Britain is one of the few countries contemplating building incinerators -
personally I think it's all about power and not wanting to devolve it back
to the grassroots
nick scott

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Pete Pasterz [SMTP:ppasterz@no.address]
> Sent:	04 March 2003 17:41
> To:	WYNNCALDER@no.address; GRNSCH-L@no.address
> Cc:	greenyes@no.address
> Subject:	[greenyes] Re: recycling?
> 
> So, what's new...the anti-recyclers exist in Europe, too.   And
> conservative papers print anti-recycling articles [so do "liberal" ones,
> like the John Tierney article in the NYT Magazine]
> 
> I would hardly consider a former [conservative??] environment agency
> staffer [like J. Winston Porter, formerly of USEPA]  , a director of Keep
> Sweden Tidy [correlary to Keep America Beautiful, a industry-funded front
> to diffuse producer responsibility], and managing directors of solid waste
> collection companies as "leading environmentalists and waste
> campaigners...
> 
> But, I'm not of the school which says we should dismiss and ignore these
> attacks...I think we should take these head on, or risk these tales to
> become truths...
> 
> >>> WYNNCALDER@no.address 03/04/03 11:38AM >>>
> This article came out in today's Washington Times, a conservative paper.
> It
> may be worth noting since recycling questions never go away.  From my
> understanding, cardboard and aluminum recycling are both consistently
> profitable and better for the environment overall.  (Glass and plastic
> recycling get consistently mixed reviews.)   Any thoughts?
> 
> Wynn Calder
> -------------------------------------------
> Time to throw out 'myth' of recycling
> By David Harrison
> LONDON DAILY TELEGRAPH
> 
> 
>       LONDON - Throw away the green and blue bags and forget those trips
> to
> return bottles - recycling household waste is a load of, well, rubbish,
> say
> leading environmentalists and waste campaigners. Top Stories
>       In a reversal of decades-old wisdom, they argue that burning
> cardboard,
> plastics and food leftovers is better for the environment and the economy
> than recycling.
>       They dismiss household trash separation - a practice encouraged by
> the
> green lobby - as a waste of time and money.
>       The assertions, likely to horrify many environmentalists, are made
> by
> five campaigners from Sweden, a country renowned for its concern for the
> environment and advanced approach to waste.
>       They include Valfrid Paulsson, a former director-general of the
> government's environmental protection agency; Soren Norrby, the former
> campaign manager for Keep Sweden Tidy, and the former managing directors
> of
> three waste-collection companies.
>       The Swedes' views are shared by many British local authorities, who
> have
> drawn up plans to build up to 50 incinerators in an attempt to tackle a
> growing waste mountain and cut the amount of garbage going to landfills.
>       "For years, recycling has been held up as the best way to deal with
> waste. It's time that myth was exploded," said one deputy council leader
> in
> southern England.
>       A spokesman for East Sussex County Council, which plans to build an
> incinerator, said, "It's idealistic to think that everything can be
> recycled.
> It's just not possible. Incineration has an important role to play."
>       The Swedish group said that the "vision of a recycling market
> booming by
> 2010 was a dream 40 years ago and is still just a dream."
>       The use of incineration to burn household waste - including
> packaging
> and food - "is best for the environment, the economy and the management of
> natural resources," they wrote in an article for the newspaper Dagens
> Nyheter.
>       Technological improvements have made incineration cleaner, the
> article
> said, and the process could be used to generate electricity, cutting
> dependency on oil.
>       Mr. Paulsson and his co-campaigners said that collecting household
> cartons was "very unprofitable."
>       Recycled bottles cost glass companies twice as much as the raw
> materials, and recycling plastics was uneconomical, they said. "Plastics
> are
> made from oil and can quite simply be incinerated."
>       The Swedes stressed that the collection of dangerous waste, such as
> batteries, electrical appliances, medicines, paint and chemicals "must be
> further improved."
>       They added, "Protection of the environment can mean economic
> sacrifices,
> but to maintain the credibility of environmental politics the
> environmental
> gains must be worth the sacrifice."
>       The Environmental Services Association, representing the British
> waste
> industry, agreed that the benefits of incineration had been largely
> ignored.
>       Andrew Ainsworth, its senior policy executive, said, "This is a
> debate
> that we need to have in this country. Recycled products have got to
> compete
> in a global market, and sometimes recycling will not be economically
> viable
> or environmentally sustainable."
>       A spokesman for the government's Department for Environment, Food
> and
> Rural Affairs said incineration was "way down the list" because "it causes
> dangerous emissions, raises public concern and sends out a negative
> message
> about reuse."
> 
> __________________
> Wynn Calder
> Associate Director
> University Leaders for a Sustainable Future
> 2100 L St., NW
> Washington, DC 20037
> T: 202-778-6114
> F: 202-778-6138
> W: www.ulsf.org
> 
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