[greenyes] Single-stream composition

["Jerry Powell" <jpowell@no.address>]

Recycling planners need to be cautious when using composition data due to the wide variance in materials consumption among communities.  Numerous examples exist of problems in comparing data from outside a local region.  For example, the Los Angeles Times is America's thickest newspaper (as an aside, Resource Recycling is America's thinnest magazine).  Using data from Southern California will over-report the percentage of ONP in a single-stream program.  Houston and Birmingham, Alabama are said to have the highest per-capita levels of aluminum can consumption (heat, humidity).  As a result, UBC percentages in the Southeast will be high.  Some major dairies in several regions have moved away from using plastic milk jugs, thus resulting in a decline in percentage for HDPE in these areas.  Religious restrictions regarding alcohol consumption result in lower percentages of glass in some regions, such as in the Mormon-dominated Rockies (about three quarters of glass production is for packaging beer, wine and liquor).  These are only several examples why recycling officials will find a low level of similarity among composition data from various communities.
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Jerry Powell, Editor and Publisher
Resource Recycling Magazine
E-Scrap News
Plastics Recycling Update

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