Tuesday, September 13, 2005

Recycling is silly

Houston spent $1.3 million last year on it's recycling program and took in only $885,000. Curbside recycling is offered to only one half of Houston neighborhoods and participation is down 13% from 2001 to 2005.

Perhaps the problem is the way we do it. There are two bins, one for paper and one for everything else (but no glass). I remember reading years ago that the only resource that made economic sense to recycle is aluminum.

Other cities may have problems with space for landfills; Houston doesn't. We should stop wasting money and put the trash where it belongs: in a big hole in the ground.

1 comment:

Scooter said...

I've also read that in spite of our best efforts, the overall efficacy of the recycling effort is negative, i.e., the net cost in terms of energy and resources expended in "recycling" is greater than the cost of use of non-recycled resources.

I for one want to continue the efforts but hope that soon our recycling industry will make the efforts productive.