Is recycling a waste of energy?

Hey Mr. Green,
My friend refuses to recycle because he says the amount of energy it requires is enormous and the effect on the planet is negligible. Is he right? If not, how can I convince him to start recycling?--George in Santa Monica, California

Tell your friend that recycling does save energy, and lots of it--the equivalent of 10.2 billion gallons of gasoline per year from recycled U.S. municipal waste alone. And we still recycle only about a third of our staggering annual total of 250 million tons of waste, according to the EPA.

The savings do depend on the material. Recycling aluminum cans, for example, saves a high percentage of energy per pound, yet we Americans recycle only about half of our cans.

If your pal claims that recycling has its roots in tree hugger hysteria, point out that U.S. aluminum companies import more than 7 billion used cans per year--90,000 tons--to reduce their energy expenses and other costs.

Even if recycling didn't spare a crumb of coal or a drop of oil, its effect on the planet is far from "negligible." It averts some of the collateral damage from our material excess. A ton of recycled steel prevents 2,500 pounds of iron ore, 1,400 pounds of coal, and 120 pounds of limestone from getting gouged out of the earth, says the Steel Recycling Institute.

Recycling also slows the spread of dumps, keeps plastic out of the food chain, and prevents hundreds of millions of gallons of used motor oil from fouling our streams and lakes.

Comments

[Nev Stokes]

Recycling still shouldn't be the default option in my opinion. Yes, it is better than just throwing things away but I maintain that it should be the last resort: reduce, reuse and *then* recycle

http://nevstokes.com/blog/2010/08/25/recycle-less/

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[Charmn Goldie]

Asking that questions is a waste of energy. Even if it weren't efficient it's caught on so much now there's no way you'd stop people from recycling.

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[Denise]

Aluminum only takes sixty days to go from can into another form.
I recycle all alumimum cans. When I return my cans for deposit, I help my household's bottom line.

[micahkatelynn]

Recycling is a very good idea and is is an very good initiative that would reduce energy costs. More projects should be implemented in the near future. I also recommend the readers to visit the website http://investmentsinenergy.com since it a lot of info regarding transformation of waste to energy methods. Hope the articles published in the website would be helpful for you.

[IT recycling UK]

erm yeah right. The ammount of energy needed to produce a new product from the stuff removed from the ground is even greater than that needed to recycle something into a new product. Besides, recycling off-sets the cost of extraction from the ground, which due to our insatiable appetite for consumer goods, is resulting in the earth becomming devoid of resources (see oil prices, gold prices, steel prices, copper prices etc). The mroe we recycle, the less costs for raw materials will rise.

[recycling]

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[Tim]

Why is it green

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I disagree! Recycling is a process that maintains the balance of our living, thus making it a part of the energy flow. It greatly preserve our natural resources and improves waste management.

[Plumbing]

Recycling is not a waste of energy. It serves as a recreational activity that will help us in many ways. It is not only creating an improvement to a waste but it also give us chances to widen our mind to create something new.

[Marshall @ Composter]

I do not know the exactly. But one thing that I know is save energy and use natural resources like sunlight and wind power. Compost bins also good to decompose wastage.

Marshall
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[plumbing]

Save drink holders to corral used cans and bottles. Wrap newspapers with twine and then simply stack them. Plastic lids and caps are generally made of a different material than their containers and need to be sorted separately.

[plumbing]

I think recycling is a important thing to do today. You can use any recycled materials again and you can help protect mother nature too. It is not a waste of energy because you help your world to be a trash free world.

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[Chris]

Recycling is not a waste of time and more people should do it. We recycle carpets and rugs on a regular basis and our waste gets turned in to new products and that cannot be a bad thing.

[Dorthy Packer]

Thank you so much for sharing this information on recycling and if it is a waste of energy or not. I believe that it is not. There are a lot of recyclers in edmonton and I am one of them. I think recycling is very important in keeping our world clean and energy efficient.