Earlier this week, while flying back to Philly from Ecuador, I happened upon an article in Newsweek that made me want to force the plane turn the plane around and land in another city. The article, which would probably seem innocuous to most, was in an international copy of Newsweek, and it took a look at the huge export market of recyclables and other junk to China:
Scrap materials are the alpha and the omega of the industrial process. Consumers create scrap when they use goods; factories consume it to create new goods. As China has industrialized, its demand for such materials has soared. According to Stan Lancey, chief economist at the American Forest & Paper Association, U.S. exports of recovered paper to China—where paper was invented around 100 B.C.— soared from 348,000 metric tons in 1994 to nearly 9.1 million metric tons in 2006, worth $1.07 billion. This year, China has bought 58 percent of U.S. scrap-paper exports. Meanwhile, exports of ferrous scrap (it sounds like a Scottish breakfast but means waste iron and steel) rose from 166,000 metric tons in 1998 to 2 million metric tons last year. Junk dealers reaped $1.5 billion selling scrap copper to China in 2006. All told, China's ravenous factories hoovered up 42 percent of U.S. scrap exports in 2006.
So why does this piss me off so much? How about the fact that Philadelphia basically doesn't recycle at all. Not only is Philadelphia not cashing in on this global trend, we are all paying to pollute when people would pay us to conserve.
The market has gotten so hot for junk, that this week, New York City Council passed a bill that severely fines people who "steal" recyclable materials that people and businesses put on the curb. (Apparently though these "thieves" wouldn't touch discarded Mets memorabilia- even the Chinese are smart enough not to buy that crap)
The City Council unanimously passed a bill yesterday that would sharply increase fines for people who steal recyclable material from curbsides — to $2,000 from $100 for a first offense, and $5,000 for each subsequent offense within a year.
Officials say the bill is aimed at organized enterprises that use vehicles, which would be impounded under the new law, adding that the $100 fine had not been large enough to prevent these thefts. Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg is expected to sign the bill, according to an administration spokesman.
Sanitation officials estimated the city might be losing as much as 15,000 tons of paper a year from Manhattan alone. Based on the city’s current recycling contract, which pays $10 to $30 a ton, that means an annual loss of $150,000 to $300,000.
...“Our recyclable waste that used to be thought of as worthless is getting so valuable that people now see an economic advantage to stealing it,” said Eric A. Goldstein, a senior lawyer for the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group that helped prepare the city’s original recycling law in 1989. “What this sensible legislation does is create a mechanism that would get at the problem of rustlers of recyclables.”
I'm sure that this is just one example of how the city squanders its many resources, but it's a particularly annoying one. The next time you want to know where we could get money for a robust violence reduction program, for more affordable housing, for better schools, etc. look no further than your filled-with-valuable-recyclables garbage can. I cannot think of a single, solitary, sane answer to the question of why we are paying to throw away stuff that other people would pay us for, other than maybe the crooked-nosed "trash lobby" is exerting some sort of pressure on Council and the Mayor not to act, or these folks are dumber than we all suspected. Can anyone give me one reason, it doesn't even have to be a good one, why the city isn't selling it's trash to the highest bidder?
absolute insanity
There is no logical reason why the city is literally throwing away money. The Rendell administration, Street administration and the majority of city council have had zero interest in recycling. The notable exceptions on council are Blondell, DiCicco, Kenney, O'Neill and Nutter when he was there.
One member of council refused to meet with RecycleNOW on the basis that recycling is a white issue and those people don't vote for him/her anyways.
Philadelphia's current recycling rate is 7%. Los Angeles, San Francisco and Seattle have recycling rates of 45% to 50%.
This spring, when Mayor Street and the city released with much fanfare (their own) the grand plan to combat global climate change over the next several years, their goal was to increase recycling to.... wait for it.... 10%. That's like aiming to go from an F to a D minus.
As for reasons, it's not the sanitation crews and unions (the city is essentially working the crews to death or disability now), not really the recycling office (they've had almost nothing to work with), not the economics (we'd be saving boatloads of money), not the technology (RecycleBank is a proven way that's been piloted with tremendous success for the past 3 years), etc.
It comes down to the lack of leadership and pressure from the top (the mayor and managing director's office) and the sadly Philadelphian trait of refusing to change, no matter the reasons.
Just a reminder....
Over the past 18 months RecycleNOW Philadelphia has been hard at work collecting over 12,000 signatures, lobbying for public hearings, and making sure our next mayor will implement a dependable weekly curbside recycling program for everyone in the city. Now we need your help...
Come out for an afternoon of Philly's best local bands playing to support the future of recycling in Philadelphia!
Rock & RecycleNOW
Saturday, September 29, 2007
3pm to 7pm
Whole Foods South Street Roof
10th and South
Featuring Live Performances by:
* The Capitol Years
* The Swimmers
* The Adam Monaco Band
* Adam and Dave's Bloodline
* Sarsaparilla
* Tough Guys Take Over
***Get in for $10 if you bring a completed RecycleNOW petition sheet available at www.recyclenowphiladelphia.org***
Tickets are $15 and available at www.cleanair.org
Win great prizes from PhillyCarShare, Sun and Earth, Starbucks, and more...
For more info contact Katie Edwards at kedwards@cleanair.org or 215.567.4004 ext 107
Recycle NOW Philadelphia is an all volunteer citizens’ campaign. In order to keep this campaign running, funds are needed to cover costs ranging from transportation to printing. All proceeds from this event will go directly to supporting campaign costs. For more about RecycleNOW Philadelphia please visit http://www.recyclenowphiladelphia.org.
Working with Scavengers and Habitat for Humanity
City council needs to do more than pass laws to prohibit recyclable stealing by scavengers although that is probably an easy first step. The city needs to examine ways in which much of the stuff beyond the easy things to recycle like metal cans and paper such as old electronics can be consolidated and recycled. Getting scavengers to help with the difficult items that can be profitably sold only if there is sufficient quantity would be a mutually beneficial proposition for both the city and the scavengers. Maybe this just means having more collection sites or maybe its something like giving out flyers with numbers to call like 1-800-Get-Junk or encouraging folks to post bigs items on craigslist before putting them out in the trash. Heck, put a link on city.gov home page so that folks can post to craigslist easily.
In the suburbs, folks are charged a fee, let's say $20 for putting out a big appliance. In Philly, you can rehab a house and the city is responsible for removing tons of rubble and bricks as long as it is on the curb. While it's nice that the city's pickup policy is so generous, should the rest of us really have to pay for cheap contractors and landfills filled with reusable bricks?
In addition, maybe Michael Nutter or some members of City Council can talk to Habitat for Humanity about starting a deconstruction crew (example in Wisconsin) and provide jobs for some of those ex-cons.
--Mike
Weeds in the Sidewalk