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How about this information from CT's DEEP which quotes the EPA for the majority of it's information? Compared to virgin materials, using recycled materials more

How about this information from CT's DEEP which quotes the EPA for the majority of it's information? Compared to virgin materials, using recycled materials more efficient by: - 40% for paper - 60-74% for steel and tin cans - 33% for plastics - 30% for glass - 5% for aluminum cans These numbers appear to be referencing the generation of new products using recycled vs new materials, but do they fail to take in to account the cost of actually getting those recycled materials (ie going from trash to the recycled paper pulp)? I always thought the 3 R's are in the order they are for a reason. Reduce - first step realize that happiness is not automatically linked to consumption. This is harder than it seems because this extends beyond product consumption to other forms of material consumption like traveling by plane or car (IC vs EV vs hybrid is a whole other debate) Reuse - once you have something, get the full use out of it, and try to repurpose it for other uses too if possible. Recycle - once you have used something to the point that can no longer serve it's purpose adequately because it's worn out, place it or parts of it in a recycling bin if possible. What this article and discussion has prompted me to do is research further into which parts of something deserve to be placed in the recycle bin (whether or not there is an established way to recycle them, ie plastics) and if certain reduction techniques aren't all they're cracked up to be (reusable straws and shopping bags) Reference: https://www.ct.gov/deep/cwp/view.asp?a=2714&q=440320 https://www.ct.gov/deep/cwp/view.asp?a=2714&q=440320

repsilat 7y ago
> using recycled materials more efficient by: > ... > - 5% for aluminum cans I found this phrasing confusing. From the article you linked, >> Aluminum can be recycled using less than 5 percent of the energy used to make the original product. (EPA) I would say that's more efficient by 95%. (Thank you for providing the link!)
- yongjik 7y ago
  Well, if you're using less than 5% of energy, that means with the same amount of energy you can make 20x. So I'd say it's actually 1900% more efficient.
- contactlight11 7y ago
  Yes, you are right! Each bullet point on their site tried to word it slightly differently so it was a little confusing. I messed up translating the aluminum one clearly. Thanks for pointing it out!
1338 7y ago
Most of the statistics are worded differently from that source, but according to the EPA, the energy used to make products with recycled materials is: paper: 40% less steel and tin: 60%-74% less plastic: 33% less glass: 30% less aluminum: 95% less edit:formatting
- FreeFull 7y ago
  Aluminium is the prime example of a material that's really worth recycling. Production of aluminium involves both high temperatures (950 to 980 degrees Celsius) and a rather large amount of electricity. Recycling just involves melting the aluminium down (The melting temperature is around 660 degrees Celsius).
  - SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
    >Production of aluminium involves both high temperatures (950 to 980 degrees Celsius) and a rather large amount of electricity. It’s rare I see anyone have even the slightest bit of actual production knowledge in these climate-related topics, so I appreciate that. You’re right about recycling aluminum. It’s also why a LOT of the new production work is done in Iceland with geothermal heat and nearly free electricity. Unfortunately, it makes so much sense to produce aluminum in Iceland, that it’s shipped from China to Iceland and back again to do so... on crude tanker fuel at very low efficiency.
Zarel 7y ago
That's weird. In my experience, products advertising "made using recycled materials" tend to be more expensive than without (with the exception of aluminum, which tends not to be advertised as recycled at all). Are there costs missing from your efficiency numbers?
- coldtea 7y ago
  >In my experience, products advertising "made using recycled materials" tend to be more expensive than without That's not necessarily because of their higher cost to produce. It's often because they target higher end "environmentally conscious" customers, and use the "made with recycled materials" as a price differentiation / market segmentation strategy (working class Joe? get our $1 notebook. Latte-sipping hipster? Here's our $5 recycled notebook)...
  - barrkel 7y ago
    You'd still expect recycled material to be used in preference to virgin materials for cheap products, if recycled material is actually more efficient.
    - C4stor 7y ago
      This doesn't forbid using recycled materials for cheaps products, you just don't advertise it.
      - tomstoms 7y ago
        In an economic system, a product will be sold at the highest price possible, so if advertising it as using recycled materials nets you higher profit, than you will do that. So even if non-recycled is more expensive to produce, it will be cheaper if people are not willing to pay as much for it.
        C4stor 7y ago
        There a lot of cases of the exact same product being sold at different price tags under different names/brands. In an economic system, a product tries to be sold at the highest price possible _for each potential buyer_, not as a whole.
AmericanChopper 7y ago
> first step realize that happiness is not automatically linked to consumption I’ve always thought that framing the issue like this is both smug and dishonest. Smug because you’re essentially saying that people are wrong about the things they believe bring them satisfaction and comfort. Dishonest because reduce in this context will always mean a reduction in quality of life. Aside from being an ineffective way to convince people of anything, it also seems counterproductive in the sense that it alienates people from caring about the issue.
- m0zg 7y ago
  This is a profoundly consumerist point of view, IMO. It presupposes that buying more stuff necessarily brings more satisfaction and comfort (which is not true in general once one's basic needs for security, food, shelter, and healthcare are met), and that having less stuff means "a reduction in quality of life" (also not true, having less stuff leads to an increase in quality of life for many people). There are demonstrably a lot of unsatisfied, uncomfortable people who have a lot of stuff and whose quality of life is quite poor, all things considered.
  - AmericanChopper 7y ago
    This position erroneously presupposes that life satisfaction and quality of life are the same thing. Many people are satisfied with a lower quality of life, and are more than happy to invest tremendous effort into things that others may expect to be more convenient. But the point of view in the parent comment is essentially “if you do not derive satisfaction in life from the same things that I do, then you are wrong”, which is remarkably arrogant and closed minded.
    - kilburn 7y ago
      Quality of life is a subjective issue [1], of which material possesion is just one amongst several dimensions. Therefore, it is perfectly possible for a person to improve their quality of life by consuming less: by the very definition of quality of life, it is enough for said person to feel that their quality of life improved as a result of consuming less for it to be true. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_of_life https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_of_life
remcob 7y ago
This only looks at energy consumed during production, not at (long term) availability of raw materials. It seems reasonable to assume that long term the cost of energy and recyclables will go down and that of non-renewables such as oils and ores will go up.
- pfdietz 7y ago
  We better worry about running out of aluminum. After all, it's only the third most abundant element in the Earth's crust. /s
emn13 7y ago
It's not clear to me from that link whether those savings apply to the whole supply chain or not. So when they say stuff like... "Producing recycled paper requires about 60 percent of the energy used to make paper from virgin wood pulp." ... does that include costs of reasonably sustainable forestry vs. reasonably sustainable old paper separation & collection? ... does it include non-financial costs made by the end-users of the original paper? ... does it include implicit costs of potentially lower quality paper (or if that's ever the case, the values of higher-quality)? ... does it include the opportunity costs (probably small) of whatever else you might do with that old paper, such as sequester carbon or burn for energy? ... does it consider costs of energy (some joules are cheaper and less damaging than others; so e.g. it may be wood->paper factors run where energy is trivially cheap and simply haven't bothered to try and be energy-efficient)? ... does it consider non-energy resources? Basically, it's not clear to me whether this is a technical argument about one of the important steps in the respective processes, or an overall assessment about the approaches going forward.
JoeAltmaier 7y ago
There's the in-home cost. My mother-in-law would run the cans and bottles through the dishwasher before putting them in the rcycle bin. The energy, hot water, soap constituted a catastrophic reversal of any possible gain from the recycling. Just driving the truck around the neighborhood to pick up the bins is a cost in diesel, human resources (which translate to carbon at some level).
- dwild 7y ago
  >My mother-in-law would run the cans and bottles through the dishwasher before putting them in the rcycle bin. That seems to be the issue, not the recycling program. > Just driving the truck around the neighborhood to pick up the bins is a cost in diesel, human resources (which translate to carbon at some level). The same truck would still drive arround though if you didn't have recycling program, it will just be a black truck instead of a green one.
  - JoeAltmaier 7y ago
    How many folks are derailing recycling out of a misconception of the issues involved? Most I would guess. Not sure what black/green means. We have separate recycling pickup vehicles around here. They wouldn't run at all if there were no recycling.
    - jrace 7y ago
      But then your garbage truck (black) would have to pick up all the recycling that the green truck used to pick up. So unless your current black trucks are never full then you would either need more black trucks or they would need to make 2x the trips.
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
    - pure-awesome 7y ago
      Not the previous poster, but it seems "black" represents garbage truck whilst "green" represents recycling. The argument they were making is if your garbage weren't going to a recycling plant, it would be going to a landfill. Either way, the same amount of waste has to be transported from your home, so the same number of trucks would still be driving around.

repsilat 7y ago

> using recycled materials more efficient by: > ... > - 5% for aluminum cans I found this phrasing confusing. From the article you linked, >> Aluminum can be recycled using less than 5 percent of the energy used to make the original product. (EPA) I would say that's more efficient by 95%. (Thank you for providing the link!)

yongjik 7y ago
Well, if you're using less than 5% of energy, that means with the same amount of energy you can make 20x. So I'd say it's actually 1900% more efficient.
contactlight11 7y ago
Yes, you are right! Each bullet point on their site tried to word it slightly differently so it was a little confusing. I messed up translating the aluminum one clearly. Thanks for pointing it out!

1338 7y ago

Most of the statistics are worded differently from that source, but according to the EPA, the energy used to make products with recycled materials is: paper: 40% less steel and tin: 60%-74% less plastic: 33% less glass: 30% less aluminum: 95% less edit:formatting

FreeFull 7y ago
Aluminium is the prime example of a material that's really worth recycling. Production of aluminium involves both high temperatures (950 to 980 degrees Celsius) and a rather large amount of electricity. Recycling just involves melting the aluminium down (The melting temperature is around 660 degrees Celsius).
- SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
  >Production of aluminium involves both high temperatures (950 to 980 degrees Celsius) and a rather large amount of electricity. It’s rare I see anyone have even the slightest bit of actual production knowledge in these climate-related topics, so I appreciate that. You’re right about recycling aluminum. It’s also why a LOT of the new production work is done in Iceland with geothermal heat and nearly free electricity. Unfortunately, it makes so much sense to produce aluminum in Iceland, that it’s shipped from China to Iceland and back again to do so... on crude tanker fuel at very low efficiency.

Zarel 7y ago

That's weird. In my experience, products advertising "made using recycled materials" tend to be more expensive than without (with the exception of aluminum, which tends not to be advertised as recycled at all). Are there costs missing from your efficiency numbers?

coldtea 7y ago
>In my experience, products advertising "made using recycled materials" tend to be more expensive than without That's not necessarily because of their higher cost to produce. It's often because they target higher end "environmentally conscious" customers, and use the "made with recycled materials" as a price differentiation / market segmentation strategy (working class Joe? get our $1 notebook. Latte-sipping hipster? Here's our $5 recycled notebook)...
- barrkel 7y ago
  You'd still expect recycled material to be used in preference to virgin materials for cheap products, if recycled material is actually more efficient.
  - C4stor 7y ago
    This doesn't forbid using recycled materials for cheaps products, you just don't advertise it.
    - tomstoms 7y ago
      In an economic system, a product will be sold at the highest price possible, so if advertising it as using recycled materials nets you higher profit, than you will do that. So even if non-recycled is more expensive to produce, it will be cheaper if people are not willing to pay as much for it.
      - C4stor 7y ago
        There a lot of cases of the exact same product being sold at different price tags under different names/brands. In an economic system, a product tries to be sold at the highest price possible _for each potential buyer_, not as a whole.

AmericanChopper 7y ago

> first step realize that happiness is not automatically linked to consumption I’ve always thought that framing the issue like this is both smug and dishonest. Smug because you’re essentially saying that people are wrong about the things they believe bring them satisfaction and comfort. Dishonest because reduce in this context will always mean a reduction in quality of life. Aside from being an ineffective way to convince people of anything, it also seems counterproductive in the sense that it alienates people from caring about the issue.

m0zg 7y ago
This is a profoundly consumerist point of view, IMO. It presupposes that buying more stuff necessarily brings more satisfaction and comfort (which is not true in general once one's basic needs for security, food, shelter, and healthcare are met), and that having less stuff means "a reduction in quality of life" (also not true, having less stuff leads to an increase in quality of life for many people). There are demonstrably a lot of unsatisfied, uncomfortable people who have a lot of stuff and whose quality of life is quite poor, all things considered.
- AmericanChopper 7y ago
  This position erroneously presupposes that life satisfaction and quality of life are the same thing. Many people are satisfied with a lower quality of life, and are more than happy to invest tremendous effort into things that others may expect to be more convenient. But the point of view in the parent comment is essentially “if you do not derive satisfaction in life from the same things that I do, then you are wrong”, which is remarkably arrogant and closed minded.
  - kilburn 7y ago
    Quality of life is a subjective issue [1], of which material possesion is just one amongst several dimensions. Therefore, it is perfectly possible for a person to improve their quality of life by consuming less: by the very definition of quality of life, it is enough for said person to feel that their quality of life improved as a result of consuming less for it to be true. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_of_life https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_of_life

remcob 7y ago

This only looks at energy consumed during production, not at (long term) availability of raw materials. It seems reasonable to assume that long term the cost of energy and recyclables will go down and that of non-renewables such as oils and ores will go up.

pfdietz 7y ago
We better worry about running out of aluminum. After all, it's only the third most abundant element in the Earth's crust. /s

emn13 7y ago

It's not clear to me from that link whether those savings apply to the whole supply chain or not. So when they say stuff like... "Producing recycled paper requires about 60 percent of the energy used to make paper from virgin wood pulp." ... does that include costs of reasonably sustainable forestry vs. reasonably sustainable old paper separation & collection? ... does it include non-financial costs made by the end-users of the original paper? ... does it include implicit costs of potentially lower quality paper (or if that's ever the case, the values of higher-quality)? ... does it include the opportunity costs (probably small) of whatever else you might do with that old paper, such as sequester carbon or burn for energy? ... does it consider costs of energy (some joules are cheaper and less damaging than others; so e.g. it may be wood->paper factors run where energy is trivially cheap and simply haven't bothered to try and be energy-efficient)? ... does it consider non-energy resources? Basically, it's not clear to me whether this is a technical argument about one of the important steps in the respective processes, or an overall assessment about the approaches going forward.

JoeAltmaier 7y ago

There's the in-home cost. My mother-in-law would run the cans and bottles through the dishwasher before putting them in the rcycle bin. The energy, hot water, soap constituted a catastrophic reversal of any possible gain from the recycling. Just driving the truck around the neighborhood to pick up the bins is a cost in diesel, human resources (which translate to carbon at some level).

dwild 7y ago
>My mother-in-law would run the cans and bottles through the dishwasher before putting them in the rcycle bin. That seems to be the issue, not the recycling program. > Just driving the truck around the neighborhood to pick up the bins is a cost in diesel, human resources (which translate to carbon at some level). The same truck would still drive arround though if you didn't have recycling program, it will just be a black truck instead of a green one.
- JoeAltmaier 7y ago
  How many folks are derailing recycling out of a misconception of the issues involved? Most I would guess. Not sure what black/green means. We have separate recycling pickup vehicles around here. They wouldn't run at all if there were no recycling.
  - jrace 7y ago
    But then your garbage truck (black) would have to pick up all the recycling that the green truck used to pick up. So unless your current black trucks are never full then you would either need more black trucks or they would need to make 2x the trips.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - pure-awesome 7y ago
    Not the previous poster, but it seems "black" represents garbage truck whilst "green" represents recycling. The argument they were making is if your garbage weren't going to a recycling plant, it would be going to a landfill. Either way, the same amount of waste has to be transported from your home, so the same number of trucks would still be driving around.