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Do you recycle? I don't even have the option. (Also incentivizing "green" behavior)

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Posts

  • enc0reenc0re Registered User regular
    edited February 2012
    We just got a great recycling upgrade this past month. I'm really happy with my township. It's called streamlined recycling. Instead of having to sort your recycling into different bins, each house got a large wheeled garbage bin that you throw all your recycleables into: glass, plastic, paper, aluminum, etc. Then they have a fancy machine at the recycling yard that shreds and sorts it out.

    Recycling has never been this easy for me. Loving it.

    enc0re on
  • bowenbowen How you doin'? Registered User regular
    Octoparrot wrote:
    Uh drive your shit somewhere you CAN recycle it?

    Makes sense to waste gas to recycle something that probably outweighs all the costs associated with using said gas.

    not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
  • SaammielSaammiel Registered User regular
    enc0re wrote:
    We just got a great recycling upgrade this past month. I'm really happy with my township. It's called streamlined recycling. Instead of having to sort your recycling into different bins, each house got a large wheeled garbage bin that you throw all your recycleables into: glass, plastic, paper, aluminum, etc. Then they have a fancy machine at the recycling yard that shreds and sorts it out.

    Recycling has never been this easy for me. Loving it.


    It is really nice for the end-user, and it does bump up recycling rates, but IMO multi-stream is better if you can get community buy-in. Sorting problems are magnified in single stream systems precisely due to the fact that various materials are co-mingling. It basically transfers the onus on seperation from the consumer to the recycling center, which isn't good because when consumers are seperating they are doing so from a 'pure' stance more or less. They are less likely to be putting a peanut-butter laden Jiff container on top of the newspaper. In contract, single stream systems have a lot more contamination issues as well as things like broken glass. And those fancy machines really have a long way to go before they can reliably seperate all of the products handled in a modern recycling program.

    There are some advantages to single stream though like I said. You increase participation rates, you reduce capital requirements on the waste management company (they can re-use old trucks), and consumers are happy. But there are back-end costs.

  • SniperGuySniperGuy SniperGuyGaming Registered User regular
    Burtletoy wrote:
    I know this sounds like a crazy thread to have in 2012, but I don't recycle at home. It isn't because I don't want to. I can't. I live in a private community that pays for private waste removal, and we don't contract with a recycling company. I know other people in private communities in the same predicament, but I also know people in public communities where they either not collect recycling, or don't collect recycling on a regular basis, which makes it hard for people to recycle. At the same time, as much as I don't want to throw my plastic bottles into garbage cans when I am out, it can be next to impossible to find a recycling bin in many places. Does anyone else face simmiliar problems, or have ideas about what we can be doing as a society to make recycling easier and more efficient?

    Go to the public recycling bins that are undoubtedly located all the fuck over every town in america?

    This is not a thing. Maybe where you live. Where I live? This is not a thing at all.

  • BurtletoyBurtletoy Registered User regular
    Pi-r8 wrote:
    Octoparrot wrote:
    Uh drive your shit somewhere you CAN recycle it?
    here's the problem: going off these numbers, driving costs about 40 KwH to drive 30 miles (or 15 miles distance round trip). And all of the stuff we use in a day costs only 48KwH. So even with 100% efficient recycling, the energy savings would be minimal. With most stuff that's not aluminum cans, the energy savings are a lot less than 100%. Not to mention that you can also recover some energy by burning the trash in an incinerator.

    So no... don't make an extra car trip for recycling. It's actually better to just throw it away. Except, like ELM mentioned, for the really nasty stuff like electronics that just need to keep out of the soil.

    Wait. Who drives to the recycling plant every day?

  • OctoparrotOctoparrot Registered User regular
    bowen wrote:
    Octoparrot wrote:
    Uh drive your shit somewhere you CAN recycle it?

    Makes sense to waste gas to recycle something that probably outweighs all the costs associated with using said gas.

    Gee golly I believe Arch covered this response; make it a part of your commute. Or take the bus like some of us.

  • SynthesisSynthesis Honda Today! Registered User regular
    edited February 2012
    OP's case doesn't seem unusual--the last three apartment complexes I lived all had their own trash pickup services, and none of them offered any sort of recycling.

    If you want to recycle, the mantra (here in the US) seems to be keep all youre recyclables in a box or bag or whatever and then drive to the nearest place that actually does it. I live in a small city in Georgia, though, so I actually suspect the emissions of me driving somewhere to dump my small quantity of recyclable trash (I live alone) might basically be a overall "negative" in terms of the environment. Though that would have to do with me not knowing a place less than 20 minutes away I could do it anyway. Of course, I'm not certain this is the case since I haven't done the math on the subject. Hilariously, I actually live in one of the few cities in the area with something resembling a bus route (it just doesn't go to my apartment), though if it did, I wonder how they'd respond to me carrying a large trashbag with me onto the bus everhy so often.

    It's a bummer. I grew up with mandatory recycling (with recycling being picked up alongside trash), but that's just how things are in the US South.

    Synthesis on
  • bowenbowen How you doin'? Registered User regular
    edited February 2012
    Octoparrot wrote:
    bowen wrote:
    Octoparrot wrote:
    Uh drive your shit somewhere you CAN recycle it?

    Makes sense to waste gas to recycle something that probably outweighs all the costs associated with using said gas.

    Gee golly I believe Arch covered this response; make it a part of your commute. Or take the bus like some of us.

    Yes that would not be part of my daily commute no matter what. The trash/recycling plants are nowhere near my daily commute. My daily commute is 3 miles round trip.

    Nearest trash plant? 25, next one over? 50.

    It'd be cheaper for me to pay someone to eat my trash. And the total cost to the environment of me using that gasoline? Totally negates any benefit from recycling. If it were limited resources (aluminium which I can recycle in my daily commute), yes, I do that. If it's glass and paper? No, fuck you.

    bowen on
    not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
  • ThanatosThanatos Registered User regular
    I guess the "recycling is everywhere" is just a West Coast thing.

    I mean, about half the time when there's a trash can on a street corner, there's a recycle bin right next to it. And I'm fairly sure that recycling pickup is mandatory in the city of Seattle, if not the entire state of Washington.

  • Pi-r8Pi-r8 Registered User regular
    Burtletoy wrote:
    Pi-r8 wrote:
    Octoparrot wrote:
    Uh drive your shit somewhere you CAN recycle it?
    here's the problem: going off these numbers, driving costs about 40 KwH to drive 30 miles (or 15 miles distance round trip). And all of the stuff we use in a day costs only 48KwH. So even with 100% efficient recycling, the energy savings would be minimal. With most stuff that's not aluminum cans, the energy savings are a lot less than 100%. Not to mention that you can also recover some energy by burning the trash in an incinerator.

    So no... don't make an extra car trip for recycling. It's actually better to just throw it away. Except, like ELM mentioned, for the really nasty stuff like electronics that just need to keep out of the soil.

    Wait. Who drives to the recycling plant every day?
    Yeah, good point. That math is not right. But I still think my main point is correct- the energy savings from recycling are pretty minimal compared to what we waste on driving and flying. I guess if you drink from a whole lot of aluminum cans it might be worthwhile though.

  • SynthesisSynthesis Honda Today! Registered User regular
    Veevee wrote:
    TehSpectre wrote:
    Many schools, grocery stores, Wal-marts, etc etc have recycling dumpsters outside of their buildings. Just haul your stuff there every so often and there you go.

    Don't do this unless it is actually designated as a public dumpster. It is a crime to dump trash and recycling in a business's dumpster without their permission

    Yeah, hence my dilemma. Furthermore, I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if the local Wal-Mart dumbsters (which aren't marked, from what I've seen, but I haven't investigated the matter) aren't even subjected to recycling all the time.

    But more pressingly, it is illegal.

  • Evil MultifariousEvil Multifarious Registered User regular
    edited February 2012
    My city makes it very easy to recycle - my apartment is literally across the hall from a bunch of giant recycling bins that are regularly emptied - but my friends who live in Newfoundland were telling me that the province only discovered recycling this year. And most people still don't do it. This is the provincial capital they live in, mind you.

    Evil Multifarious on
  • BurtletoyBurtletoy Registered User regular
    Thanatos wrote:
    I guess the "recycling is everywhere" is just a West Coast thing.

    I mean, about half the time when there's a trash can on a street corner, there's a recycle bin right next to it. And I'm fairly sure that recycling pickup is mandatory in the city of Seattle, if not the entire state of Washington.

    It's pretty ubiquitous in Michigan.

    And its pretty common in Kansas, too. Or at least, this small liberal corner of Kansas. I don't really travel to the other spots in this state.

  • SniperGuySniperGuy SniperGuyGaming Registered User regular
    Thanatos wrote:
    I guess the "recycling is everywhere" is just a West Coast thing.

    I mean, about half the time when there's a trash can on a street corner, there's a recycle bin right next to it. And I'm fairly sure that recycling pickup is mandatory in the city of Seattle, if not the entire state of Washington.

    Yeah the west coast is all about being eco friendly. I'm closer to the east coast and more in the south. Telling people to recycle gets you made fun of.

  • BurtletoyBurtletoy Registered User regular
    Synthesis wrote:
    Veevee wrote:
    TehSpectre wrote:
    Many schools, grocery stores, Wal-marts, etc etc have recycling dumpsters outside of their buildings. Just haul your stuff there every so often and there you go.

    Don't do this unless it is actually designated as a public dumpster. It is a crime to dump trash and recycling in a business's dumpster without their permission

    Yeah, hence my dilemma. Furthermore, I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if the local Wal-Mart dumbsters (which aren't marked, from what I've seen, but I haven't investigated the matter) aren't even subjected to recycling all the time.

    But more pressingly, it is illegal.


    Going from memory/anecdotal evidence, many wal marts, during their negotiations with the city to be allowed to build a wal mart, are required to offer recycling.

  • SynthesisSynthesis Honda Today! Registered User regular
    Burtletoy wrote:
    Synthesis wrote:
    Veevee wrote:
    TehSpectre wrote:
    Many schools, grocery stores, Wal-marts, etc etc have recycling dumpsters outside of their buildings. Just haul your stuff there every so often and there you go.

    Don't do this unless it is actually designated as a public dumpster. It is a crime to dump trash and recycling in a business's dumpster without their permission

    Yeah, hence my dilemma. Furthermore, I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if the local Wal-Mart dumbsters (which aren't marked, from what I've seen, but I haven't investigated the matter) aren't even subjected to recycling all the time.

    But more pressingly, it is illegal.


    Going from memory/anecdotal evidence, many wal marts, during their negotiations with the city to be allowed to build a wal mart, are required to offer recycling.

    I intensely dislike the thought of driving to Walmart if I could help it, but it's still much closer than the alternative (drive onto a dormitory hall on campus with my recyclables), so I'll need to do some investigating.

  • SirUltimosSirUltimos Don't talk, Rusty. Just paint. Registered User regular
    Thanatos wrote:
    Had a buddy that tried to "properly" dispose of a CRT monitor that was gigantic. The exchange went like this:
    "Hi, do you recycle monitors?" /holding huge CRT
    "Yes, we'ill do it for $75-100."
    "Oh ok, Ill be right back with my checkbook" /sets CRT down, walks out, drives away

    When I worked at radioshack we would recycle batteries for free, we had boxes behind the register we would just bag them and throw them in a box till it was full, then mailed the prepaid box out.

    I remember when living in NOVA in 1993 and having to recycle everything, plastic/glass/cans, and we even had to seperate newspapers. We still do not recycle in SWVA.... in the county or city.
    In California, retailers charge you a fee when they sell you a monitor or TV, and then disposal is free.

    This is really how every state should do it.

    This is how it's done in Ontario, as well. Only they add the fee onto anything electronic.

    My city actually goes one step further, as well. We don't have "garbage" bags anymore. We have 3 seperate bags: A clear bag for garbage, a blue bag for recyclables, and a green bag for wet, compostable waste. The city collects all 3 and does the appropriate things with it.

  • FeralFeral MEMETICHARIZARD interior crocodile alligator ⇔ ǝɹʇɐǝɥʇ ǝᴉʌoɯ ʇǝloɹʌǝɥɔ ɐ ǝʌᴉɹp ᴉRegistered User regular
    Thanatos wrote:
    I guess the "recycling is everywhere" is just a West Coast thing.

    I mean, about half the time when there's a trash can on a street corner, there's a recycle bin right next to it. And I'm fairly sure that recycling pickup is mandatory in the city of Seattle, if not the entire state of Washington.

    pvp20110405.png

    every person who doesn't like an acquired taste always seems to think everyone who likes it is faking it. it should be an official fallacy.

    the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
  • spacekungfumanspacekungfuman Poor and minority-filled Registered User, __BANNED USERS regular
    I did some searching, and apparently there are no public recycling plants in my entire township (there are tons of villages in the township). If you are not in a pick up zone, there is no where you can go to recycle. My car also doesn't get very good gas mileage, and takes premium, so I guess the cost of recycling would outweigh the benefit? The only place I can think of that I could go to recycle would be those machines outside stores where you collect the bottle deposits, and I'm just not doing that. Even if I wanted to hire a private recycling company to come to my house and pick up my recycling (no idea if this exists) I don't think that they would let them past the gate.

    And to the people who said I should lobby the housing association, the only thing it does is meet once a year to pass the budget, and it never takes any action that would increase monthly payments, or which would hurt our ability to run at a surplus.

  • lonelyahavalonelyahava Call me Ahava ~~She/Her~~ Move to New ZealandRegistered User regular
    back in my parent's hometown in delaware there are 2 recycling centers that you can drop off the big things (TV and monitors and what not) as well as bags of pretty much everything else. or, there are these big dumpsters outside of at least 2 grocery stores in town. Those are the most fun, especially the glass ones. used to have the best time tossing glass bottles into the bins and listening to them shatter. The best sound and so very therapeutic.

    Down here? everything is recycled.

    The council provides for a garbage bin on wheels, and a recycling bin on wheels. The recycling bin can be filled with plastic, metal, and glass. Cardboard and paper are set out on their own near the bins. And there are council provided (well we have to buy them) garbage bags for regular waste and compostable garden waste as well. Between the 2 of us we can fill one of the 6L garbage bags every 2 weeks, sometimes 3 weeks depending. And the recycling bin is collected every 2 weeks. it's not even a thought for me anymore. When i first got down here it was a conscious effort for me to make sure the recycling got put where it was supposed to. Now, it's just instinct.

    The only thing that we don't recycle right now in our area is the plastic grocery bags. our section of the city just doesn't have that facility set up. yet. They're working on it. But that's ok, because what rare chances that we get plastic grocery bags at we save them and reuse them for rubbish bags in our small kitchen/bedroom/bathroom bins.

    We do most of our grocery shopping at a store that charges 10 cents per bag, so we bring our own reusable bags. And other shopping like for clothing or craft goodies, I almost always have my own reusable bag/purse thing that i put my purchases in.

    But then, new zealand is HUGE on environmental awareness and policies and saving the world bit by bit. Might have something to do with the giant hole in the ozone that sits over the country....

  • poshnialloposhniallo Registered User regular
    edited February 2012
    "I live in a special community for rich people. We don't care about recycling, we don't know anything about recycling, we don't allow recyclers in to our special community, we don't recycle and we think some forms of recycling are icky.

    Pity us!"

    poshniallo on
    I figure I could take a bear.
  • JarsJars Registered User regular
    depends. some of the byproducts of stuff like paper is way worse than tossing it in a landfill, of which we can pretty much unlimited space for all our trash.

    stuff like aluminum and glass is worth recycling

  • VanguardVanguard But now the dream is over. And the insect is awake.Registered User, __BANNED USERS regular
    edited February 2012
    I did some searching, and apparently there are no public recycling plants in my entire township (there are tons of villages in the township). If you are not in a pick up zone, there is no where you can go to recycle. My car also doesn't get very good gas mileage, and takes premium, so I guess the cost of recycling would outweigh the benefit? The only place I can think of that I could go to recycle would be those machines outside stores where you collect the bottle deposits, and I'm just not doing that. Even if I wanted to hire a private recycling company to come to my house and pick up my recycling (no idea if this exists) I don't think that they would let them past the gate.

    And to the people who said I should lobby the housing association, the only thing it does is meet once a year to pass the budget, and it never takes any action that would increase monthly payments, or which would hurt our ability to run at a surplus.

    Yeah, that's just lazy. I mean, I get it, it's not convenient, but going against the dominant way of living usually never is. You know how often you need to take out the recycling? Once a week. Seriously, if you rinse your shit like you're supposed to it won't smell and you can just collect it all week to drop off your cans and bottles areas.

    As far as your housing association goes, you can still can still certainly get a meeting together. Do some research about environmental organizations in your area. Call them and ask about resources for this stuff. If you live in a private, gated community in the middle of fuck all stickfuck, you may be out of luck, but I doubt there are no options. It may be as simple as talking to your neighbors. If enough people within a community demand something, shit will get done. I used to organize electronics recycling days for electronics and we'd get people who drove a solid hour to drop their shit because of the partnerships we had with local organizations.

    Where do you live, out of curiosity?

    Vanguard on
  • JacobkoshJacobkosh Gamble a stamp. I can show you how to be a real man!Moderator mod
    Burtletoy wrote:
    Thanatos wrote:
    I guess the "recycling is everywhere" is just a West Coast thing.

    I mean, about half the time when there's a trash can on a street corner, there's a recycle bin right next to it. And I'm fairly sure that recycling pickup is mandatory in the city of Seattle, if not the entire state of Washington.

    It's pretty ubiquitous in Michigan.

    And its pretty common in Kansas, too. Or at least, this small liberal corner of Kansas. I don't really travel to the other spots in this state.

    We've had easy-peasy curbside recycling for almost twenty years now in Johnson County.

    rRwz9.gif
  • finnithfinnith ... TorontoRegistered User regular
    poshniallo wrote:
    "I live in a special community for rich people. We don't care about recycling, we don't know anything about recycling, we don't allow recyclers in to our special community, we don't recycle and we think some forms of recycling are icky.

    Pity us!"

    This was entertainingly horrible.

    In any case I don't see how you can expect normal people to be so activist when it comes to recycling @arch. It's a real untenable position to say that realistically speaking.

    Bnet: CavilatRest#1874
    Steam: CavilatRest
  • ZombiemamboZombiemambo Registered User regular
    It might be worth recycling plastic if only to prevent contributing to the massive islands made of plastic floating in the ocean. That shit ain't okay, yo.

    JKKaAGp.png
  • zerg rushzerg rush Registered User regular
    edited February 2012
    Thanatos wrote:
    Had a buddy that tried to "properly" dispose of a CRT monitor that was gigantic. The exchange went like this:
    "Hi, do you recycle monitors?" /holding huge CRT
    "Yes, we'ill do it for $75-100."
    "Oh ok, Ill be right back with my checkbook" /sets CRT down, walks out, drives away

    When I worked at radioshack we would recycle batteries for free, we had boxes behind the register we would just bag them and throw them in a box till it was full, then mailed the prepaid box out.

    I remember when living in NOVA in 1993 and having to recycle everything, plastic/glass/cans, and we even had to seperate newspapers. We still do not recycle in SWVA.... in the county or city.
    In California, retailers charge you a fee when they sell you a monitor or TV, and then disposal is free.

    This is really how every state should do it.

    That's how all disposal/recycling should work, not just CRTs.

    If it costs <x> to recycle something, then add <2x> to the cost to purchase it and give back <x> when they return it to the center. Aluminum cans should cost an extra 10 cents each (5 cents back when you recycle), CRTs should cost an extra $200 ($100 back when you recycle), etc.

    "Oh but if people don't recycle, they have to pay twice as much!" Yeah, that's the whole point!

    zerg rush on
  • enc0reenc0re Registered User regular
    Saammiel wrote:
    enc0re wrote:
    We just got a great recycling upgrade this past month. I'm really happy with my township. It's called streamlined recycling. Instead of having to sort your recycling into different bins, each house got a large wheeled garbage bin that you throw all your recycleables into: glass, plastic, paper, aluminum, etc. Then they have a fancy machine at the recycling yard that shreds and sorts it out.

    Recycling has never been this easy for me. Loving it.

    It is really nice for the end-user, and it does bump up recycling rates, but IMO multi-stream is better if you can get community buy-in. Sorting problems are magnified in single stream systems precisely due to the fact that various materials are co-mingling. It basically transfers the onus on seperation from the consumer to the recycling center, which isn't good because when consumers are seperating they are doing so from a 'pure' stance more or less. They are less likely to be putting a peanut-butter laden Jiff container on top of the newspaper. In contract, single stream systems have a lot more contamination issues as well as things like broken glass. And those fancy machines really have a long way to go before they can reliably seperate all of the products handled in a modern recycling program.

    There are some advantages to single stream though like I said. You increase participation rates, you reduce capital requirements on the waste management company (they can re-use old trucks), and consumers are happy. But there are back-end costs.

    I used to not recycle. Now I recycle everything I can. From my perspective, single stream is a winner. I even approve of the tax/millage increase that paid for it.

  • lonelyahavalonelyahava Call me Ahava ~~She/Her~~ Move to New ZealandRegistered User regular
    I honestly don't see anything about what Arch suggested being untenable.

    It's completely and totally possible to do everything that he suggested, and it doesn't really take that much more of your time or energy.

    now if you really don't care about recycling, if you think that you can't be bothered or are in some odd situation like bowen where there is literally a big production about it, then yeah. Maybe it's not possible.

    of course you could always lobby, or use collective action, to get what you want. but that would require some commitment to recycling.

    same goes for the OP. I'm sure that if you and your neighbors got together and formed a, i dunno, collective action committee to lobby or bargain with the owners of the complex, you could probably get recycling for your community. True, you might have to pay some extra dues or fees or taxes, but it's for the greater good of not only yourself, but also your community, right?

  • spacekungfumanspacekungfuman Poor and minority-filled Registered User, __BANNED USERS regular
    finnith wrote:
    poshniallo wrote:
    "I live in a special community for rich people. We don't care about recycling, we don't know anything about recycling, we don't allow recyclers in to our special community, we don't recycle and we think some forms of recycling are icky.

    Pity us!"

    This was entertainingly horrible.

    In any case I don't see how you can expect normal people to be so activist when it comes to recycling @arch. It's a real untenable position to say that realistically speaking.

    I cracked up at that one too.
    Vanguard wrote:
    I did some searching, and apparently there are no public recycling plants in my entire township (there are tons of villages in the township). If you are not in a pick up zone, there is no where you can go to recycle. My car also doesn't get very good gas mileage, and takes premium, so I guess the cost of recycling would outweigh the benefit? The only place I can think of that I could go to recycle would be those machines outside stores where you collect the bottle deposits, and I'm just not doing that. Even if I wanted to hire a private recycling company to come to my house and pick up my recycling (no idea if this exists) I don't think that they would let them past the gate.

    And to the people who said I should lobby the housing association, the only thing it does is meet once a year to pass the budget, and it never takes any action that would increase monthly payments, or which would hurt our ability to run at a surplus.

    Yeah, that's just lazy. I mean, I get it, it's not convenient, but going against the dominant way of living usually never is. You know how often you need to take out the recycling? Once a week. Seriously, if you rinse your shit like you're supposed to it won't smell and you can just collect it all week to drop off your cans and bottles areas.

    As far as your housing association goes, you can still can still certainly get a meeting together. Do some research about environmental organizations in your area. Call them and ask about resources for this stuff. If you live in a private, gated community in the middle of fuck all stickfuck, you may be out of luck, but I doubt there are no options. It may be as simple as talking to your neighbors. If enough people within a community demand something, shit will get done. I used to organize electronics recycling days for electronics and we'd get people who drove a solid hour to drop their shit because of the partnerships we had with local organizations.

    Where do you live, out of curiosity?

    I live in Long Island. I don't understand how Nassau county can not have drop off sites, but that seems to be the case.

    The only things I am aware of the housing community ever approving were the construction of two saunas in the club house a couple of years ago and building a playground like 10 years back. I guess it's worth a shot though.

  • spacekungfumanspacekungfuman Poor and minority-filled Registered User, __BANNED USERS regular
    I honestly don't see anything about what Arch suggested being untenable.

    It's completely and totally possible to do everything that he suggested, and it doesn't really take that much more of your time or energy.

    now if you really don't care about recycling, if you think that you can't be bothered or are in some odd situation like bowen where there is literally a big production about it, then yeah. Maybe it's not possible.

    of course you could always lobby, or use collective action, to get what you want. but that would require some commitment to recycling.

    same goes for the OP. I'm sure that if you and your neighbors got together and formed a, i dunno, collective action committee to lobby or bargain with the owners of the complex, you could probably get recycling for your community. True, you might have to pay some extra dues or fees or taxes, but it's for the greater good of not only yourself, but also your community, right?

    We own the community. It is governed by a home owners association, and we farm out day to day things like landscaping, snow removal (which is awesome. They shovel right to my door and when there is a big storm they cart the snow away using a back hoe and dump trucks) and maintaining the pool and tennis courts to a management company. The home owners association would have to approve recycling pick ups. I doubt it will, but it may be worth a shot.

  • VanguardVanguard But now the dream is over. And the insect is awake.Registered User, __BANNED USERS regular
    If you can get enough people on board, there's no reason why they wouldn't, aside from being grouchy and resistant to change. Depending on the infrastructure, it may not even cost that much more. I'll look into LI. I live in Brooklyn and we have curbside pickup so I don't have too much to think about besides rinsing my shit and making us stuff is actually recyclable.

  • HyphyKezzyHyphyKezzy The Best On MarsRegistered User regular
    zerg rush wrote:
    Thanatos wrote:
    Had a buddy that tried to "properly" dispose of a CRT monitor that was gigantic. The exchange went like this:
    "Hi, do you recycle monitors?" /holding huge CRT
    "Yes, we'ill do it for $75-100."
    "Oh ok, Ill be right back with my checkbook" /sets CRT down, walks out, drives away

    When I worked at radioshack we would recycle batteries for free, we had boxes behind the register we would just bag them and throw them in a box till it was full, then mailed the prepaid box out.

    I remember when living in NOVA in 1993 and having to recycle everything, plastic/glass/cans, and we even had to seperate newspapers. We still do not recycle in SWVA.... in the county or city.
    In California, retailers charge you a fee when they sell you a monitor or TV, and then disposal is free.

    This is really how every state should do it.

    That's how all disposal/recycling should work, not just CRTs.

    If it costs <x> to recycle something, then add <2x> to the cost to purchase it and give back <x> when they return it to the center. Aluminum cans should cost an extra 10 cents each (5 cents back when you recycle), CRTs should cost an extra $200 ($100 back when you recycle), etc.

    "Oh but if people don't recycle, they have to pay twice as much!" Yeah, that's the whole point!

    Isn't that what the deposit price on all the bottles and cans is all about? Like the beer I'm drinking right now has two different deposit prices shown across the eleven states listed. I always just put my recycling curbside but I thought that was the amount you were supposed to get back if you brought them in yourself.

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  • ArchArch Neat-o, mosquito! Registered User regular
    Spacekungfuman, what really is your goal here?

    "I can't recycle at all, there are a million barriers to me recycling, and any idea you propose that isn't 'they pick it up at my house' absolutely can't work for me."

    That seems to be what you are saying here. Do you just want a bunch of people to go "Yeah! Fuck recycling anyway!" so that you can write off recycling as a stupid idea?

    Where do you work? Does your company not have a recycling program? Have you looked? Does your grocery store not have recycling bins located in the store?

    Same goes to you Bowen- you claim that it is a huge production for you, but I thought you worked at a hospital?

    Most hospitals have an institutional recycling program for employees to use.

    Guys, seriously, recycling isn't this difficult.

    And if it is? The only answer is to do what you can to make it easier.

    A lot of people are being huge geese when it comes to this, and I can't help but agree with @Poshniallo.

  • ArchArch Neat-o, mosquito! Registered User regular
    finnith wrote:
    poshniallo wrote:
    "I live in a special community for rich people. We don't care about recycling, we don't know anything about recycling, we don't allow recyclers in to our special community, we don't recycle and we think some forms of recycling are icky.

    Pity us!"

    This was entertainingly horrible.

    In any case I don't see how you can expect normal people to be so activist when it comes to recycling @arch. It's a real untenable position to say that realistically speaking.

    The fact that "if you don't have curbside pickup for your recycling, sort it at home, find a drop center on a route you normally use, and dump it every few weeks" is considered some crazy level of activism that normal people don't do is infinitely depressing.

  • ThroThro pgroome@penny-arcade.com Registered User regular
    Arch wrote:
    finnith wrote:

    This was entertainingly horrible.

    In any case I don't see how you can expect normal people to be so activist when it comes to recycling @arch. It's a real untenable position to say that realistically speaking.

    The fact that "if you don't have curbside pickup for your recycling, sort it at home, find a drop center on a route you normally use, and dump it every few weeks" is considered some crazy level of activism that normal people don't do is infinitely depressing.
    Look, not everyone has access to recycling any reasonable distance from where they normally drive. As several people have already said, when there is a place to drive to, the use of gas outweighs the energy savings of recycling. There is a net loss to the environment if we go recycle.
    I still do what I can that actually helps. Glass bottles go back to the store I got them from, cause that's what they take and I get the deposit money.

    Speaking of glass, there was an earlier post that talked about how it's basically a waste to recycle the stuff. Where I am, they actually just reuse the returned bottles. I don't know what the energy cost is to cleaning them though (or how well they do it. . . ). It's definitely the cheapest option cost wise over recycling or making a new one, or they wouldn't be doing it.

  • OrganichuOrganichu poops peesRegistered User, Moderator mod
    edited February 2012
    it sort of looks like he's saying recycling is a lot more work for some people than for others, and that he wishes there were an easier way him to personally recycle. that doesn't seem all that preposterous.

    Organichu on
  • zerg rushzerg rush Registered User regular
    edited February 2012
    HyphyKezzy wrote:
    zerg rush wrote:
    Thanatos wrote:
    Had a buddy that tried to "properly" dispose of a CRT monitor that was gigantic. The exchange went like this:
    "Hi, do you recycle monitors?" /holding huge CRT
    "Yes, we'ill do it for $75-100."
    "Oh ok, Ill be right back with my checkbook" /sets CRT down, walks out, drives away

    When I worked at radioshack we would recycle batteries for free, we had boxes behind the register we would just bag them and throw them in a box till it was full, then mailed the prepaid box out.

    I remember when living in NOVA in 1993 and having to recycle everything, plastic/glass/cans, and we even had to seperate newspapers. We still do not recycle in SWVA.... in the county or city.
    In California, retailers charge you a fee when they sell you a monitor or TV, and then disposal is free.

    This is really how every state should do it.

    That's how all disposal/recycling should work, not just CRTs.

    If it costs <x> to recycle something, then add <2x> to the cost to purchase it and give back <x> when they return it to the center. Aluminum cans should cost an extra 10 cents each (5 cents back when you recycle), CRTs should cost an extra $200 ($100 back when you recycle), etc.

    "Oh but if people don't recycle, they have to pay twice as much!" Yeah, that's the whole point!

    Isn't that what the deposit price on all the bottles and cans is all about? Like the beer I'm drinking right now has two different deposit prices shown across the eleven states listed. I always just put my recycling curbside but I thought that was the amount you were supposed to get back if you brought them in yourself.

    Sort of. Not all states do it this way, and not all products are equally treated this way.

    Even a 'good' state like California messes it up. Aluminum cans have a CRV (increase the cost upfront, you get it back when you recycle it). But something like cell phones is on the hope system, where they just sorta pray that people return them. And some chemicals require you to pay to recycle them (resulting in the usual dumping when nobody's looking).

    There should just be one system: recycling and proper disposal pays you money to do it (and tacks the cost on the front end). It should work for everything everywhere, in an easy system people can understand instead of a hodgepodge depending on where you live and what item you're recycling. Creating a system with a dozen different exceptions and rules is just asking for people to get confused and stop doing it. Recycling should be brick dumb for a consumer to understand; do it, get reward.

    zerg rush on
  • enc0reenc0re Registered User regular
    edited February 2012
    I want to talk about recycling plastic. Here's my thought: since oil in places like Saudi Arabia is dirt cheap to get out of the ground, it will be extracted and used eventually. Perfect planet-wide cooperation to prevent it is impossible. In other words, even if nearly everybody agrees to cut CO2, someone will buy oil to burn at $2/barrel.

    However since oil makes plastic without being burned and therefore not releasing nearly as much CO2, putting plastic into landfills is effectively carbon capture/sequestration. Conclusion: make sure to throw away your plastic instead of recycling to save the planet from global climate change.

    enc0re on
  • bowenbowen How you doin'? Registered User regular
    edited February 2012
    Arch wrote:
    Same goes to you Bowen- you claim that it is a huge production for you, but I thought you worked at a hospital?

    Most hospitals have an institutional recycling program for employees to use.

    Guys, seriously, recycling isn't this difficult.

    And if it is? The only answer is to do what you can to make it easier.

    A lot of people are being huge geese when it comes to this, and I can't help but agree with Poshniallo.

    Ambulatory care clinic, we just started recycling cardboard this year. Employees aren't allowed to use it, we got the smallest container to save on costs. (we share the building)

    It is increasingly expensive and out of the way to recycle in my area. Most businesses don't do it because of that (you have to double your garbage pickup costs for a new bin basically).

    The closest place that will actually take my stuff is... quite a bit ways away from where I live and commute. Like I said my commute is 3 miles round trip. I can go to the store, they only take aluminum cans (and plastic bottles) and batteries, which we recycle.

    Paper,cardboard, glass? That gets trashed.

    If I wanted to drive 15~ miles (approximately how far it is, I had to check) I could drop off cardboard/paper. Though that seems relatively pointless, I'd be wasting more in gas starting my car than what is saved by recycling paper and cardboard.

    bowen on
    not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
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