Keeping tags on rubbish

Thousands of pieces of household rubbish are to be tracked using sophisticated mobile tags (BBC News and MIT press release)

Three thousand smart tags are going to be attached to things being thrown away. OK, so the researchers say that the resource use and manufacturing of the tags is justified by the information that will be gathered, but how does adding a tag this size (we're not taking a James Bond micro-gadget here) not contaminate the recycling stream of whatever it's attached to? One of the items mentioned is garden waste - I don't think they will compost, somehow. And the tag is made of electronic components, which are hard enough to reprocess thanks to all the toxic metals and so on.

"We hope that Trash Track will also point the way to a possible urban future: that of a system where, thanks to the pervasive usage of smart tags, 100 percent recycling could become a reality," says research assistant, Musstanser Tinauli.

Hang on - I can accept that for one research project it could be a good idea to track a load of rubbish. Pervasive (i.e. much wider) use of smart tags does not, to me, seem to be the way to go. Tags tell you where your stuff has been (if you care) when it is/after it has been there. What needs to happen is that the information from the research project needs to be used to identify where the biggest improvements to recycling flows can be made, so that consumers who do throw things away don't have to worry about it - as long as they put them in the appropriate bin, they are dealt with properly. There's no need to tag everything!

(Of course this research should also just be a part of the bigger picture, where efforts are also put into reduction and re-use so that there is less to recycle anyway, rather than reinforcing the idea of "I recycled it, so that's OK" regardless of whether or not the item was actually necessary in the first place, or still had useful life left in it.)

Concerns aside, I'll be interested to see where the tags end up, at what point they get removed (will they be crushed and melted down if attached to a glass bottle? Will they get recycled themselves if they are on other electronic equipment? What happens when an item is split up, e.g. mobile phone into plastic casing, screen and circuitry?), and whether the information gathered matches up with what we think we know from the conventional records of where particular waste streams go. It could shed some light on the old "recycling collected by X council actually goes to landfill" stories we see in the media from time to time. But as ever, the important thing is then what's actually DONE with the information...

Buy less - buy nothing?

Following up on yesterday's post about the mountains of recyclables building up - I wonder whether there is another ideal opportunity here. For a long time, councils and national government have pushed the recycling idea hard, promoting it perhaps (in my opinion) beyond its third place in the Reduce, Reuse, Recycle hierarchy. Perhaps this is because the other two have less council involvement, and so they just have less to tell us about those options, but I still feel they are the poor relations sometimes. Of course, we do need to recycle things - but where are the strong messages on not throwing away so much into any kind of bin? On making things last, repairing them, and finding new uses for old stuff? Or (gasp) buying less stuff in the first place? There's the beginnings of a movement on reducing packaging, but the idea of just not purchasing so much doesn't really seem to be getting as much exposure. Yet, if we didn't purchase so much, we wouldn't have to deal with so much recycling.

As I wrote yesterday, the Bank of England had just cut the interest rate by a massive 1.5%, to try kick-start the economy and keep us all buying stuff, so that we can continue with "business as usual". How big a financial crisis does it take to make us realise this isn't a sustainable way to live? (Answers on a reused envelope please...)

Neatly wrapping up these rhetorical musings is a reminder about Buy Nothing Day, 29th November. The wrapping is even recycled as it was used a couple of days ago by Mrs A over on The Rubbish Diet :)

Recycling - the clue's in the name

Recycling is a hot topic - there's no way we could even be thinking about "zero waste" without it. Yet how many people cheerfully fill up their blue bin, put it out every fortnight, and think no more about it? How many people are clamouring to be able to recycle plastics, Tetra packs, foil, batteries and all sorts of other things from the comfort of their own doorstep? After all there's nothing to lose - it all gets taken away and dealt with in a green way, and you don't have to worry about it.

Right?

Wrong.

The current global financial climate means that markets for recyclables (i.e. the contents of our recycling bins) are reducing or disappearing (as reported in this Times article today). Councils are having to store collected materials in the hope that prices will recover and they can sell them before long, but so much is being stored that a relaxation in storage regulations is being considered. The councils' whole recycling systems are built on the idea that someone, somewhere finds used newspapers/plastic bottles/steel cans a useful resource and is willing to pay for it. That income then helps pay for the recycling collections, centres, etc.

Now, that income is falling or disappearing. Less stuff is being manufactured, so less material is needed. As well as the question of where we can put all the stuff that is piling up, it seems that this could have implications for council coffers (some already under pressure following the Icelandic banking problems) if it continues, at least in terms of recycling services.

What sometimes seems a bit forgotten, and is not always emphasised enough in official recycling literature, is this. Recycling is called recycling because there is a cycle involved. Check out the logo! (One major exception was the series of TV ads remindng us that "the possibilities are endless" and that today's drinks can could be tomorrow's aeroplane... or drinks can. That campaign is now over.) But I think the constant (often negative) media focus on fortnightly collections and differing council policies detracts from that message, and makes it seem like recycling is "just about the bin".

For recycling to work, there has to be something completing the cycle, filling in the bit that goes from our recycling bin to the stuff we buy. How many people forget that bit when out shopping? Some things, like recycled kitchen roll, are pretty much mainstream, but other recycled things are still sold as "special", almost novelty items. Pens that tell you they are made from old drinks cups. Fleeces that are badged as being from plastic drinks bottles. Wouldn't it be great if these things were the norm, and you had to have stickers on things that were made from virgin materials instead? If everyday people, who didn't consider themselves "green", were supporting the market in recyclables without even knowing it? This already happens with some things, such as newspapers and food/drink can - is there any way the same can be done for other materials?

Our responsibility for an item doesn't end when we pop it in the blue bin. Without consumer demand for recycled items, that bottle or cardboard box you're about to put out could have nowhere to go. I'm not saying buy more - but collectively we could perhaps buy better?

Brought to you by the ISBO

This morning I finished off a packet of cranberries. I'm collecting plastic film for recycling with Polyprint, and I know they can take types 2 and 4, which Waste Online tells me is high- and low-density polyethylene, or HDPE and LDPE. But I'm still not sure whether that covers my cranberry bag - websites giving examples of types of plastic usually just describe HDPE as used in opaque milk bottles, and LDPE as carrier bags. So, I check the packet, and sure enough there is a "recycling information" panel. Woohoo!

It says: "Bag: plastic. Recyclable where facilities exist."

ISBO = Institute for the Statement of the Bleeding Obvious.