As you may have noticed, every county has different requirements about what can and can’t be recycled. In time I have found that most people do not pay attention to the specifics about recycling, the act of recycling itself is enough to satisfy an uninterested consumer. But for those who are a little more curious as to why these regulations differ and what actually happens to the plastic bottle after you leave it in a recycling bin, these answers are hidden away. I find myself explaining to my peers that plastics don’t get recycled, they get “down-cycled”, all too often. So in order to write this article I called the United States Recycling Inc, located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and spoke to an extremely helpful man named Salvator who knew the answers to my basic questions more than the average Joe (to clarify, USRI handles domestic recycling and not construction scraps, which are handled by specific recycling companies that deal with large scrap material). My questions came from friends / other people asking me, and my own curiosity. I asked Salvator:
Four kinds of materials can be recycled: cardboard, paper, plastics, and scrap metal. Unfortunately, glass no longer gets recycled because there is no more incentive to do so. The glass market has practically disappeared so glass is no longer worth the economic value to recycle. This is bad news because glass and metal are the only two materials that can be fully recycled 100%, meaning that a glass jar / aluminum container can be melted down and turned into a brand new jar / container. Plastic on the other hand, cannot do this, instead it gets down-cycled until it can no longer be used and eventually landfilled.
a. Cardboard when it gets collected if it’s in good condition can be reused as cardboard. But usually when it’s collected, it goes to a mill to make gypsum board (aka sheetrock or drywall), which is used to make interior walls and ceilings. Cardboard can also be make into chipboard, which is used to make cereal boxes, notebook covers, etc. Office paper / mixed paper also goes to a mill and goes from high-grade paper to lower grades of paper. The good thing about paper materials is that once they can no longer be recycled or used, they can be composted so there is little environmental damage.
b. Plastics: there are many types of plastics, but to keep in simple lets just categorize into two groups, soft plastics (water bottles, plastic containers, plastic bags, etc.) and hard plastics (keyboards, toys, phones, appliances, etc.). Both types of plastics are recycled in similar ways, by shredding the plastic into pellets and then melting the pellets down to make new things. Soft plastics are usually converted into shrink wrap; depending on the grade and material used, shrink wrap can be very durable or flimsy. Hard plastics are usually turned into something else. But then I asked Salvator where these plastics go to actually get shredded, melted, and turned into something else. He told me that around 80% of collected recyclable plastics get shipped to China, because of the cheap labor. It makes more sense for US consumers to pay the cost of shipping recyclables and buying them again from China than having a domestic factory that does this because of the costs. This is due to labor costs and the low price of oil.
c. Metal is wonderful because it can be recycled 100%, along with glass. Metals are also easier to sort compared to glass because it does not shatter, it’s more lightweight, and comes in many different types.
The market for recyclables is very dependent on the price of oil. When oil prices are low, companies would spend more money to recycle rather than buy new. Recycling facilities will only spend the money and resources to ship some kind of material to be recycled if the volume makes it worth it; in other words, if there aren’t enough plastic bags to be recycled, the volume isn’t great enough, that batch will most likely go to a landfill instead. Understanding volume is important, it is the reason why different counties have different regulations about recycling. Recycling is a business, just like anything else. Money drives all decisions in the market economy, so if recycling doesn’t make economic sense for the customer it will diminish.
Now that we have a better understanding of how recycling works in the US, you can do your part by purchasing less plastic and more paper / metal material, especially at the grocery store where we throw away packaging every day! The fact that plastics are being shipped back and forth from China and the US is depressing, so much fossil fuel consumption just because it’s cheaper.
Thanks for reading!
Camilla
- What materials get recycled?
- How does each material get recycled?
- Where does each material get recycled?
- Why do different counties have different recycling regulations?
Four kinds of materials can be recycled: cardboard, paper, plastics, and scrap metal. Unfortunately, glass no longer gets recycled because there is no more incentive to do so. The glass market has practically disappeared so glass is no longer worth the economic value to recycle. This is bad news because glass and metal are the only two materials that can be fully recycled 100%, meaning that a glass jar / aluminum container can be melted down and turned into a brand new jar / container. Plastic on the other hand, cannot do this, instead it gets down-cycled until it can no longer be used and eventually landfilled.
a. Cardboard when it gets collected if it’s in good condition can be reused as cardboard. But usually when it’s collected, it goes to a mill to make gypsum board (aka sheetrock or drywall), which is used to make interior walls and ceilings. Cardboard can also be make into chipboard, which is used to make cereal boxes, notebook covers, etc. Office paper / mixed paper also goes to a mill and goes from high-grade paper to lower grades of paper. The good thing about paper materials is that once they can no longer be recycled or used, they can be composted so there is little environmental damage.
b. Plastics: there are many types of plastics, but to keep in simple lets just categorize into two groups, soft plastics (water bottles, plastic containers, plastic bags, etc.) and hard plastics (keyboards, toys, phones, appliances, etc.). Both types of plastics are recycled in similar ways, by shredding the plastic into pellets and then melting the pellets down to make new things. Soft plastics are usually converted into shrink wrap; depending on the grade and material used, shrink wrap can be very durable or flimsy. Hard plastics are usually turned into something else. But then I asked Salvator where these plastics go to actually get shredded, melted, and turned into something else. He told me that around 80% of collected recyclable plastics get shipped to China, because of the cheap labor. It makes more sense for US consumers to pay the cost of shipping recyclables and buying them again from China than having a domestic factory that does this because of the costs. This is due to labor costs and the low price of oil.
c. Metal is wonderful because it can be recycled 100%, along with glass. Metals are also easier to sort compared to glass because it does not shatter, it’s more lightweight, and comes in many different types.
The market for recyclables is very dependent on the price of oil. When oil prices are low, companies would spend more money to recycle rather than buy new. Recycling facilities will only spend the money and resources to ship some kind of material to be recycled if the volume makes it worth it; in other words, if there aren’t enough plastic bags to be recycled, the volume isn’t great enough, that batch will most likely go to a landfill instead. Understanding volume is important, it is the reason why different counties have different regulations about recycling. Recycling is a business, just like anything else. Money drives all decisions in the market economy, so if recycling doesn’t make economic sense for the customer it will diminish.
Now that we have a better understanding of how recycling works in the US, you can do your part by purchasing less plastic and more paper / metal material, especially at the grocery store where we throw away packaging every day! The fact that plastics are being shipped back and forth from China and the US is depressing, so much fossil fuel consumption just because it’s cheaper.
Thanks for reading!
Camilla