Woodsy Owl's message did work

[TheBigToyAuction.com]

Yes, particularly in e-waste. Depending on how old your computer is, a computer can have anywhere between $5 - $25 in gold just on the motherboard, not to mention all the copper.

I used to work for an e-cycler where we would accept or sometimes even charge to take old computers, break them into component pieces and then take the greenboards to local refineries to be smelted down.

It always amazed me when we would drive around south Philly in a pickup truck with $40,000 in gold in the open flatbed. My first couple of weeks there, I'd always be nervous when we'd stop for lunch at a Mcdonald's or something, and just leave the truck filled with open drums of gold in the parking lot. But since the real value was all hidden in greenboards, and nobody really knew what it was let alone wanted to steal it, eventually it beccame no big thing.

I imagine it'll be the same way with landfills in a few years as technology catches up and we find a way to make these things valuable.

I'm consistently impressed with how far we've come with recycling. We have further to go and the processes still need to be refined and made cheaper, but we've come a long, long way. The more convenient it is to recycle, the more people will do it.

Also, a little off-topic, but I've been reading lately about "landfill mining". By tonnage, there's actually more gold and silver in landfills then there is in the natural ore they were mined from. Also, you can take methane gas from old landfills and convert it into renewable energy, as well as recycle the tons of other metals, glass, plastic, and paper that were dumped before there were serious recycling initiatives. Companies like Alcoa have known about this for a long time, but the extraction process was always deemed too cost-prohibitive. Now, with skyrocketing commodity prices, it's getting to the point where it's economically feasible to try it.

I think that's pretty cool. I love the idea of actually making landfills productive.

[Brazoo]

Recycling stinks in a lot of ways.

Some plastics are fairly recyclable - some are recyclable at high financial and environmental cost. You still put energy into recycling something - and sometimes the energy in / energy out payoff is not that great.

For example, there are huge shipments of plastic being sent to China for melting down. You have to measure cost of shipping all that tonnage that distance - that's a HUGE amount of energy right there. Then you have to factor in the fact that in China they have a lot less environmental limitations. So if they're melting down all that plastic, and releasing the toxic chemicals back into the air there are a lot of arguments made that recycling is a lot more polluting than we think.

In the 3 'R's, "Reduce, Reuse and Recycle" - recycling is far and away the worst option, but since recycling has become so common - and sold to the general population as this incredible solution to save us - the other more important two 'R's often get ignored.

[Brazoo]

I'm consistently impressed with how far we've come with recycling. We have further to go and the processes still need to be refined and made cheaper, but we've come a long, long way. The more convenient it is to recycle, the more people will do it.

I'm a bit of a pessimist in this area - recycling has been extremely convenient in Toronto for years - and I honestly think that the more convenient recycling is, the less people think about reducing the amount of waste in the first place.

[TheBigToyAuction.com]

During college I ended up having this trouble all the time. I did a lot of internet selling, and once a week I'd head down to the student union building and dig through the paper recycling bin to pick up that week's unread student newspapers for packing material

I got yelled at on more than one occasion that I was the worst person on earth because those papers were meant for recycling and that by using them, I was single-handedly destroying the environment. I tried a few times to explain how much water and energy was used in the process of recycling paper and that it could still get recycled on the other end of its journey once I got another use out of it in its current state, but it was like arguing with a wall. (I was actually told once "well then you should go out and buy those biodegradable packing peanuts, then")

In the end, I found it was better just to agree and come back 10 minutes later when everyone was gone. We've had "recycle" thrown at us so much and so often that we don't even use common sense and think about "reuse" anymore.

Recycling stinks in a lot of ways.

Some plastics are fairly recyclable - some are recyclable at high financial and environmental cost. You still put energy into recycling something - and sometimes the energy in / energy out payoff is not that great.

For example, there are huge shipments of plastic being sent to China for melting down. You have to measure cost of shipping all that tonnage that distance - that's a HUGE amount of energy right there. Then you have to factor in the fact that in China they have a lot less environmental limitations. So if they're melting down all that plastic, and releasing the toxic chemicals back into the air there are a lot of arguments made that recycling is a lot more polluting than we think.

In the 3 'R's, "Reduce, Reuse and Recycle" - recycling is far and away the worst option, but since recycling has become so common - and sold to the general population as this incredible solution to save us - the other more important two 'R's often get ignored.

[MicromanZone]

Were you in Brooklyn?? Fellow former brooklynite here....no offense..

No offense taken Grew up in Brooklyn. In Brighton Beach before and during the transition from working class Jewish neighborhood to “Little Odessa.” The dog crap ratio is insane. My inner 11 year-old kicked in to help me dodge the tons of it that I saw.

[Brazoo]

During college I ended up having this trouble all the time. I did a lot of internet selling, and once a week I'd head down to the student union building and dig through the paper recycling bin to pick up that week's unread student newspapers for packing material

I got yelled at on more than one occasion that I was the worst person on earth because those papers were meant for recycling and that by using them, I was single-handedly destroying the environment. I tried a few times to explain how much water and energy was used in the process of recycling paper and that it could still get recycled on the other end of its journey once I got another use out of it in its current state, but it was like arguing with a wall. (I was actually told once "well then you should go out and buy those biodegradable packing peanuts, then")

In the end, I found it was better just to agree and come back 10 minutes later when everyone was gone. We've had "recycle" thrown at us so much and so often that we don't even use common sense and think about "reuse" anymore.

Yeah - That's exactly the kind of thing that bugs me about recycling! I mean, that's a very specific example, but even in general terms I think we tend to think things like that.

I do remember a time like Mikey is saying - where people would think nothing of throwing trash on the streets, and I think to some degree littering became unfashionable. I just wish all this extra waste became unfashionable too.

There's a LOT more disposable and non-reusable products now then there was years ago. People use to use mops, and dust rags, now people use Swiffers. People use to drink water from their tap, now even at home people drink bottled water.

Anyway - I don't mean to lecture or make myself seem better - I find myself using wasteful things too - it's hard not to. I try when I can, but I mostly just feel bad about this stuff. It's going to take something big to make a real difference I think.