Should We Recycle Everything?

  • Right now, San Francisco is at 72% recycling. They also just passed legislation to make composting mandatory. (Photo source: Tewy at Wikimedia Commons)

Recycling has become the law in
San Francisco. Residents who fail
to recycle and compost will face
warnings and, eventually, a fine.
It’s part of the city’s goal to
eliminate waste altogether. But,
as Amy Standen reports, recycling
and composting can only take us
so far:

Transcript

Recycling has become the law in
San Francisco. Residents who fail
to recycle and compost will face
warnings and, eventually, a fine.
It’s part of the city’s goal to
eliminate waste altogether. But,
as Amy Standen reports, recycling
and composting can only take us
so far:

(conversation in Chinese)

Janis Peng is a foot soldier in San Francisco’s war against garbage. Today, she’s going door to door in a San Francisco Chinatown apartment complex, trying to convince the mostly elderly residents to make better use of their city-provided compost bin.

In fact, Peng is part of a city-wide effort to eliminate waste altogether. In 1989, California passed a law, which was considered radically ambitious at the time. They wanted to divert away from landfills 50% of the state’s garbage by the year 2000.

For San Francisco, that wasn’t enough.

“We got to 50%, and we said, ‘well we’re here now, what are we going to do next?’”

That’s Jared Blumenthal. He’s head of San Francisco’s Department of the Environment. Today, he’s in the backseat of a Toyota Prius. He’s on his way to a recycling press conference.

“So in 2003, we set the goal of 75% by 2010 and to zero waste by 2020.”

Right now, San Francisco’s at 72% recycling. City officials say that mandatory recycling will bring that number up even higher. But can any city ever get to zero waste?

(sound of trucks and machinery)

“It’s almost 9:45 in the morning and some of the trucks that went out this morning are coming in with their first loads.”

Robert Reed is a spokesman for Sunset Scavenger Company, in San Francisco. Here at Pier 96, dozens of workers stand by conveyor belts, sorting out the contents of an entire city’s worth of blue bins.

“All these materials go to different places, the glass goes to a glass plant, the paper goes to a paper mill.”

Sunset Scavenger sells these commodities to buyers here and in Asia. That generates revenue that helps fund the program. But recycling is expensive, in part because some products – like many plastics – cost far more to recycle than they’re worth.

“We’re dealing with clear plastic and opaque plastic and medium plastics. And many of these containers have three types of plastics.”

Aluminum and glass can be yanked off the conveyor belts with magnets and other machinery. But plastic has to be hand sorted.

Mark Murray is executive director of Californians Against Waste, a Sacramento non-profit group.

“We have seven different types of plastic resins and manufacturers invent new ones every day. And I know it might make us feel good to put those number sevens into the recycling bin, the scrap value is insufficient. It’s not sustainable recycling.”

Murray says he hears all the time from residents who want to eliminate waste all together.

“They recycle everything, but they can’t get their city to take a certain type of number 6 or 7 plastic in their program. And they’re mad at the city. But it’s not just about recycling everything we get. That’s not gonna solve the problem.”

That’s because some things may never make sense to recycle. Like ballpoint pens and plastic razors.

Murray say that maybe if the costs for those items included what cities pay to take them apart for recycling or to dump them in the landfill, maybe people would use less of them, bringing us a little closer to the holy grail of zero waste.

For The Environment Report, I’m Amy Standen.

Related Links

Tax Incentives Put Solar Within Reach

  • Eric Lindstrom, Vice President of Cannon Design, stands next to the building's 140 new solar panels (Photo by Joyce Kryszak)

Buying a solar system for your home still is not as simple or inexpensive as say picking up a new water heater. But solar energy advocates argue that the systems are affordable and obtainable for just about everyone – right now. Joyce Kryszak checked out that claim:

Transcript

Buying a solar system for your home still is not as simple or inexpensive as say picking up a new water heater. But solar energy advocates argue that the systems are affordable and obtainable for just about everyone – right now. Joyce Kryszak checked out that claim:

You might say that sunlight is a trade mark for Cannon Design. The Western New York based firm designs some of the most solar friendly buildings in the world. But only now is Cannon using the sun for its own building.

Eric Lindstrom is Vice President of the company. He says it’s what their environmentally savvy clients expect.

“You know there’s a huge P.R. factor here that we can bring our clients in and say, you know, this is what we’re recommending to you, but we’ve done it ourselves and it works. That we didn’t just read it in a magazine somewhere and say this is what you should be doing.”

Lindstrom takes us up on the roof of the company’s building to have a look at the new system.

Up here we find solar panels. 140 of them. They’re stretched out from edge to edge, soaking up the rays.

Lindstrom says they generate about 5% of the energy the building needs. But he says even at that small percentage the company will recoup the roughly $17,000 investment in about three years.

The system’s total price tag is actually about $170,000. But Cannon Design got corporate tax credits and incentives that covered roughly 90%. After the pay-back period, Linstrom says the company will actually pocket money.

Back in the building they can watch the savings add up on the inverter meters inside. That got Lindstrom thinking. He got a bid on a system for his home. He’s decided against it for now because the payback would take about eight years. You see, businesses get more tax breaks than homeowners.

But some people say the payback time can be less. And sometimes it just doesn’t’ matter to them.

Joan Bozer was at the American Solar Energy Society Conference held in Buffalo, New York. Bozer was showing off pictures of her home’s $30,000 solar system. It cost her half that after incentives. The payback will take a while—about eight years. But Bozer says that’s okay.

“Because it doesn’t make any difference to me if it’s five years or ten years what the payback period is. I want the solar panels, like people in their house they put on the roof they want, or they put on what they want and this is what we want – solar panels on the roof. That’s how we want to do it.”

But as green-minded as she is, Bozer admits that federal and state incentives gave her the final push.

While everybody can take advantage of recent federal tax credits, state incentives vary. Some are generous, and some offer homeowners nothing. Some local governments are offering low-interest loans on top of the federal and state incentives.

Neal Lurie is with the Solar Society. Lurie says incentives are creating demand and that’s driving down the cost of solar systems.
He says systems cost about 30% less than last year.

Lurie says with lower prices and tax incentives, some homeowners can have solar without much – or no – money out of pocket.

But how soon will solar catch on with the masses? Lurie predicts in less than six years.

“We’ll see solar technology a low-cost provider of electricity, even lower priced than fossil fuels without incentives. I think that when that happens we’re going to see it go from being something that people are looking at and starting to do to something that is truly common-place, much more than people may actually expect today.”

Others think solar will really take off in just three years. Solar installers are already gearing up. Some say they’ll double their workforce by the end of this year.

For The Environment Report – I’m Joyce Kryszak.

Related Links

Getting Crafty for the Holidays

  • Student Kate Doyle makes a sweatshirt as a holiday gift (Photo by Jennifer Guerra)

The economy is on the fritz,
unemployment is way up – so this holiday
season: cheap is the new black. And who
better to give tips on how to stretch
a dollar than students. Some crafty
college kids share their more unique
ideas for homemade gifts:

Transcript

The economy is on the fritz,
unemployment is way up – so this holiday
season: cheap is the new black. And who
better to give tips on how to stretch
a dollar than students. Some crafty
college kids share their more unique
ideas for homemade gifts:

“Hi, I’m Dani Davis.”

“Meghann Rotary.”

“I’m Kate Doyle and I’m crafting currently as we speak. I’m cutting up some old
sweatshirts and I’m creating them into Christmas gifts. The bottoms and the sleeves of
old sweatshirts you get this really nice stretchy material and you can make a woven detail
to put on the front of a new sweatshirt and give it to somebody. Ideally, you’re using the
person who’s receiving the gifts their favorite colors. And what not. This is actually a test
drive to make sure it looks good because I saw this pattern in the stores actually but it
was like $135 dollars. So these two sweatshirts were given to me. But if I were to buy
these at Salvation Army or something, I would say the project would cost 5-8 dollars.”

“For Christmas this year I think my big crafty endeavor for my boyfriend. My friend lent
me a taxidermy ram head which is currently on my wall in my bedroom. And my
boyfriend thought it was really cool and even at the Salvation Army they’re like $150 or
something and they’re missing chunks of hair. So I was like, oh, out of fluff and fabric,
probably like old curtains or something, I could make him a taxidermy in quotations deer
head. You guys can’t tell him!”

“A few years ago I decided – well, I was broke first of all, so I didn’t know what I was
going to do for a gift. So I decided I was going to make marshmallows and package them
really nicely.”

“Basically it’s just gelatin, corn syrup, confectioners’ sugar, granulated sugar – lot of
sugar – and water. And they only take about 20 minutes to make. So I’ll buy a bunch of
dark chocolate and white chocolate and melt that down and then dip the marshmallows in
that and then dip the chocolate in nuts and peppermint. And then put them in little boxes
and sometimes I’ll cover the boxes in nice papers or wrapping paper. So it’s pretty cheap.
Yeah. And if you’ve never had a homemade marshmallow you’re missing out.”

“I’d like to get some of your marshmallows this Christmas.”

Related Links

Investors Wary of Diesel From Coal

  • (Photo courtesy of the US Geological Survey)

The price of gasoline and diesel fuel from
foreign oil is making people think about other ways
to fill up. Lester Graham reports the coal industry
is pushing the idea of making diesel out of coal
from the US:

Transcript

The price of gasoline and diesel fuel from
foreign oil is making people think about other ways
to fill up. Lester Graham reports the coal industry
is pushing the idea of making diesel out of coal
from the US:

The technology to make diesel fuel out of coal has been around for a while. Germany
used it in World War II.

Recently, researchers at Rutgers and the University of North Carolina developed a
more efficient way to convert coal to diesel.

So, what’s stopping coal-to-diesel? Money and risk.

Coal to diesel is feasible – if the price of oil is above $50 a barrel. Oil is around $143 a
barrel right now. So, the money is good.

Phil Gonet is president of the Illinois Coal Association. He says now investors want
some government assistance.

“That guarantees that investors will at least get their money back if OPEC starts to play
around with the world price of oil.”

And make diesel from foreign oil cheaper than diesel from domestic coal.

For The Environment Report, this is Lester Graham.

Related Links

Faster Payback on Hybrids

  • High gas prices cause some hybrid vehicles to recoup prices faster (Photo by Ben VanWagoner)

Hybrid cars are generally more expensive than their gasoline counterparts. But as Lisa Ann Pinkerton reports, high gas prices mean several hybrid models are recouping their costs faster:

Transcript

Hybrid cars are generally more expensive than their gasoline counterparts. But as Lisa Ann Pinkerton reports, high gas prices mean several hybrid models are recouping their costs faster:

Hybrid cars like the Nissan Altima and Toyota Prius take around 4 years to pay back their premium. That’s according to the automobile research firm Edmonds.com. The GMC Yukon hybrid has the shortest payback period of the SUVs – almost five years. The hybrid that comes in dead last is the Lexus 600H.

John O’Dell at Edmunds.com says the Lexus could take over 80 years to recoup its premium.

“In that case you have a v8 engine that’s hybridized you’re really using the hybrid for some additional power and performance. You’re not using it – well you are using it for a little bit of gas savings – but we compute those saving to be a mere $192 dollars a year.”

That’s compared to more than a thousand dollars a year in gas savings for the Yukon and the Prius.

For The Environment Report, I’m Lisa Ann Pinkerton

Related Links

Book Publishers Getting Greener

  • Logging truck. (Photo courtesy of US Fish and Wildlife Service)

The next time you curl up with your favorite book,
you might think about where the paper in the book comes from.
Mark Brush reports on a new trend for the pulp industry that
isn’t fiction:

Transcript

The next time you curl up with your favorite book,
you might think about where the paper in the book comes from.
Mark Brush reports on a new trend for the pulp industry that
isn’t fiction:

It’s estimated that only a small amount of paper in the average book is made up of
recycled content. Experts say a lot of the paper comes from sensitive forests in Canada,
the southeastern US, and Indonesia.

But a new report says publishers are beginning to use more recycled paper.

Tyson Miller is the Director of the Green Press Initiative – one of the groups that commissioned the report. He says some major book publishing companies are doing their part:

“Random House’s policy says that they’ll move from a 3% recycled fiber use rate to a
30% recycled fiber use rate by 2010. That alone will save about a half a million trees a
year.”

Some companies don’t want to use more recycled paper because it’s more expensive. But
Miller says their research has shown that people who buy books are willing to pay a little
extra to save a few trees.

For the Environment Report, I’m Mark Brush.

Related Links

DRAWING UP AN ENERGY EFFICIENT MORTGAGE (Short Version)

  • A mortgage program through Fannie Mae can help people buy older homes and make them more energy efficient with one loan. (Photo by Lester Graham)

As homeowners face another winter of rising heating bills,
one loan officer in the region is promoting energy efficiency when
people shop for a mortgage. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s
Erin Toner reports:

Transcript

As homeowners face another winter of rising heating bills, one loan officer in the
region
is promoting energy efficiency when people shop for a mortgage. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Erin Toner reports:


The government and government-chartered companies such as Fannie Mae offer Energy
Efficient Mortgages. But relatively few homeowners take advantage of them. Under the
program, new or existing homes are inspected and rated for energy efficiency. The
homeowners decide which energy-efficient improvements to do, and then roll the cost of
them into their mortgage.


Joel Wiese is a loan officer. He recently closed one of the few non-governmental
energy
efficient mortgages in the Great Lakes region.


“When you start looking at the total housing expense, utilities on top of the rest
of what
you’re doing, you’re basically going to spend less money than you normally would.
Because you’re reducing your utilities. Even though you’re increasing your mortgage
slightly, you’re reducing your utilities significantly. It’s a win-win.”


Wiese says there haven’t been more energy efficient mortgages in the region because
few
realtors, loan officers and lenders know how to use the program.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Erin Toner.

Related Links

Epa Calculates Illnesses Caused by Sewage Overflows

Sewage overflows during heavy rains have long been implicated in illnesses in people. For the first time, the Environmental Protection Agency has come up with an estimate of just how many people are getting sick from swimming at contaminated beaches. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Tracy Samilton reports:

Transcript

Sewage overflows during heavy rains have long been implicated in
illnesses in people. For the first time, the Environmental Protection
Agency has come up with an estimate of just how many people are getting
sick from swimming at contaminated beaches. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Tracy Samilton reports:


The EPA estimates that somewhere between 3,500 and 5,500 beachgoers get sick
every year when untreated sewage is flushed into rivers, streams and lakes
by heavy rains. The EPA’s Ben Grumbles says the report is another reason
for cities to fix their aging sewage systems – despite the high cost.


“And it can literally add up to hundreds of millions, a couple of billion dollars, for
very large cities, to fix the problem for the long-term.”


Grumbles says many communities can avoid that bigger expense by investing
in new technologies to better manage existing systems – and keeping pipes
well-maintained and free of debris.


Environmental groups say they hope legislators are listening. Congress just reduced
the fund from which communities can get loans for sewer projects by 500 million dollars.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Tracy Samilton.

Related Links

Battle Lines Drawn Over Mississippi Locks

The Army Corps of Engineers is proposing spending billions of dollars to expand locks along the Mississippi River, but environmentalists say it’s a waste of money. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Katherine Glover has the story:

Transcript

The Army Corps of Engineers is proposing spending billions of dollars to expand locks
along the Mississippi River, but environmentalists say it’s a waste of money. The Great
Lakes Radio Consortium’s Katherine Glover has the story:


The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has compiled a study that suggests the nation needs to
spend billions of dollars improving navigation on the Upper Mississippi River. It would
expand or add locks at dams on the Mississippi from Minnesota to just above St. Louis,
Missouri. The Corps has similar plans for the Illinois River, which stretches from near
Chicago to near St. Louis.


Tow boats push barges full of grain downstream, carrying 60 percent of the nation’s grain
exports. They use the Mississippi lock and dam system, which was built in the 1930’s.
The Corps of Engineers built the lock and dam system to ensure the water would remain
deep enough to keep barge traffic moving year round. The locks that allowed barges
through the dams were adequate for the time. But today, towboats are pushing groups of
barges twice as long as they were in the 1930’s. To get through the locks, they must
separate into groups and then reconnect on the other side.


Denny Lundberg is the project manager of the Corps’ navigation study. He says the
Mississippi River system is an important corridor for the grain trade and the aging current
locks could put Midwest farmers at a disadvantage.


“What the Mississippi River does is provides a transportation system for certain key
exports and helps the nation’s balance of trade and it does this by saving roughly 60 to 70
percent of the cost of shipping over that distance by rail… so the existing system out
there generates about a billion dollars annual transportation cost savings to the nation.”


Farmers are in favor of expanding the locks. Gerald Tumbleson farms in Southern
Minnesota. He attended a public hearing on the Corps’ recommendations.


“The problem of the system now is it is too slow. Now, you might say it delayed an hour
or two on a barge or something like that, but when you start adding those up over a
period of time that’s a lot of hours.”


Tumbelson says that delays lead to increased transportation costs, bringing down the
price he can get for his products. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ proposal would
speed up the system by building seven new locks and five lock extensions, as well as
other smaller measures to speed river navigation.


The Corps’ proposal also includes money to help restore some of the ecosystems that
have been damaged by the Corps’ navigation projects in the past. But many
environmentalists are skeptical that anything will be done for the environment.


In a study called Twice Cooked Pork, a coalition of environmental and taxpayer
groups say they found major flaws with the Corps’ conclusions in its proposal. The
groups say that barge traffic on the river is declining, not increasing. They say there’s
more domestic demand for grain and other products, so there’s not as great a need to ship
it downriver. And the groups say the project will be the most expensive waterway project
in history, but will only benefit the barge industry. And they add… it will benefit the
Corps itself.


Mark Muller of the Institute of Agriculture and Trade Policy is skeptical that the
proposed project would have any benefit for people like farmer Gerald Tumbleson.


“I don’t think it really matters if we have longer locks or not, that doesn’t mean our
exports are going to increase, and unless we have an increase in exports we’re not going
to have any benefits to farm income.”


Critics say given the Army Corps of Engineers’ history, there’s plenty of reason to be
skeptical of the Corps’ findings. In 2000, a whistleblower within the Corps revealed he
was pressured to falsify statistics to justify spending billions of dollars on Corps projects
along the Mississippi. Further investigation by both the Pentagon and the National
Research Council revealed widespread flaws and corruption in the Corps’ research and
methodology.


But the Corps says the current proposal came after many public hearings, and extensive
consultation with other federal agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency.
The Army Corps of Engineers’ Denny Lundberg says those public meetings and
discussions had a role in developing the current proposal.


“And we have taken that and developed a combined plan to try to seek a balance out on
the river so this integrated plan really serves as a framework for being able to operate and
maintain the system both for navigation and for the environment.”


The Corps will continue taking public comments on the draft report until July 30th. In
the fall, they will present their final report to Congress, which has the final say on the
river’s future.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Katherine Glover.

Related Links

Technology to Help Farmers Manage Water?

Water is of growing concern to people in the Great Lakes region, especially after this summer’s widespread drought. Now researchers are testing a device that could help Midwest farmers decide the best way to manage their water. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Rebecca Williams has more:

Transcript

Water is of growing concern to people in the Great Lakes region, especially after this summer’s widespread drought. Now, researchers are testing a device that could help Midwest farmers decide the best way to manage their water. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Rebecca Williams has more:


The device is called an electron moisture sensor. It measures the amount of moisture in soil, as deep as 3 feet below the surface. The sensor is hooked up to a hand-held computer that brings together soil data with information about weather and the type of crop being raised.


Rich Hoddup is an agriculture extension agent with Michigan State University. This year, he recruited several farmers to test the moisture sensor. He says the farmers are reacting to the system with optimistic caution.


“They’re looking at it and saying, well, it’s kinda nice to be able to understand what’s going on below the soil profile, rather than waiting until that crop begins to show symptoms of drought.”


Rich Hoddup thinks the sensors may allow farmers to increase their yields, by telling them when and where to add water to their crops. He plans to continue his research to see if the benefits to farmers will outweigh the high cost of the system.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Rebecca Williams.