I hope you’re right, but I think this a bit naive.
I’m not sure that there’s actually a dichotomy between saving money and saving the environment. The costs in many activities, including probably recycling vs. landfilling, mostly come down to energy costs. So if it costs more money to recycle than to landfill, that probably indicates that it costs more energy, too. And energy usage is by far the #1 environmental issue. So if everyone did what was cheapest, that probably would work out to be the best choice environmentally, too, or at least a pretty good choice.
I wonder how efficient…thermodynamically as well as economically…these systems are:
An earlier thread of mine.
One of the big factors on disposal of waste is transportation. Most cities don’t have a glass plant and may not generate enough HDPE to make a reprocessing system worth it. There are likely many areas that would produce enough waste oil, plastic, whatever within a short radius to keep one of those diesel fuel plants going. It also minimizes the need for the unnatural act of keeping waste streams separate and clean. Long ago I managed a vinyl compounding plant as part of the electrical wire business. We trashed vinyl by the ton that would have been reusable if kept clean. That scrap is different from trash is a concept that eludes many.
It’s certainly quite different here in the UK. Landfill space is at an absolute premium (so it’s expensive just to dump stuff), population density is high and distances are small, so consolidating and transporting recyclables to a processing point is easier and cheaper.
Glass is something people often poo-pooh as being pointless to try to recycle - after all, it’s just melted sand, right? Well, the same could be said of steel or aluminium, more or less - these are just processed minerals. The point is that the energy required to recycle something is often considerably less than the energy required to make it from scratch. In the case of glass, remelting cullet (crushed waste glass) requires about 30% less energy than working with virgin raw materials. That’s a fair old wedge of saving - and ought to make it possible to profitably recycle glass.
It’s difficult, however, to distinguish between some things that are being recycled because it’s effective, and those that are being recycled because of some subsidy or contractual obligation imposed by the state out of some ‘green agenda’. There’s a weekly food waste collection here, that goes off to municipal digester to make biogas and compost - but I’m not sure whether this process, considered alone, breaks even.
There is no arguing the more recycled glass in the furnace, the less heat it takes to process it. Although glass plants are quite energy thirsty, it is only part of the energy usage. Start with extracting sand and preparing soda lime. Haul them to the glass plant. Haul the finished bottles to where they are filled. Since they don’t pack well, you may see single axle tractors and trailers hauling them. They burn less diesel, but it is still inefficient. Then packing plant to the consumer with out of the way stops at a distribution center. This step is necessary with any packaging, but glass takes more fuel due to the extra weight. Store to home. At the home, heating water to rinse the bottles. Then they need to be collected, either curbside, or dropped off. We usually manage to drop our off without a special trip. We have not been apprehended doing so in another county yet. Once collected, they must be crushed and accumulated into truckloads to be hauled to a glass plant.
Yes, other packaging takes energy too. The plastic lined boxes of wine I buy through the winter start out by cutting down trees and pumping oil. Paper takes lots of energy too. Still, I am sure the boxes and liners are shipped flat and assembled at the winery. As far as efficientcy of shipping empty containers, nothing beats some dairies that have a blow molding machine on site. I checked, an empty milk jug weighs about 2 ounces. You could make 320,000 of them out of one 40,000 pound truckload of plastic pellets. I am not sure what is done with collected plastic. Once again, you are collecting low value, bulky material.
That is why I like Enola’s diesel fuel thing. I think it wouldn’t take too big of an area to supply all the material one could process.
My town swears this is true and encourages everyone to recycle everything so that we don’t have to pay to have it shipped to the dump.
Landfill space is becoming more scarce and nobody seems to want a new one to open in their backyard. I think that municipalities have to make it convienient for people, and everyone should make some basic attempt to conserve and recycle.
I believe it would be most efficient where the confluence of raw feed stock is produced and diesel fuel is consumed (of course :rolleyes:) such as any sufficiently large industrial enterprise producing organic waste…and a fleet of diesel vehicles.
I certainly foresee such diesel reprocessing plants sprouting up across the world, as Peak Oil is surely upon us.
Indeed I wouldn"t be surprised if today’s landfills start to be mined as a source of feedstock as an artificial resource.
I just read a book all about plastic. Plastic: A Toxic Love Story. Very good book, more balanced than the subtitle would have you assume. It includes a chapter about plastic bottles and recycling and had some interesting insight into how recycling bottles are processed.
What was surprising to me that the manufacture of brown paper bags for groceries is more environmentally damaging than that of plastic bags. Notice I said manufacture; there’s more to consider than that, but it was fascinating.
The EPA has controlled the worst of the pollution from manufacturing paper, but it still starts with cutting trees and ends with energy intensive evaporating plenty of water. I don’t think you can smell paper mill for miles any more.
transportation costs are a factor in if landfill or recycling costs more.
landfills are becoming increasingly farther from garbage sources, have higher dump fees and require truck transport.
recycling may have some of its transport via less costly railroad, costs are less than dump fees.
if landfills eventually get mined then downhill skiers in the north and hikers will loose some space temporarily.
I don’t understand this. Naive? Do you think the municipality is lying to me? That hardly seems likely. I’m quite certain they have to pay to dispose of our garbage. And having worked for a waste disposal company, I don’t doubt that they get paid for their cardboard/metal/plastic.
Or naive to think that money is the only consideration? It’s good enough measure for me.
Assuming communal, high-bulk collection, I reckon the energy costs of collection, crushing and shipping to the plant are probably fairly similar to the energy costs of mining, processing and shipping raw virgin materials. Although I’d fully expect that equation to drift in one way or the other depending on location (for example, in the UK, distances between municipal collection sites, and distances on to the processing and factory stages are fairly small, whereas I don’t think we mine silica sand here, so it’s shipped in from abroad.
Our problem is that we’re a net importer of green glass (All that wine we import), but our products (jam, beer, pickle) need clear glass. We end up exporting green glass cullet.
I suspect the “naive” part was expecting the authorities not to put up taxes just because they’re saving money on landfill. 
Ah, that makes more sense. Well, at least they can spend the saved money on a playground or a new car for the mayor’s mistress. Something worthwhile.