0:01

Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from

0:03

how Stuff Works dot com.

0:11

Hey, and welcome to the podcast again.

0:14

I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles

0:16

W. Chaz Bryant, there's

0:19

Jerry Jerome Roland over there, and

0:21

this is Stuff you Should Know again. Why

0:25

are you say it again? Well, so,

0:27

before we recorded, I

0:29

want to tell all of you, Chuck confided in me a

0:31

tabit of concerned. Right, can

0:34

we reveal all this or is this going to get edited

0:36

out? We'll reveal. So

0:38

we we have done an episode on recycling

0:41

again or before this

0:43

is again? Um? Before

0:45

it was from my understanding, it was the premise

0:48

was is what you're recycling actually

0:50

getting recycled? Right? That

0:52

was the basis of it. That's kind of everything,

0:55

and then we just kind of went over recycling

0:57

here there. Yeah, I mean it was it

1:00

was year two of the show. It's

1:02

about a half an hour in linked that was

1:04

long for back then, and probably eight

1:07

minutes of that covered the garbage

1:09

patch, which we went

1:12

on to do in an episode just on that

1:14

did. Yeah, for sure, we talked

1:17

about the eight minutes of the garbage patch

1:19

something. Yeah, I mean the name of the episode

1:21

was recycling in the Great Pacific garbage

1:23

Patch. Did we combine

1:25

those two into one? I don't know. I

1:28

think I'm having some sort of weird like

1:32

flashback or yeah. So

1:34

here's the deal, though, folks. We're redoing

1:36

recycling. Updating

1:39

is what it's called. We're updating with new information.

1:41

And there may be some of the same stuff.

1:44

But I listened to that episode, and

1:46

we weren't very good at what we did back then. I

1:48

thought, I thought we. I'm

1:51

almost positive we did a separate episode

1:53

on the Great Pacific Garbage We may have. But

1:56

all of this to say is don't

1:58

freak out and say you as are repeating yourselves.

2:01

Are we Are we already there? Because

2:04

no, we're not. No, No, this is an update.

2:06

This is so important, and things

2:08

have changed enough since what two it

2:12

may have even been nine. Yes,

2:14

quite a bit has changed since back then. As

2:17

a matter of fact, Um, we've

2:19

gotten better recycling, we've

2:22

gotten worse at recycling.

2:24

Simultaneously, recycling

2:26

has turned into a huge business. We understand

2:29

it more. And then there's been major colossal

2:31

changes just this year to the

2:34

global recyclable

2:36

material commodities market that is

2:38

going to change everyone's life one

2:41

way or another. If you care at all

2:43

about recycling because of China.

2:46

Yeah, and you know what, we'll

2:48

we'll get to that, but I'm just gonna come out and say it

2:50

good for China,

2:53

all right, but depending that one. Right,

2:55

we've been putting pins all over the place. I'm afraid that

2:57

we have just bins everywhere. No, we've been

3:00

going back. I don't think we've left a single

3:02

pin in place, which is unusual for

3:04

us because we do that a lot. And

3:06

I also want to say that it's nice that

3:08

we're all three together again. Yeah, Jerry

3:11

is back again. She keeps leaving, but

3:13

she's back, and she has a summer cold. Yeah,

3:16

that's just the worst that that to me is like

3:18

that is a clear indication that you have been working

3:20

too hard. If you go on vacation

3:23

and get sick because you're like work,

3:25

work, work, and then you relax on vacation and

3:27

your your immune system goes down. You interesting,

3:30

you gotta take it easy, You gotta you need like

3:32

a step down vacation like

3:34

a work and then staycation

3:37

and then vacation. Jerry. Jerry

3:40

gave a thumbs up, sickly

3:42

thumb it's

3:44

a little pale green. Uh

3:47

so chuck, Yes, I think

3:49

I think also, Uh, we agreed

3:52

that you're going to participate even more and

3:54

I'm going to participate less. Well,

3:56

the last one it was pretty funny to listen

3:58

to. You should give it a listen. Oh, we'll see if you notice.

4:01

Oh I've noticed before, like sometimes

4:03

I'm just like cringing and pinching the bridge

4:05

of my nose, like shut up, josh.

4:08

Uh. So that is the last we will speak

4:10

of that episode. And let's just pretend like

4:12

we're starting a new or updating

4:15

recycling. What is it? So

4:17

let's talk about recycling. Yeah, one of

4:19

the three the third best of the three rs. That's

4:23

your favorite one, or it's the your least

4:26

favorite of Well, it's not the least favorite, it's it

4:28

should be the third option. As a green

4:30

human, you should try and

4:32

reduce and reuse first. Yes,

4:35

And that's why they put them in that order, because recycling is

4:37

the the last line of defense.

4:39

Yeah. I thought it just kind of float off the tongue a little

4:41

more. I didn't realize that they had them in order. It's

4:43

in order of preference. Well that's cool,

4:46

okay, So you it is best to reduce

4:49

reuse and then when all else fails

4:51

recycle. That's an ideal

4:54

world, right, yeah, because if you go to a website

4:56

and you look up like can I recycle my toilet

4:59

paper tubes and the recycling ben Sure.

5:01

Yeah. But if you go to like you know,

5:04

tree Hugger and all these other sites are like, well you can,

5:06

but what you should really do is

5:08

this, And then it's they first, find

5:11

a way to not use toilet paper at all, and

5:13

so you don't have those that would be the reduce.

5:16

Turn it into the stand for like a pipe

5:18

cleaner tree. Well, that's everything else, that's the

5:20

reuses. They're they're like, there are so

5:22

many crafty things you can do with toilet paper

5:24

too. You can use it as a telescope, which

5:26

will eventually end up in the trash.

5:29

You can use it as a harmonica. Maybe

5:32

I can do this all day. We should

5:34

so, actually I don't think we should. So when

5:37

you recycle that toilet paper too, when

5:39

you drop it into a bin out

5:41

front, you may notice that you're also dropping

5:43

in like glass like you're your

5:45

old like Captain Morgan's bottle or

5:48

um it took you eight years to drink? Sure,

5:52

uh, you're drinking them run these days? Oh,

5:55

I love rom I'm not big on

5:57

Captain Morgan, but I love rom alright,

5:59

It's one of my highest favorite I'm like,

6:01

wow, I really like Rum. I say

6:03

that every time I take a sip of rum. Just

6:05

look at my glass and go, wow, I really love romdd

6:08

everyone in the house

6:13

Momo rolls, rolls her little eyes, um,

6:17

big eyes, so um.

6:19

You dump all this stuff together in a single bin,

6:22

and you may stop and be like,

6:24

wait, wait, this is crazy. How am I

6:26

dumping all this stuff in a single bin? Didn't

6:28

we used to have to separate? Yes, we

6:30

did. But thanks to the event of single

6:32

stream recycling, people

6:34

recycle a lot more stuff than they

6:37

ever did before. Recycling participation

6:39

is up. You may have noticed, like back

6:41

in the nineties, early two thousands, they gave you like a

6:43

little tiny bin. Now you get like

6:45

a big old garbage

6:48

can with wheels on it so you can put even

6:50

more stuff in it. That's how much recycling

6:52

participation is up. Programs all over

6:54

the country, everybody's recycling.

6:56

So on the one hand, it's really good that we

6:59

have single streamer cycling because

7:01

it makes people more likely to

7:04

recycle. On the other hand,

7:07

it also makes us more likely to recycle

7:09

stuff that we really shouldn't be recycling

7:12

or or using as much up

7:14

to begin with. Right, But even if it's

7:16

stuff that, like, um that, even

7:18

if you're you're reducing and reusing, you

7:21

people still have a tendency to throw stuff

7:23

in that recycling ben even though it can't be

7:25

recycled. Yeah, with that one article

7:27

you sent called it aspirational recycling. Yes,

7:30

like, I don't really know if this can go in there, but I'm

7:32

gonna do it because it makes me feel good, right, I hope,

7:34

So I hope it can be recycled. So

7:36

that doesn't sound like that bad of a deal, you

7:39

know, if like you're like, okay, well it can't be recycled,

7:41

so it doesn't get recycled, it cares you know, it just

7:43

disintegrates into nothingness magically.

7:45

Right, it's actually not what happens

7:47

that stuff ends up at the landfill. Right,

7:50

So you're basically saying, here, recycling company,

7:52

throw this away for me, will you. Yeah,

7:55

And if you listen to our show on landfills,

7:57

which was a good one, yeah, um,

7:59

we we sort of had glowing praise for landfills

8:02

and that was I think in terms of in the

8:05

context of hey, if you're going to have

8:07

a landfill. They're really have

8:09

made leaps and bounds from the old days.

8:11

Yeah, for sure, but obviously we

8:14

want to do this instead of the

8:16

landfill. Yeah. The ideal situation

8:19

would be for us to UM

8:21

to basically close the loop on

8:23

our all of our materials, on

8:25

our metals, on our plastics, on our paper

8:28

and that, and figure out a way to reuse

8:30

them. And now there's enough of everything,

8:33

and we never have to cut down another tree, we never

8:35

have to dig up another piece of box site, we

8:37

never have to do anything. We've got enough, and

8:39

then we just have these perfect like reusing

8:41

UM reprocessing techniques

8:44

and we've just got to close the loop of these

8:46

materials. That would be ideal. We're pretty

8:48

far from that, right, um,

8:50

But it is a good step in the right direction

8:52

that we are recycling. Right.

8:56

So when you recycle, when you put that stuff

8:58

in that bind, we're gonna get to all this really

9:00

great stuff. I just tease something that you don't

9:02

even know what I'm talking about yet, dear listener,

9:05

what box eye. That was one

9:07

thing, um, But the the aspirational

9:10

recycling turns into play later on. So

9:12

when you recycle, you put it out on the bin, and

9:14

then some people come up and what looks like an old

9:16

garbage truck or a modified garbage truck, except

9:18

it's usually much cleaner, maybe a pleasant

9:21

blue or pleasant green color. Uh.

9:23

And there's no juice usually dripping

9:26

out of the back garbage juice. Um.

9:29

And they pick it up and

9:31

they cart it off, and that begins

9:34

the the plastic bottle or

9:36

the toilet paper tubes journey.

9:38

Yeah. And um, this is a grabstar

9:41

article. It's nice to work from one of those. Again. Head

9:44

points out though, that when things are recycled, it's

9:46

pretty rare that, um, you get

9:48

the same thing as the original

9:51

material. So like that soda

9:54

can, that beer can

9:56

may not end up a beer can. Right.

10:00

Does that make you sad that person out there listening.

10:02

Um, well, that's that's what I was saying. Like in an

10:04

ideal world, it would it

10:06

would become another beer can, right,

10:09

Yeah. But we're not there yet because

10:11

when we recycle stuff, it degrades. Yeah.

10:14

And that's why you can't recycle paper and

10:16

think that it's going to be the next thing that

10:18

you print something on. Uh,

10:21

it's not gonna come back like clean Lily White

10:23

does printer paper No, and that's called

10:25

downstream recycling, where that

10:28

that office paper you printed on that you recycle

10:31

ends up becoming like, um,

10:33

a coffee clutch for

10:35

your coffee. And then you recycle that and it becomes

10:38

low grade like napkin, and then

10:40

after that it just basically ends up in landfill

10:42

because it can't be recycled, an then it becomes

10:45

airport toilet paper. It's

10:47

just the lowest form of paper.

10:50

Yeah, it's pretty bad. Like it's

10:52

just you can see right through it.

10:54

Yes, doesn't do anything anything,

10:56

It just provides a false sense of security and

10:58

then your fingers go right there. Uh

11:01

uh. Up cycling is a little different,

11:03

and that's pretty rare, but that's when

11:05

something is made more valuable than the original

11:07

product. Yeah, and I like the

11:10

example that egg games. You

11:12

could take a hub cap and turn it into a

11:14

decorative bird bath. Yeah,

11:17

that counts. Good job, ed. Hey, I'm

11:19

all about that. Uh, found Art, like

11:21

those people do a valuable service. We should

11:24

redo that episode, remember that one found

11:26

Art that we didn't do that? Now

11:31

I think you're joshing. No really,

11:34

I'm promised. All right, I'm gonna have to

11:36

look that one up. Uh, let's

11:38

talk about the history a bit though, because

11:41

Ed makes great pains to point out that it's

11:43

interesting that, um, most

11:46

people probably think like man in the seventies,

11:48

in the sixties, that's when it all started, But

11:51

recycling actually kind of started because of

11:53

the Industrial Revolution.

11:56

Yeah, And it wasn't like necessarily it

11:58

didn't have green and d well.

12:01

No, it was more like do you remember

12:03

when we did the extinct job titles

12:06

when and we talked about armors and you can't find

12:08

a suit of armor from the fourteenth or

12:10

fifteen centuries because they reused that

12:12

stuff that was just par for the course

12:14

back then. Yeah, Like things were just too

12:17

valuable to throw away. You

12:19

just found a way to reuse it. And that

12:21

was pretty much the way people lived

12:24

for many many years until basically

12:26

the post war economic boom

12:29

led to this consumer society

12:32

that we live in today where it's

12:34

just very very cheap to

12:36

produce stuff, including like packaging

12:39

and materials, and we use

12:41

it out the yen yang and we just throw

12:43

it away typically. And it wasn't until the

12:47

I think the first Earth Day that recycling came

12:49

back again. Yeah, and that's when

12:51

it definitely had a more of a green tent

12:55

on it. For sure, which is good. Um

13:00

add points out to that that you know, there were some leneers

13:02

here and there. I think recycling the United

13:04

States really had its

13:07

heyday in the nineties. That's when I first remember

13:09

it becoming like this thing is

13:11

a thing now. Yeah, And I've got a couple of stats

13:13

here. Um, it peaked

13:16

in actually it peaked

13:19

in recent years. And this is you know,

13:21

I believe how many tons

13:25

are diverted from the landfill. So

13:27

if you're going by that stat, it peaked in two thousand

13:30

eleven at thirty four point seven

13:33

Um, what is that million tons? Yeah,

13:36

there are thirty or four point seven percent. I would think,

13:38

oh yeah, yeah, thirty four point seven percent of

13:41

the hundred and whatever. What have we

13:43

send today? About a hundred and fifty million tons?

13:45

I saw, so I saw different things,

13:48

like I think that that's from the e p A. Right,

13:50

yeah, yeah, Actually in the eighties it was about a hundred

13:52

and fifty. Now we're down to about a hundred. I

13:55

think that's going to

13:57

the hundred million tons that's going to

13:59

the and fill. Yes, yeah, yeah, but

14:02

but our recycling is up, But

14:04

are I think our actual waste

14:07

production overall is

14:10

up to Yeah, and more people

14:12

of course, Stu, Yeah,

14:14

exactly. But that's that's actually a

14:16

thing that we'll talk about that recycling masks.

14:19

Um Like, we're throwing

14:21

away way more stuff and luckily

14:24

we're recycling more than ever, so we're actually

14:26

putting less than ever in the landfill. But

14:28

if we would do that first thing, reduce,

14:31

and then the second thing we use, we could

14:33

really have a significant impact on it

14:35

without recycling. Yeah,

14:37

for sure, recycling is much What would

14:39

be your guests as to the

14:42

the number one thing recycled in the United States?

14:45

My guests would be aluminum cans, that

14:48

is all the way down to number eight. What,

14:52

um, I'm gonna say,

14:54

rubber chickens then, well, yeah,

14:56

you nailed it, um,

15:00

acid batteries. Batteries are the number one thing.

15:03

Like people, what multiverse did

15:05

you come from? Today? I think people understand,

15:07

they seem to have an understanding that you just don't throw

15:10

batteries away anymore.

15:13

What do you do with them? You recycle them? Where

15:16

do you recycle them? Seriously,

15:18

you throw batteries away, I just like throw them in the closest

15:20

body of water I can find. Well,

15:23

they were known to float. Where do you recycle

15:26

these? Like in your recycling bid. Well no,

15:28

I mean you have to take them somewhere. Where do you

15:30

take them? Like a recycling place? Yeah,

15:32

like like there are places that accept batteries.

15:35

Are you talking about little batteries? Are you talking about car

15:37

batteries? Lead acid batteries? Is that

15:39

a car battery? Actually, I don't

15:41

know. I think that's a car battery. Okay,

15:43

yeah, yeah, I know you recycle cars. That makes

15:45

sense because you get a little juice when

15:48

you buy your new battery if you plunk down

15:50

your old one. Yeah, that would make sense. But still

15:52

you would think aluminum Kansas

15:54

number eight, Yeah, number two was corrugated

15:57

at boxes number three, steel

15:59

number four or his newspaper, and

16:01

then all the way down to number numbers eight

16:03

and nine or soda and beer cans and bottles.

16:06

That is really bizarre. Yeah,

16:08

but that you know, how did they say

16:10

Brenstein? I

16:13

don't know. I'm not sure.

16:16

But at any rate, we've we've been bouncing

16:18

around over the last decade, somewhere in the

16:20

thirty two to thirty five percent

16:22

range. So peaked is a percentage

16:24

of waste diverted, Like you can't say peaked

16:26

then, like it's been inching

16:29

downward. I predict it's

16:31

going to continue

16:33

to inch downward, and then it's going to start going

16:35

up again more than the

16:37

peak, the recent peak. Yeah,

16:40

in the next ten to fifteen years. That's

16:42

my prediction. Would be great. In America,

16:44

if you wanted to know, is number five in the world,

16:47

behind Austria, Germany, Belgium,

16:49

in Switzerland as

16:52

far as um most recycling participation

16:54

or something. Yeah, diverting the most tonnage

16:57

away from landfills. Number what number

16:59

five? That's not good,

17:02

it's okay, And and numbers

17:04

three through six are virtually tied. It's

17:07

really Austria and Germany or like ten

17:09

percent twelve percent more those guys will recycle

17:12

anything. Uh. And then

17:14

America's only city on the list.

17:16

Take a guess there, I bet you know that one. I M say Portland's

17:19

good guests, Seattle closer,

17:22

uh, further away somewhere in Wyoming.

17:25

San Francisco is the number

17:27

one city or recycling. It's the only American

17:29

city to make like the All Star Recycling

17:32

list. So

17:34

I think that means we're done, right. I'll

17:37

bet we didn't mention that before in the last episode.

17:40

No, oh yeah, we're not mentioning that should

17:42

we take a break. Then let's take a break, man, all right,

17:44

we'll talk a little bit more about landfills and

17:46

all kinds of recycling stuff. All

18:12

right, Chuck, I think this is going very

18:14

well. So far. Great, So

18:17

let's get back to that process we

18:19

kicked off and then abandoned, and now we're getting back

18:22

to it. When you drop something

18:24

in your recycling bind and the people come and

18:26

pick it up, and it

18:28

begins this beautiful journey of

18:32

discovery, coming of age

18:34

maybe of um,

18:36

really coming to understand oneself. For

18:38

the say, plastic water bottle that you set

18:41

off, and when

18:43

it's collected, depending on where you are,

18:45

it may be either collected by a city worker

18:48

or a worker for like a private company,

18:51

um, and it will be taken somewhere

18:54

along this chain. What this is a big

18:56

picture, and this is something I didn't quite understand

18:59

fully but for until this time around

19:01

researching this article, Like

19:04

that water bottle or

19:06

that beer can, or that

19:09

toilet paper roll you just threw out that

19:12

you just recycled, You just threw it

19:14

away as trash. It's just it's

19:16

being put into a different trash

19:18

stream, the recycled stream. Right,

19:21

So When you do that, it becomes you were

19:23

saying, here, this actually

19:26

has value. I don't want anything in

19:28

return for it. I just want the

19:30

peace of mind that it's going to have

19:32

another life. It's going to stay away from the landfill.

19:35

You do whatever you want with it, and it

19:37

enters with that exchange into

19:39

a global commodities market, where

19:44

it goes from a sorting

19:46

facility to a place where

19:49

it's put together with other stuff

19:51

similar to its kind, sent into put

19:53

into bails, and then sold on

19:56

the commodities market to be

19:58

reprocessed back in of raw materials

20:01

and then sold the manufacturers who use those

20:03

raw materials to make new stuff

20:06

that you then buy that then you

20:08

hopefully ideally recycle

20:10

and the whole process continues again. That's

20:13

what happens when you drop it in a bin and it goes

20:15

off. That's ideally. Yeah. And China,

20:17

like we mentioned, is a big I

20:20

think, like the number one buyer of US

20:22

garbage. They were until like

20:24

late two thousand seventeen ish

20:27

when they said no on

20:30

certain things. So here's why I said,

20:33

UM, good for China. UM.

20:35

China said that they did not want

20:38

to be the world's garbage

20:40

dump any longer. And um.

20:42

One of the reasons why why recycling

20:45

rates kind of started to climb in the eighties

20:48

and nineties is because there

20:50

was a market for this stuff. Right. If

20:53

there had never been a market for it, it just would

20:55

not have been viable. It would have cost too

20:57

much to pay somebody to reprocess

21:00

it. But the fact that you could sell it to somebody

21:02

who could then reprocess it and then sell

21:04

it as raw materials to manufacturers

21:07

that men have value to it. So okay, now we've

21:09

got like something going here. And the way

21:11

that this was able to go, the reason why

21:13

there was value to it is because China said, you know

21:15

what, We're gonna become manufacturers

21:17

to the world. Give us all materials

21:20

you can you can send us. And

21:22

one of the things they got into was reprocessing

21:25

things like paper and plastic, and

21:27

so countries around the world, especially

21:29

in the West and the developed West, started

21:32

sending all of their

21:34

trash, but they're recyclable trash

21:37

to China, and China would

21:39

reprocess it, make it into like little

21:41

plastic toys or paper goods or whatever,

21:43

and then sell it to the world. And because

21:46

of that, recycling was able to take off

21:48

well. China finally said, you know what, this is

21:50

not working any longer. We're

21:52

actually on our feet economically more than we

21:55

were before. And you guys have been

21:57

sliding in a lot of

21:59

your trash with these recyclable

22:01

materials, and we don't want it anymore.

22:03

Well, and China had

22:06

has not historically done a great job with

22:09

their own trash, like

22:11

they hadn't even sorted that out much less

22:13

to be able to take on all this trash from

22:15

all over the world. And we're talking hundreds of

22:18

millions of tons of recyclable

22:20

materials and I saw something like ten

22:22

percent of that weight was

22:25

just straight up trash that was slipped in

22:27

with this stuff. Yeah, it says here and estimated

22:29

one point three to three point five million metric

22:32

tons enters the oceans from

22:35

China's coastline, right because it just was

22:37

falling out of this out of the recycling

22:40

stream, right, unbelievable, and into the

22:42

into the oceans. That was how many

22:45

tons, one point three to three point

22:47

five million metric tons, So

22:49

that's out of like twelve million metric

22:51

tons worldwide, So about a quarter of

22:53

the plastic entering the ocean was going into

22:55

it from China. Yeah, that's a huge

22:58

amount, Right, So China finally said this

23:00

is not okay, this is not sustainable. We're

23:02

just we're stopping, like we're not going to accept

23:04

this any longer. We're not going to accept that any longer.

23:07

And the stuff we do accept can't be

23:09

any less than one percent to half

23:11

of a percent impure, meaning

23:14

like if we're buying a bail, a giant

23:16

biale of plastic bottles, no

23:19

more than half of a percent of that bail

23:23

bail's total weight can be anything

23:25

but the plastic bottles that we're buying. So

23:28

this this is a big deal because the world's

23:31

market since the nineties and as far

23:33

as like recyclable materials has

23:35

been sent to China, like a third of the world's

23:38

recyclable materials goes to China,

23:40

and China was buying it, and they said

23:43

we're done, We're not doing that anymore. And

23:45

so the market just went came to a

23:47

screeching halt. And so what happened.

23:50

All that stuff that you were recycling,

23:53

um that was originally going to China is now

23:55

just being diverted to landfills because

23:57

America's recycling recyclers,

24:00

the UK's recyclers, Europes recyclers

24:02

don't know what to do with it. The market just stopped,

24:05

and so they they're just sending it to landfills.

24:08

Now, So the stuff you're recycling a lot

24:10

of people, not all of it, and not

24:12

not everything that everybody's recycling,

24:14

but a significant amount has been going to

24:17

landfills so far in two thousand.

24:20

Yeah, and this is not the old school

24:22

argument where people, you

24:24

know, ten years ago, we're like, oh,

24:27

they don't even take it to recycling anyway, they

24:29

just throw it in the trash. I know, if you

24:31

believe that, then now you're saying, see there, I told

24:33

you this is something new because

24:36

of a new policy within the

24:38

last year, right, So this

24:40

is not like that old line. I just want to make

24:42

that clear. And again, the reason why that

24:44

that argument didn't hold before is

24:47

because China was there to buy

24:49

the stuff, So why

24:51

would you throw it would be like throwing away money.

24:53

So that was a stupid argument. Now it's

24:56

not even argument, it's just a fact, like

24:58

they're having to divert some of this and their

25:00

stockpiling. These people who are

25:02

basically recyclable material

25:05

distributors are actually stockpiling

25:07

the stuff in warehouses hoping

25:10

that the market will come back, and

25:12

there are countries taking up the slack. I think

25:14

like Malaysia, India, UM,

25:16

Indonesia. They're starting to buy

25:18

more of this than they were before. But

25:20

China accepted so much of it,

25:22

bought so much of it that you

25:25

just can't fill that void. It's gonna take a little

25:27

while, and then hopefully one

25:29

of the ways that we will handle this is

25:32

countries like America or like

25:34

the UK will say

25:37

maybe we should start getting into the reprocessing

25:39

business more than we were before

25:42

and start handling our own recyclables.

25:46

Yeah, I'm all for it.

25:48

Yeah, So let's talk about that loop. Let's

25:51

let's say, let's talk about let's give

25:53

an idea of what happens to your recyclables

25:55

when they're carted away, and let's

25:58

say it just stays in country. Okay, okay,

26:00

alright, so let's uh.

26:03

I guess we can start with paper because

26:05

that's one that is widely recycled.

26:08

And there's a bit of a um

26:10

not a misnomer, but you know, trees

26:13

are are grown to be

26:15

used for paper. Um. It's

26:17

there's a couple of misnomers. It's not like people

26:19

go out and cut down these great, old

26:21

old forests to make the paper that

26:23

you print on they have, you

26:26

know, they do this from pulp with trees.

26:28

However, a lot of times old

26:30

growth forests are chopped down to

26:32

create room to plant these pulp with trees.

26:35

Ter. Yeah, so it is a bit of a thing

26:38

like while they may not be making paper out of it, they

26:40

are clearing area to plant the pulp

26:42

would trees to make the paper, right, it would be a pretty

26:45

pretty big waste of those old growth trees

26:47

to just turn them into paper when you can make

26:50

like furniture and stuff out of them. But

26:52

they are cutting them down for this paper

26:54

stuff. But once that happens,

26:56

it's not like they're growing the old

26:59

old growth or us back again. Right, No, right,

27:01

okay, uh so then that paper

27:04

is sorted and you're gonna hear a lot of the word

27:06

sort a lot, because that's what happens at

27:08

a sorting facility, depending

27:10

on how heavy it is. What color apparently,

27:13

like really brightly colored paper isn't

27:15

good to recycle, um at

27:17

all? Or good to look at? Yeah, like

27:19

construction papor sure like um

27:22

you know neon green flyers,

27:24

Oh good lord, they'll get your attention, but

27:27

they're bad for the environment. They're bad for the environment.

27:30

Uh, A hot chemical and water bath

27:32

can reduce the stuff. And that's

27:34

really what you want to do, is to make this slurry,

27:37

the soupy mix of fibrous

27:40

you know what was once paper. Uh.

27:42

Then they have like if you always wonder should I take my

27:45

my paper clips and staples off? If

27:47

you got a minute, it's probably not a bad idea.

27:50

But they do have magnets and things and

27:53

filters to get out the glues and the staples

27:55

and all that stuff. Yeah, they basically

27:58

have a lot of different rings

28:00

along this line that um or

28:02

the stream that that can handle

28:04

your laziness. Yeah,

28:06

I mean from paper clips to a

28:09

little bit of mayonnaise left in the jar

28:11

a little bit, a little bit, they

28:13

can handle that. But well,

28:16

I was gonna say, like I said in the previous episode,

28:19

I'll just say it again, that's stuff stinks

28:21

in your kitchen anyway, So that's why you should clean it out

28:24

right or stinks next to your house,

28:26

Like who want? Who wants a

28:28

gross dirty mannai'se jar? Nobody

28:30

beside their house, certainly not your local recycler.

28:33

No. Uh, so they're gonna

28:35

get the staples and all that stuff out generally with the magnets,

28:38

but if you want to do it yourself, that's great too. They

28:40

remove the ink a lot of times chemically,

28:43

or sometimes this is really interesting, they'll

28:45

blow it to the surface and skim it

28:47

off, bleach that pulp, and

28:50

you've got this pulpy slurry

28:52

where they can then uh spray

28:54

it and roll it into a sheet, press it and dry

28:56

it and it becomes paper. Again. Remember we talked

28:58

about making paper in our toilet paper episode.

29:01

That one. How it's made, that hypnotic

29:04

how it's made episode, it's pretty cool.

29:07

Um, So that

29:09

what you just described probably doesn't

29:11

take place in like your local town or

29:13

something like that. That's gone from

29:15

your your curb to your town's

29:18

sorting facility to like a

29:21

material um material

29:24

recovery facility or MURF

29:27

is what that's called. And then probably

29:29

what you just described has done it like a someone

29:32

who specializes in paper reprocessing,

29:35

right, Um, their money

29:37

right exactly. But along the way, your

29:39

town made money by

29:42

not sending something to landfill, because

29:44

most towns have to pay for landfill stuff.

29:47

So by diverting this from the landfill,

29:49

the town just saved money. And if it's a big

29:51

enough town because say millions, tens hundreds

29:53

of millions of dollars in fees

29:56

um, and then once it entered

29:58

that murf then they start to sort

30:01

it for resale to reprocessors

30:03

and the money started to come in right about that, Yeah,

30:06

right, all right, So what about glass glasses

30:10

like similar to paper, and that they'll usually

30:13

sort it. And again, so sorting

30:15

is can be done by machines in

30:17

a lot of cases, but there are a

30:19

lot of human beings who are employed in this

30:22

process whose job it is to say,

30:24

brown bottle goes here, green bottle goes here,

30:26

clear bottle goes here. I really like Rome,

30:29

right exactly, Captain Morgan's and

30:31

they drop them down these different shoots and

30:33

it's a convey convey about going past

30:36

them, and they're like kind of I love Lucy's

30:38

style, like just grabbing the stuff and mixing

30:40

it around and putting it sorting it themselves.

30:43

Right, Yeah, And glass is significant

30:45

because, um, you've

30:48

also heard people say that you know you

30:50

do you burned just and there have been people that have taken

30:52

great pains to try and prove that recycling

30:55

actually uses more energy than just

30:57

making new stuff and throwing it away. Uh

31:00

uh, and that is very fair about

31:02

it. He points out that it really depends on your material

31:05

as a whole recycling, I think

31:07

without question, um

31:09

uses less energy as a whole

31:11

from what I understand. Yeah, but if you want to break

31:14

it down to the individual things, some

31:16

of them are a little tougher to get, you

31:18

know, your money back out of or

31:20

your energy usage. But glass is one of

31:22

those that has a significant

31:24

energy cost savings, right and and in some

31:26

cases UM glass recycling

31:29

basically is just the intact

31:31

bottle is being washed and sterilized

31:34

and then reused again. Sometimes so

31:36

when you drink out of like a glass coke bottle

31:38

or something that may have been used

31:41

because it's nineteen, you're

31:45

at the soda jerk. But I mean, if you think about

31:47

it like that's if you could buy just

31:49

glass bottles, you're probably it's

31:51

probably better off as far as recycling

31:54

is concerned, because they probably are just reusing

31:56

the bottle as long as you don't smash it on the ground,

31:59

then sweep it up, put it in the recycling bin.

32:01

Well, that's another thing that can be done with glass,

32:03

right. They might reuse it like wash

32:06

it out, burn the label off, put the go put

32:08

have it go through the whole process again, so it's basically

32:11

like new, or they

32:13

may smash it up into pieces and

32:16

um, those pieces will get melted down

32:18

and turned into glass again, which is another reason

32:20

why the glass gets sorted, because

32:22

if you have a bunch of different colored glass mixed

32:24

together when you melted down, it has

32:26

like kind of a modeled color that nobody

32:28

would want. So it's very

32:31

important to have your green glass over here, and

32:33

your clear glass over here, and your brown glass

32:35

over there. Yeah. And I think I said on

32:37

the show they announced in our county

32:39

or maybe city that they were not doing glass

32:42

anymore, and so they set up the big

32:44

ben's like in certain places around

32:47

the county. That's for you and your wine o friends

32:49

congregate. Right, Absolutely, what

32:52

a great bottle that was so

32:55

um. Hey, you know something

32:57

You can reuse a wine bottle by putting a candle

32:59

in it. Yeah, make

33:01

it into a candle holder, or make it a

33:03

water a feeder for your plants. That

33:06

I've tried that before. I've never gotten it to work.

33:08

What does it? What does it do? Well?

33:10

You fill it up and then you plunge it into the

33:12

soil, and I guess like the I

33:15

don't think it's ever come out. It's either stuck

33:17

in there or it's just poured out. I don't remember, but I was

33:19

like, I don't think this is working. Interesting.

33:22

Has it worked for you?

33:24

You know? It comes out very slowly, like

33:26

it's not like you're gonna see go glug glog glog globe,

33:29

because then you might as well just pour the water on it.

33:31

No, I know, I think I left it in there for a good week

33:33

or two and this plant is dead now. It

33:36

didn't work, huh, I

33:38

don't know. You're sure it was water like

33:41

on no way to put grain alcohol alcohol.

33:44

It was weird. Uh

33:46

So is that good on glass? They

33:49

ground it up into culor it. Yeah,

33:51

that's like the ground, the ground stuff that they eventually

33:53

melt down. Yeah. Well, the neat re

33:55

reuses of glass or recycle the

33:58

one of the neat things that glass and be recycled into

34:01

his fiberglass. It

34:03

can be extruded into fiber ak

34:05

a fiberglass, meaning

34:08

it's glass. It may have been your coke bottle

34:10

at one time, and now you're keeping your house. Sure,

34:13

yeah, I hadn't thought about that. I always think of like house

34:15

installation it's like the pink panther.

34:19

Yeah. What about steel steal

34:21

is a big one. It's usually recycled. At

34:24

least of American

34:26

steel is recycled. Is made of recycled

34:29

steel from what I

34:31

couldn't find that anywhere but in this in this

34:33

article. But yeah,

34:36

he's smart. But the

34:38

the reason why is number one

34:40

is just useful to recycle steel. But

34:42

also apparently it's very easy. You just

34:45

melt that stuff down and reuse

34:47

it. Yeah, and Ed mentions the giant

34:49

machines at shred cars. Uh

34:53

did you see these videos? I've seen it before.

34:56

It's about the best thing ever to watch, Yeah,

34:58

is to see a man e van just

35:02

get sucked into a a tooth

35:04

machine. It's really amazing.

35:06

Yeah, and it feels like there's nothing that can

35:08

clog this thing. No, I mean a minivan

35:10

can't clogg it. Yeah, nothing can can't.

35:13

Yeah, man, I could have watched that stuff for hours.

35:15

And steel too. So they don't just do minivans,

35:18

chuck. They do buildings, old buildings,

35:21

Um they do. Uh, there's something

35:23

called ship breaking, where like

35:25

you know those old huge ships,

35:28

Well they get torn apart and recycled eventually.

35:31

Um, that's actually

35:33

one that's not necessarily very good for the environment

35:35

because there's so many like toxic metals and

35:37

like old diesel and stuff like that that gets like

35:39

leached out into the environment. But an old

35:42

ship is probably one of the worst like

35:44

environmental disasters. It's it's pretty

35:46

bad. But what are you gonna do? Just like sink

35:48

it. You have to do something

35:50

with it. So, um, that's

35:52

steal. Another one, this one stuck out

35:54

to me is um plastic water bottles.

35:57

Right. Yeah, So with

35:59

plastics and general, it's tricky

36:01

because if you ever get into

36:03

an argument with somebody who's just hell been

36:05

on proving that recycling is actually not green

36:08

because they like to rain on people's parade

36:10

or whatever. Um, they

36:13

will point to plastic and they are

36:15

absolutely right. Like you, you just

36:17

can't argue it's cheaper and

36:21

probably less polluting to

36:23

produce plastic new than

36:25

it is to recycle plastic. It's just that's

36:28

how cheap making plastic is.

36:30

We've got to do an episode on plastics. It's

36:33

just like we live in a plastic age, right, So,

36:36

um, that is true, it is. It's

36:38

it's it's more costly

36:41

both environmentally and I think economically

36:44

to recycle plastic than to just make it new.

36:47

But that's not to say that you just shouldn't

36:49

recycle plastics. So if you do recycle

36:51

like a plastic water bottle, one thing

36:54

that I ran across it I didn't know before is screw

36:56

that cap on tightly. And

36:59

if you'll notice that plastic cap is

37:01

a different type of plastic than your plastic

37:03

water bottle. Um. But

37:05

if you throw the cap away separately,

37:08

it'll just end up in the landfill, even

37:10

if it's in your recycling bin, if you screwed

37:12

on the The way that

37:14

the plastics reprocessors

37:16

are set up these days is that whole

37:18

bottle goes through and the

37:20

plastic is separated by density.

37:22

So the stuff in the cap, I believe,

37:25

floats and the stuff in the bottle sinks

37:28

in in like whatever liquid bath they

37:30

create for it and melt it and then they

37:32

separate it like that. But if it's just

37:34

your caps or whatever, it's not going to make it through the machine.

37:36

The machines are set up to separate them.

37:39

Connected with your cap connected

37:41

to the to the water bottle, still screwed on.

37:44

A commonly

37:46

argued that

37:49

we now have given you the answer to, Yeah,

37:51

and now I think back, I'm like, how

37:53

many times I've been like, well, I got to unscrew the

37:55

cap and throw it in separately, had

37:57

no idea. Now I know I won't

37:59

be doing in that again. I can assure you, Chuck, I'll

38:02

chick through these recycling symbols real quickly. For

38:04

plastic, instead of going

38:07

into great detail, there is

38:09

one through seven that you will see

38:11

stamped on the bottom usually of whatever,

38:14

or you know sometimes on the side of

38:16

your plastic. Number one is

38:19

p E, t E or PET. Number

38:21

two is hd p E, Number three

38:24

is V or PBC, final

38:27

four is ld p E. Number five

38:29

is PP and these all have you know,

38:32

longer scientific names. Number

38:34

five is like your yogurt container. From what I've

38:36

seen yogurt containers catch

38:39

a bottles or bottles, medicine bottles,

38:41

although most pharmacies ask

38:43

you to bring back here script

38:46

bottles. Yeah, I am so green. I

38:48

just go and like make a little basket out of

38:50

my hands, just say, put the pills in here, just

38:52

dump dump it into my hand. Number

38:55

six is polystyrene. That's

38:58

styrofoam. And then number or seven

39:00

is other and miscellaneous. That's where everything

39:02

else goes. So every single

39:04

one of those plastics can be recycled.

39:07

This is like one of the big things about recycling.

39:10

We can recycle. About seventy of

39:12

the stuff that we throw away can be recycled.

39:15

We recycled what about thirty of

39:18

it? And the reason why is

39:20

in large part because there's no money

39:23

in recycling some of those other ones, like styrofoam.

39:25

You can recycle styrofoam, but the process

39:28

for recycling styrofoam is so difficult

39:30

and expensive that it is it

39:33

costs money to recycle styrofoam.

39:35

Therefore, no one recycles styrofoam.

39:37

And when you step back and think about all the

39:39

styrofoam packaging out there, and

39:41

the styrofoam peanuts and all that stuff,

39:44

it's not getting recycled. You put it in

39:46

with your even though it has the recycling symbol, it's

39:48

saying this can be recycled. In theory,

39:51

there's no one out there, almost no one out

39:53

there that recycles it, so it's just going straight

39:55

to the landfill. The problem

39:57

is even worse than that, though, and this is

40:00

thing I was talking about before, Chuck at the

40:02

very beginning. You put that styrofoam

40:04

in there, you put enough styrofoam in there. Then

40:07

you might do what's called contaminating

40:09

the batch. Where these

40:11

the recycle um sorting center,

40:14

the murph might say,

40:16

it's not even worth paying human beings

40:19

to sort through this stuff. There's so much styrofoam

40:21

in here. Just send that whole batch to the landfill,

40:23

including the stuff that can be recycled.

40:26

So that's another big deal. Why we're

40:29

not recycling a lot of stuff is because we're

40:31

mixing stuff that can't be recycled or

40:33

won't be recycled in with the stuff

40:35

that can and should be recycled, and

40:38

it's diverting the whole batch

40:40

off to the landfill, which is

40:42

a big problem. Which is the

40:44

way the best way to address that is for

40:47

people like you and me to go onto

40:49

our local recycling website and

40:51

say what can I actually recycle

40:53

in my area and they'll tell you, and

40:56

then the stuff that can't be it feels

40:58

terrible to throw it away eight but throw

41:00

it away, like I can tell you by

41:04

like with experience. It's not a

41:06

good feeling to throw a big piece

41:08

of styrofoam away into a dumpster

41:11

that's going to the landfill. But you

41:13

can take solace in the fact that

41:15

it's not going to spoil the

41:17

batch of recycling that actually is going to

41:19

the recycling center. Yeah. So our

41:21

community has a styrofoam

41:24

recycling day like twice

41:26

a year, and I'm gonna start bringing

41:28

my styrofoam to your No, don't do that,

41:30

because we already have loads. Uh.

41:32

And that stuff does is recycled,

41:35

but it's you know, you gotta look out for it. It's

41:37

very specific programs that

41:39

ask for your styrofoam, uh,

41:41

and they do recycle it. So you

41:43

know, it's sort of like electronics recycling, right,

41:46

it's really expensive. It's uh

41:48

to do it costs money. Um.

41:51

So our community like twice a year

41:53

again, in fact, I think it's at the same time

41:55

has electronics recycling and

41:58

you actually have to pay and you

42:00

go and pay them some money to donate

42:02

your old whatever you know. Um.

42:05

Very ironically, I was going through stuff you

42:07

should know Selects and I can't remember what episode

42:09

it was, but in the listener mail,

42:12

we basically read a p s A for something

42:14

called free I t Athens.

42:16

Do you remember that, Yes, And it's

42:18

freed to I think is what it's called. But um,

42:20

I looked it up and they're still around, but

42:23

you can give them, at least in Athens, Georgia,

42:25

your old e waste, your old

42:27

electronics and and um specifically

42:29

computer stuff, and they take it, refurbish

42:32

it and then donate it to people in need. And

42:35

they're still doing it. And I guarantee that

42:37

that Athens, Georgia is not the only town

42:39

in the country that has a program like this. So

42:42

rather than paying somebody like a chump

42:44

to recyclist, give it to somebody who

42:46

can refurbish it. Well, yeah, because a lot

42:48

of times like this old Mac

42:51

is just out of date. It works fine, yeah,

42:53

and just let me throw it in the trash. Yeah,

42:56

got an old got an old computer monitor?

42:59

You can you can trade that to

43:01

an anarchist for their goods and services.

43:03

They love those things. So

43:05

to quickly finishing up on these symbols, they

43:07

say avoid

43:10

three, six and seven, look

43:12

for two, four and five. They're

43:14

considered to be the safest um

43:17

and number one is considered safe. But

43:20

that's the one that's soda bottles,

43:22

water bottles, um, salad

43:24

dressing containers, mouth wash, peanut butter.

43:27

Uh. It can be recycled and it is safe.

43:30

But they're just I think they're on a mission

43:32

to try and get people to use less of that stuff. Especially

43:35

in ED points out one of the gripes

43:37

against recycling, one of

43:40

the few they actually agree with, is people

43:43

recycle. So they're like, I'm I buy

43:45

a case of water every two weeks, but

43:47

it's fine because I recycle it. It encourages

43:50

maybe for some people to think, because

43:53

I'm doing this thing right, and then I can just

43:55

keep buying water bottles right Precisely. That's

43:57

probably the biggest argument against recycling

44:00

today is it allows for this consumer

44:03

society to keep flourishing and thriving.

44:06

Let's take a break real quick and come back. Okay,

44:33

chuck. So all that stuff

44:35

has been sorted and um

44:37

depending on what it is, say like um

44:40

aluminum cans or plastic bottles

44:42

or something like that, it is put

44:45

into these huge enormous bails

44:48

and then sent off to the reprocessors who then

44:50

do things like you described with the paper. They

44:52

basically um clean it,

44:55

burn off any impurities, scrape off any

44:58

impurities, get to the raw cial

45:00

again and then turn it into small little things

45:02

like um if it's aluminum in

45:04

gets or if it's um

45:06

glass. They're trying to cull it um or

45:09

if it's plastics, they'll

45:11

melt it down into nerdles.

45:13

I can't remember what they're called, but

45:16

those are mermaids tears, remember that's what they

45:18

break down to and fish eat them and die. Um.

45:21

And then those things go to manufacturers

45:23

and they buy it. So that's that's

45:26

this. That's the current state of recycling

45:28

right now. And that last part,

45:31

the last two parts them

45:34

where the reprocessors by

45:36

the stuff and then the manufacturers

45:39

by the stuff from the reprocessors that

45:41

has been disrupted with China

45:43

coming in and saying we're not doing that anymore.

45:46

So there's a lot of things that can

45:48

change as a result of this. Right if

45:50

all of these if these things that actually

45:53

do have value start to build

45:55

up as they are in all of these warehouses

45:57

and facilities, um,

46:00

so there another market is going to develop

46:03

because these things do have value, because

46:06

consumers do want to see like, oh, this

46:08

thing I'm using was made with you

46:11

know, post consumer recycled material.

46:14

I feel good about that. I'm gonna buy this package

46:16

over that package. There's value to this

46:18

stuff. Right, So there will be a market

46:20

that develops, But will it be this

46:23

continued thing where we're like here,

46:25

developing country, you don't have

46:27

like um regulatory and safety

46:30

and environmental protections like we have

46:32

in our country. So take this and

46:34

we can feel good about ourselves because it's

46:36

out of sight. That's that's

46:38

basically how the recycling commodities

46:41

market developed in the nineties

46:44

and up till two thousand

46:46

eighteen, it was just like here,

46:48

you take our our thing, and we can feel good

46:50

about things, but but unwarranted

46:53

and unwarranted feeling of

46:55

of feeling good about um about

46:57

recycling. So it's

47:01

possible that the actual

47:03

like real deal will develop and

47:05

that will will continue to recycle and feel

47:07

good about things, but it'll be you know, justified.

47:11

That's what I'm hoping. That's what I think is going

47:13

to happen. I think that single stream recycling

47:15

is going to go away. I think

47:17

that we're gonna have to start like

47:20

being more conscientious and just know

47:22

what we're doing more. Because if you

47:24

put the average person who recycled in the nineties

47:28

up against the average person who recycles

47:30

today, do you remember back like

47:32

in the nineties, like people knew what they were talking

47:34

about with recycling and way more sideburns.

47:37

Sure more so, but like I think of my

47:40

dad like he's still just a religious

47:42

recycler. Now. He got like the bug in

47:44

the nineties because there's such a good

47:46

campaign, a good public campaign, and

47:48

yes, fewer people recycled,

47:51

but the quality of the stuff that was entering

47:53

the recycling stream was way better

47:56

than it is today. Good stuff in the nineties

47:58

it was so great because so

48:02

depending on where you live in the country, in the

48:04

United States and reckon all over the

48:06

world, UM, you might have different

48:08

options for recycling. The

48:10

Abuse Center research study

48:13

UM found that of the United

48:15

States has something available to them

48:18

UM, which is great. Uh, thirty

48:21

percent has curbside only, drop

48:23

off only and forty pcent

48:25

and had a mix of both. And of

48:29

any town with a population over

48:31

a hundred and twenty five thousand have curbside

48:33

pick up now and in the US over

48:37

a hundred still

48:40

yeah, a lot of America. Yeah. So those

48:42

are the general ways that you're going to recycle,

48:44

either at a recycling center, uh,

48:47

like a drop off center, curbside pickup,

48:49

which you know we love UM

48:51

buy back centers. You know,

48:54

if you've ever seen the aluminum

48:57

can machines, we can

48:59

collect aluminum hands, throw them in there

49:01

and make some money. Uh, and then

49:03

that's kind of part of the deposit refund program

49:06

where you know in

49:08

the good old days when you would you

49:10

would drink a soda that you actually actually paid

49:12

extra for that bottle. That

49:16

Yeah, if it has like a five cent refund,

49:18

it's called a refund for a reason because you paid

49:21

an extra nickel to drink that coke

49:24

out of the bottle. Out of the bottle. But you can always

49:26

go take it back, sonny, and they'll give your five

49:28

cents back. Then they take that bottle, wash

49:30

it out, sterilize it, may fill it with coke

49:32

again. Yeah. I don't drink those.

49:34

I don't drink cokes at all. But there's

49:37

something about that iconic bottle that

49:39

I love. That green tinted,

49:42

green tinta that's bright ribbed. No,

49:44

no, no no, that the original coke bottle has that

49:47

really faint green. It's not green green like this

49:49

bright bottle. But yeah,

49:52

and it's got like that. It's ribbed

49:55

and it has that curve ribbed for your pleasure.

49:58

It's very sexy bottle. They

50:00

think about it. I wonder I loved it. You

50:02

just went Should

50:05

we talk about um stuff? You shouldn't

50:07

recycle absolutely. Well,

50:10

let's get to that. But let's talk about the criticisms.

50:14

One of the ones we talked about was that it gives you

50:16

and this is the one I think it sounds like we both fully

50:18

agree with, is that recycling gives

50:21

you a false sense of um,

50:23

like you're doing something for the environment. Yeah,

50:26

which you are, but not to the point where you

50:28

can just be like, hey, I'm just gonna buy

50:30

everything and but I'm recycling it. Yeah,

50:33

that's definitely true. But also you're

50:35

not fully like it's amateur

50:38

hour with recycling these days, where

50:40

before you you there was

50:42

less being recycled, like

50:44

only one to three percent of that stuff

50:46

was being diverted to the landfill. Today

50:49

there's like fifty increase

50:52

in the amount of stuff that's being

50:54

recycled, but up to like of

50:57

that is being diverted to the landfill. Yeah.

51:00

Right, So if you could just keep

51:02

that number up, the increase

51:04

over like the early nineties, and

51:07

then decrease what's going to the landfill,

51:09

that'd be fantastic. And you do

51:12

that by teaching people what

51:14

not to recycle. You should

51:16

be the e pH chief I am.

51:18

You know, like my pen cost me. You

51:22

might actually want to protect the environment.

51:24

There, it's right there in the job title. We're gonna get

51:26

some email for that. Politics.

51:30

Uh, this is one that we touched

51:33

on a little bit. But um

51:35

that it's basically a zero sum game.

51:38

Uh with with the you know, the

51:40

energy used, okay to recycle

51:43

and like we said, it sort of you know, very much

51:46

depends on the product. But many

51:48

of the most common things we recycle. It

51:50

is not a zero sum game. No. But even if

51:53

even if Chuck you took all

51:55

of material manufacturing and

51:57

all of material recycling and

52:00

it turned out that it was totally

52:02

evened out energy energy

52:05

wise, pollution wise, you

52:07

would still be it's still

52:09

be worthwhile to recycle because recycling

52:12

has a demonstrably better

52:14

impact on the economy.

52:16

Like there are more jobs associated with it, there's

52:18

more revenue associated with it. Um,

52:21

there are more goods and services associated

52:23

with it. It just has a greater economic

52:26

impact than sending

52:28

waste to the landfill does. Like there's money

52:30

and sending sending waste

52:32

to the landfill, it's true, but recycling

52:34

actually has way more of a positive

52:37

economic benefits. So even if pollution

52:40

is the same, energy uses the same, it's

52:43

just shown overall recycling

52:45

is better money wise. Take

52:47

the pin out of that one. Yeah. Uh,

52:49

there isn't a garbage problem to begin with.

52:52

There is no garbage crisis. Plenty

52:54

of landfill space. Um,

52:56

so we don't need to sweat it this one. You

52:59

just say, can you just lean forward

53:01

a little bit and you kick them in the butt. Yeah,

53:04

technically there is plenty of landfill

53:07

space. That does not mean that

53:09

we should fill it as quickly as possible. Right,

53:11

that's probably the easiest way to debunk that,

53:13

right, Yeah, I mean it's

53:16

just because there is space doesn't mean all

53:19

right, then fill it with drash exactly?

53:21

Like who thinks that? Do you look at the ocean

53:23

and go, well, we could dump a lot of stuff

53:25

in there, Like that's just that's

53:27

just that's just dumb. I'm sorry

53:30

that you're a dumb person if you think that. I

53:32

don't say that very often, but when

53:35

I do, I mean, alright,

53:37

so I think now we can talk about things

53:39

you're recycling wrong. Okay,

53:41

So again, listen up, everybody,

53:44

because if we

53:46

can tell you what not to

53:48

recycle or how to recycle things better,

53:51

and you can tell other people and everybody

53:53

just kind of figures this out and actually becomes like

53:55

primo recyclers like we used to be

53:57

in the nineties. This would have a signal

54:00

forgetting positive impact on

54:03

at the very least the amount of stuff going to

54:05

the landfill, which we can all agree is

54:07

not a good thing. Correct. Okay,

54:09

So throw away that Starbucks cup. That's

54:12

a that's a sad one. It is because

54:14

you want to even if you wash

54:16

it out with water and it's clean as a whistle,

54:19

you cannot recycle that and you're

54:21

gonna get stared at and people are

54:23

gonna shoot spit balls

54:25

at you, even though they don't have straws anymore. You just

54:27

say stop, stop, I'm I'm I'm on your

54:29

side. You don't understand. Yeah,

54:31

tell him, Josh, that you know is what you should say back.

54:34

Don't don't mention chuck. But

54:38

yes, those disposable coffee cups

54:41

have wax on them. It's a very fine film

54:43

and you you know you can tell by looking at them.

54:46

Um, that's why your coffee doesn't leak out all

54:48

over through the paper, that's right, because

54:50

yeah, it's either wax or plastic, I think. And the

54:52

problem is is very tough to separate

54:54

from the paper when they start running

54:56

it through that reprocessing process.

54:58

Yes, And there was a group of people

55:01

at um stand Earth

55:04

who did a little experiment where they actually had

55:06

tagged these Starbucks cups and

55:08

uh and where Denver, Colorado

55:11

that went to the recycling bin and then they traced

55:13

them. They ended up in the landfill. So yeah, with

55:15

like electronic tags, they were

55:17

tracking a dolphin. Yeah, or

55:20

like your child. So throw them

55:22

away. I'm sorry, Okay, but

55:24

don't just throw the whole thing away. You feel dressed

55:26

that thing, right, You pull the coffee clutch off,

55:28

you pull the lid off, both of those can be recycled,

55:31

and then you throw the cup away. Here's

55:33

the even better thing to do by

55:35

one of those like ten or fifteen dollar

55:38

travel mugs and say I would

55:40

like my Starbucks in this please, and

55:42

they'll go okay, great. Or if you're sitting

55:44

in there, I don't know that

55:47

of Starbucks does this, but every

55:49

mom and pop coffee shop will serve you your coffee

55:51

and a big, delicious giant mug. Yeah.

55:53

I think Starbucks does too, if you Yeah,

55:56

but that that's the point, Like re

55:58

reducing the number of paper

56:00

cups that you have to throw away, so much the

56:02

better. Yeah, and what I do is um my,

56:05

uh germophobes might think is creepy,

56:07

but I take the little sleeve

56:10

off what do you call it clutch to

56:12

keep it from your hand from getting warm. I

56:14

just stick that back in the thing with the other ones. What

56:18

do you mean, Well, I use it and I take it

56:20

off and I put it back where I found

56:22

it. Oh, I see smart, just for the next

56:24

person. So that's the second are yeah

56:26

nice? Use nice? Just

56:28

as long as you keep your hands clean. Yeah,

56:33

I try to poopy hand. We've

56:35

talked about pizza boxes before, but it is

56:37

definitely worth saying again, we've

56:39

talked a lot about pizza boxes. I

56:42

think it's even they say a little grease

56:44

is okay, a tiny amount. I think it's

56:46

best to just cut out the grease spot and

56:48

throw and throw the rest in the recycling bin. Or

56:50

usually there's only grease on one side,

56:53

the side where the pizza has been sitting. The other side's fine,

56:55

just tear that off and throw the non

56:57

greasy side and the recycling through the greasy

56:59

side in the track. I'm saying, go the extra mile

57:02

and cut around the grease because all those

57:04

corners are recyclable. You go you know.

57:07

Okay. And here's the other thing I said, throw the greasy

57:09

side in the trash, no light it on fire.

57:12

The that that, um, that can be composted.

57:16

Uh yeah sure. The cardboard box almost

57:18

always can be composted if even if

57:20

it has grease on it. Yeah okay, so

57:22

um, pizza boxes, no

57:25

grease equals recycling.

57:27

Right, And I already talked a little bit about food

57:30

stuffs. A little bit of food stuffs

57:32

is okay. But again I just recommend like taking

57:34

an extra thirty seconds and

57:36

rents out that mayonnaise jar, right, rent

57:38

it out. Um if if it if

57:40

it has like the oily sheen from the

57:42

mayonnaise and it's still that's fine. The plastic

57:45

reprocessor is set up to deal with

57:47

that. If it has lumps of mayonnaise and

57:49

it's still, it's not it's too dirty. Um.

57:52

Same with like peanut butter is another one.

57:54

Um, if you have like a to go like

57:57

plastic food tray or something like

57:59

that, like like get the crumbs out,

58:01

just get it, like, don't don't sit there and scrub

58:03

it as I think this is A New York Times article

58:05

points out like you're'll actually be wasting

58:07

water at some point, but you do want

58:10

to you want to kind of get it prepped. Don't just throw

58:12

it in there like it's like you would the

58:14

trash um like because

58:16

it's trash. And again, if there's enough

58:18

stuff in this batch that's going

58:20

to the recycling center, they're gonna throw

58:22

it away. So don't throw stuff

58:25

that shouldn't be recycled in with the

58:27

recycling. Yeah, I get we

58:29

have a lot of guilt about take out containers.

58:32

Yeah, so ordering in that's that's the one

58:34

thing where just like man, I

58:37

love ordering in food, love that Chinese

58:39

delivery yeah, but all that waste.

58:42

Yeah, and like the Chinese delivery boxes, I

58:44

mean their waterproof too for a reason,

58:46

so they're not getting recycled either. You've

58:48

gotta just awsome. I saw something like

58:53

this is made up. But it's something like seventy

58:56

or eighty percent of plastic

58:59

trash is one

59:01

time use food packaging,

59:04

like just some ridiculous amount.

59:07

Where if and this is the weird thing, what are you

59:09

gonna do? You're gonna take like

59:11

your own dishes to the Chinese food place or

59:13

your own like tupperware and say put it

59:15

in this please? People do that? Do

59:18

they? But I mean, you are pretty

59:20

hardcore if you're doing that, So there's

59:22

gotta be another way. And chuck. This is another another

59:25

thing we can do besides you and me being

59:27

smarter and better at recycling,

59:30

like just just making that like a side thing. It's

59:32

demanding that manufacturers

59:35

who make packaging make

59:37

it with this end of

59:39

life and mind. Make it so it can

59:41

be reused, or make it so it can be very

59:43

easily recycled, or make it so

59:46

it has a minimal design rather than a

59:48

bunch of like styrofoam and wrapping

59:50

and all this stuff. And if you, I mean, just the

59:52

smallest little things can help. Like if you're picking

59:54

up food to go, uh,

59:56

and they're throwing in a bunch of utensils

59:58

that you take home, yeah to say no, Yeah, like

1:00:01

you don't use that stuff if you're taking it home,

1:00:03

So what do you do? You probably throw it away

1:00:05

or there's a drawer in your house with those

1:00:07

things, you know. Uh.

1:00:11

Plastic straws are a big deal right now to like cities

1:00:14

are banning them. I think Starbucks

1:00:16

just said they weren't gonna use them anymore, So that's

1:00:18

a big one. Um. And plastics again,

1:00:21

plastic bags are really bad zip block

1:00:23

bags, bubble wrap. None of that stuff should

1:00:25

be in your recycling, none of it. None of it. Yeah,

1:00:27

like don't. I've seen people take a bag

1:00:29

full of alumium cans and throw the whole thing in

1:00:31

there, Right, that bag is going to good

1:00:34

like they're they're gonna say, well, this whole bag is

1:00:36

trash, even though everything inside

1:00:39

can be recycled, it's trash

1:00:41

now because it's just not worth their

1:00:43

time to empty the bag out. The

1:00:45

conveyor belts going too fast. Yeah,

1:00:47

dirty diapers can't recycle those that

1:00:50

has human bio hazardous

1:00:52

waste in it, even if you're even

1:00:56

if you're using the diapers that do have plastic

1:00:58

in them,

1:01:00

get judge. But I wouldn't use those

1:01:02

either. But that's there

1:01:05

the reason you might think you can recycle them because

1:01:07

well, it's plastic. I can recycle plastic. You can't

1:01:09

recycle like eight different kinds of plastic that are

1:01:11

in the diapers. They again,

1:01:14

they melt them down, and then yes,

1:01:16

once you add the whole dimension of poop to

1:01:18

it, it's bad news from your child who was eating

1:01:20

plastic that was plastic

1:01:22

in the poop. I can't wait to do a plastic episode.

1:01:25

It's gonna knock everybody's socks off, chuck.

1:01:28

Uh. So we're going to stop here

1:01:30

and we'll pick this up again in eight

1:01:32

years. Okay. Yes, if

1:01:35

you want to know more about recycling, go

1:01:37

to your local recycling

1:01:39

website and figure out

1:01:42

what you can recycle and what you can't

1:01:44

and do it. Okay. And

1:01:46

since I said do it, it's time for listening mail.

1:01:51

I'm gonna call this Zambardo

1:01:53

follow up. Hey, guys, big fan

1:01:55

of the show and also a fellow movie crusher.

1:01:57

Well nice, thank you. Alex. Let's

1:02:00

thing to the Stanford prison experiment and reminded me

1:02:02

of my own discovery of Zimbardo.

1:02:05

In high school, I took a psychology

1:02:07

class and the teacher didn't really have a lesson plan for

1:02:10

any day. He would periodically just put on episodes

1:02:12

of the PBS show called Discovering Psychology,

1:02:15

hosted by some middle aged guy who

1:02:17

looked a bit like a Star Trek evil

1:02:19

doppelganger. The episodes are

1:02:21

pretty elementary. He seemed to be designed

1:02:24

for student audience. The host would

1:02:26

introduce himself, talk about something like perception

1:02:28

or learning for a bit, and then read and

1:02:31

then do a reading rainbow esque graphic.

1:02:34

Uh cutaway to a famous experiment

1:02:36

on the subject. Fast forward to this

1:02:38

semester. We're given some free time

1:02:40

to research UH, and I

1:02:42

was trying to pick something good and

1:02:45

I discovered the Standford prison experiment. It

1:02:47

was only then that I realized that Zimbardo

1:02:50

was the one hosting that PBS special that

1:02:52

I had been watching for the past month. Frankly,

1:02:55

guys, im will surprise at UH,

1:02:57

the guy that had the lead role in when of the least at

1:03:00

the cool psychology experiments was given Well,

1:03:03

let's be fair, it wasn't one of the least ethical.

1:03:05

Ever. Things have gotten way worse,

1:03:08

But for as big as it was, I

1:03:11

just want to be clear, they're poorly, poorly put

1:03:14

together. I'm I'm surprised

1:03:16

he was given a hosting role for an educational TV

1:03:18

show targeting students

1:03:20

twenty years after. Okay,

1:03:23

fair enough, that's Alex's point of view.

1:03:26

That is from Alex Aberman. Alex

1:03:28

from Falls Church, Virginia, nice

1:03:30

town, buddy NICs area.

1:03:33

Yes for running it? Oh yeah, have you ever been

1:03:35

to um oh? Man, I

1:03:37

can't remember the name of the

1:03:39

place. They're famous for peaking duck there.

1:03:42

Oh really? Yeah? I can't remember.

1:03:44

There's one specific, amazing Chinese

1:03:46

restaurant that has the best peaking duck

1:03:49

you'll ever had. Wow, try

1:03:51

it all right, okay, um duck,

1:03:53

but oh well, don't

1:03:56

bother me. The rest of the food is

1:03:58

pretty good too, but the peking duck is off

1:04:00

your socks off. Um.

1:04:02

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1:04:04

already said that. If you want to get in touch with us,

1:04:06

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1:04:08

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1:04:11

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1:04:14

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1:04:18

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1:04:23

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1:04:26

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