May 18, 2009
Opinion
Recycling: Don't abandon success
THE OREGONIAN /2008Workers sort recyclable material at the Far West Fibers recycling facility. A recent opinion piece in The Oregonian ("A better way to boost recycling in Oregon," May 9) suggested that Oregon could boost recycling by eliminating the bottle bill and moving to "single stream" curbside recycling instead of collecting glass separately. For several reasons, Oregon has chosen not to go in those directions.
First, Oregon has one of the highest recycling rates in the nation in large part because of our bottle bill and our "dual stream" recycling system that keeps glass out of our commingled recycling bins.
According to Biocycle magazine, the most reputable source evaluating state recycling programs, Oregon consistently has the highest or second-highest recycling rate in all 50 states.
Oregon's bottle bill is a big part of our success story. The bottle bill produces our highest recycling rates. The Department of Enivornmental Quality estimates that 83 percent of the beer and soft drink containers sold in Oregon were recycled in 2005 -- 78 percent were returned for deposit and another 5 percent were recycled curbside or in depots. Only Michigan, with a 10-cent deposit, has a higher recycling rate for beverage containers. Oregon's deposit is still 5 cents. By comparison, non-bottle bill states recycle only 27.9 percent of beverage containers, according to a study by R.W. Beck. And the recyclables from our bottle bill are much cleaner and higher value than the recyclables coming out of the curbside programs.
Keeping glass separate from other, commingled recyclables is also essential for keeping our recycling rates high -- and for supplying the three regional newsprint mills that recycle our paper. Glass breaks, and when collected with other recyclables, glass shards are impossible to remove from paper or other materials, even with sophisticated optical (laser) sorting. The shards damage equipment at the recycling processors and paper mills, and repair and replacement costs run into the millions. Moreover, much of the glass collected in single-stream programs in other states cannot be recycled. It is too contaminated and the broken pieces are too small to be sorted, so the glass ends up as landfill cover. For many single-stream programs, none of the glass gets recycled back into bottles or other high-end uses. That is why all Oregon curbside programs work hard to collect glass separately and keep it out of the commingled recycling bins.
Quality matters for recycling. The value of recycling is not only in keeping materials out of landfills, it's providing high-quality materials that our paper mills, steel plants, glass plants and plastics recyclers can use. Mills that use our recycled materials instead of virgin materials use less fossil fuel, mine and smelt fewer ores, and cut down fewer trees to make metal, paper and plastic. Especially in hard economic times, contamination from single-stream recycling would threaten the viability of our mills. The bottom line: Increasing recycling depends on strong markets that in turn depend on reliable, clean sources of recyclable materials.
Finally, the bottle bill is one of the most effective litter abatement programs around.
Improving our recycling systems is a never-ending challenge for all of us. Let's look carefully before we abandon our successes.
Dick Pedersen is director of the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality.
http://www.oregonlive.com/opinion/index.ssf/2009/05/recycling_dont_abandon_success.html
