Recycling in the United States is in serious trouble. How does it work?

Automated recycling is coming along well. Here&#x27;s a typical modern plant in the UK.[1] Sorting is mechanized, with tumble drums, vibratory sorters, and magnets doing most of the work. Permanent magnets pull ferrous metal out. AC magnets pull aluminum out. Vision systems, often multispectral, look at the presorted materials as they go by on a fast belt and use air jets to kick out certain types of items. This is standard technology.<p>There&#x27;s still some manual picking involved in most plants. Robots are taking that over at a few plants.[2]<p>Aluminum is the moneymaker. Plastic bottles can go to a plant that turns them back into pellets for making new bottles.[3] A huge plant now serves southern California. Not clear this makes money.<p>Waste paper isn&#x27;t that valuable. &quot;Peak paper&quot; was a while back, and US paper mills have been closing for years. It&#x27;s not that sorting is hard, it&#x27;s that the product is so low-value.<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=SIVKmwzWSuc" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=SIVKmwzWSuc</a> [2] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=2gjUpDnJrZA" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=2gjUpDnJrZA</a> [3] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=vAr4BZM_Tzk" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=vAr4BZM_Tzk</a>

When my kids were young, they went on a field trip to a recycling plant. As a parent, the most interesting discovery was the sorting facility we visited didn&#x27;t sort plastic by type because you can&#x27;t expect people earning minimum wage to sort LDPE from HDPE from etc. So what did the big commercial recycling facility do? They sorted plastic by shape. Things shaped like cups and bowls were sorted as trash, things not shaped like cups and bowls were sorted as recyclable. It was pretty clear at that point recycling plastic was just a for show activity.

It&#x27;s worth remembering Recycling is the <i>least</i> good thing we should be doing.<p>1. Reduce<p>2. Reuse<p>3. Recycle<p>I always find it interesting in developing countries to see tons and tons of stuff being reused, <i>way</i> more than in Developed countries. i.e. A 1 liter beer bottle in Ecuador is $0.75 for the beer, and $1 deposit on the glass. The bottles are cleaned and reused hundreds of times.

Why not push the burden back onto the companies providing the goods in packages? If Walmart (or it&#x27;s suppliers) had to prepay for the handling of the waste the products they sell come in you&#x27;d probably see a significant reduction in packaging.

For anyone wondering why China doesn&#x27;t want our plastics any more, here&#x27;s a nice documentary:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;ooRVhRt1p54" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;ooRVhRt1p54</a>

Just wondering why burning it to produce energy isn’t considered in US. Many countries like Sweden have managed to completely get rid of garbage this way [0].<p>[0] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.thehindu.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;international&#x2F;Sweden-runs-out-of-garbage-imports-from-other-countries&#x2F;article16795374.ece" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.thehindu.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;international&#x2F;Sweden-runs-out-...</a>

I really don’t see the point of recycling.<p>These are the steps I’ve taken to reduce my impact on the planet: eating a plant-based diet, never traveling by plane and only rarely by car (I never learned to drive and the vast majority of my travel during the year is by bicycle, public transit or foot), never having kids, and living in a small apartment.<p>Does separating my glass and plastic jars really make that much of an additional difference?

What is holding back plasma gasification? <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;waste-management-world.com&#x2F;a&#x2F;plasma-gasification-clean-renewable-fuel-through-vaporization-of-waste" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;waste-management-world.com&#x2F;a&#x2F;plasma-gasification-cle...</a>

Wrong title. Should be &quot;Recycling in the United States is in serious trouble. How it doesn&#x27;t work&quot;

That trash smells like opportunity <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;techcrunch.com&#x2F;2017&#x2F;07&#x2F;06&#x2F;an-uber-for-garbage-picks-up-steam-and-11-7-million-in-series-a-funding&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;techcrunch.com&#x2F;2017&#x2F;07&#x2F;06&#x2F;an-uber-for-garbage-picks-...</a>

China&#x27;s just not a reliable trading partner. They use trade as a weapon. It&#x27;s got countries such as Malaysia reconsidering their interactions.<p><a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.atimes.com&#x2F;article&#x2F;mahathir-resets-the-terms-for-dealing-with-china&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.atimes.com&#x2F;article&#x2F;mahathir-resets-the-terms-for-...</a><p>That&#x27;s too bad, as the Chinese people are industrious and creative, and together we stand a better chance of making the best use of waste.