recycling ...are we really saving the planet ?

COOLTRIKERCHICK

i am a huge recycler.....especially over the last year.....i have also changed the way i shop, and this has made a huge reduction in my household waste..

i subscribe to a website.. which i have just had my regular email from them..

and they were say a huge percentage of recycable material ...( plastic....paper...etc..) is cent abroad to be recycled back into well plastic ...paper etc.....

what the big concern is that sending this stuff hlaf way across the world to be recycled.. then sent back again....

just imagine the impact on emissions etc...

it seems to me that coucils etc.. are doing half a job..they are saving landfils and the enviormonet with one hand... but then..... undoing all that good by exporting it all abroad..... for it to come back again......mega carbon footprint there...

what do you think ?
here is a link to the article..

http://www.letsrecycle.com/do/ecco.py/view_item?listid=37&listcatid=217&listitemid=8882

Justie

alternatively ships would go back to China etc empty and as the ships have to travel anyway (and shipping is one of the most energy efficient forms of transport) then they may as well be full of something.

My concern is about the conditions once they get there which should be better during the recycling process.

Practically as a small island we don't have the space or the resources to do all the recycling and manufacturing ourselves with the amount of consumption of goods there is in the UK.

Penelope_Penguin

Recycling isn't the answer. Only by reducing the amount of *stuff* we get through, and living more sustainably, will we really make a difference.

Penny. x

PabloNeruda

But, OP, it's not about 'saving the planet'. I think you are missing the point of the environmentalists altogether. The earth will take care of itself. It's humans who need to save themselves, because the earth only has to sneeze to take millions of people to their death. In other words, if we carry on desecrating it like have been, it will make us no longer welcome. The earth is a self-regulating entity, a huge global ecosystem. But the human population increase (trebled in 2 generations), degredation of land, depletion of resources, accumulation of wastes, pollution of all kinds, climate change, abuses of technology and destruction to biodiversity are presenting a unique threat to human welfare unknown to previous generations. Because the earth may very well decide it has had enough.

Think of it like this - we have grown in number to the point where our presence is perceptibly disabling the planet like a disease. There are 4 possible outcomes:

1. Destruction of the invading disease organisms
2. Chronic infection
3. Destruction of the host
4. Symbiosis - a lasting relationship of mutual benefit to the host and the invader

If we are not careful the outcome may very well be 1. We need to work harder to achieve 4.

mascherano

PabloNeruda wrote: »

But, OP, it's not about 'saving the planet'. I think you are missing the point of the environmentalists altogether. The earth will take care of itself. It's humans who need to save themselves, because the earth only has to sneeze to take millions of people to their death. In other words, if we carry on desecrating it like have been, it will make us no longer welcome. The earth is a self-regulating entity, a huge global ecosystem. But the human population increase (trebled in 2 generations), degredation of land, depletion of resources, accumulation of wastes, pollution of all kinds, climate change, abuses of technology and destruction to biodiversity are presenting a unique threat to human welfare unknown to previous generations. Because the earth may very well decide it has had enough.

Think of it like this - we have grown in number to the point where our presence is perceptibly disabling the planet like a disease. There are 4 possible outcomes:

1. Destruction of the invading disease organisms
2. Chronic infection
3. Destruction of the host
4. Symbiosis - a lasting relationship of mutual benefit to the host and the invader

If we are not careful the outcome may very well be 1. We need to work harder to achieve 4.

Thanks for your assessment of the situation. Do you have any more head-in-the-clouds pseudo intellectual nonsense or are you quite finished?

Penelope_Penguin

mascherano wrote: »

Thanks for your assessment of the situation. Do you have any more head-in-the-clouds pseudo intellectual nonsense or are you quite finished?

That was uncalled for.

Remember the mantra - *Pls be nice to all MoneySavrs*.

moonrakerz

I think Pablo's basic point was that "man is in danger of eating himself out of house and home", Which I must agree is a far bigger threat than me leaving my TV in standby for the evening, but he did rather spoil the message by the rather "pseudo intellectual nonsense" he finished off with. His points 1 - 4 really were 'waffle'.

PabloNeruda

mascherano wrote: »

Thanks for your assessment of the situation. Do you have any more head-in-the-clouds pseudo intellectual nonsense or are you quite finished?

Is that so, Einstein? Perhaps you'd be kind enough to share your academic knowledge on the subject. The Gaia theory of global self-regulation has been acknowledged as QED by scientists in the Amsterdam Declaration of 2001.

Therefore I'm interested in where the 'pseudo-intellectual' analysis you refer to comes from?

Do yourself a favour - stick to subjects you know something about before trying to criticise others, or else you risk humiliating yourself in public and making yourself look like an ignorant tit. Like you've just done.

Cardew

Must say I agree about the rather meaningless waffle in Pablo's post. On the wider issue, when the world's population gets too big for this planet to support, war/disease/starvation/mass culling will reduce the population - in the end we are like any other species.

No amount of theory will stop that happening - China, India et al aren't going to put the brakes on their development, anymore than we have in the past.

However getting back to the subject of this thread, surely nobody would argue against effective recycling; it is defining what is effective.

It obviously makes no sense for me to drive 12 miles to my nearest recyling centre - so I rarely visit; if the council won't take in the green bin, it goes in the black bin.

Does it make sense for UK to sort plastic, transport it to the docks for shipping to China - don't know the answer to that one, my gut feeling says no.

COOLTRIKERCHICK

i know the world has its own natural cycle...ice age.. then warming up etc....
and as i have seen and heard on tv programmes... the earth is now on the warming up cycle....( rhis is how our cost lines have changed over 100's thousandss of years ..

pablo neruda... what you say does make sense,, but to be honest.... its the recycling issue i am trying to address...

i feel sometimes that the gtoverment and recycling bodies might have lost the plot a bit.... as it doesnt make sense to ship our recycling items half way across the world for them to be recycled..... with carbo footprint etc....

its seems as though they are just shifting our rubbish to a diff country for it to be taken care of.

but as you say penelope peguin( hi.. how are you doing )
we need to start looking at what we are buying,, and the actual waste we are gtenerating...

Kay_Peel

While I do my bit, I just have to look across the valley to a mega-mansion - the home of a famous footballer and his wife. At night, it's lit up like Old Trafford. Inside, I'm told, are the biggest monstrosities of fridges, freezers, appliances, gyms, and a swimming pool that needs heating. There is also a golf course that needs watering, there's a fleet of gas-guzzling cars and they have various other toys to play with.

The two of them must consume enough energy to run a small town.

As I recycle 'greywater', fill my compost bins, fit waterbutts, re-use, reduce and recycle, I wonder what the point is.

k.