Is the cost of cleaning a tin of beans greater than the recyclable value?
In order to recycle you must clean the container, that involves the use of soap, and power to heat the water, and of course the refining and treating and transportation of the water itself. You no doubt keep the recycling container in the garage so need to consider the heat loss by opening the front door to leave the house to enter the gaage.
Based on the above this tin can must be very valuable if it is worth recycling. Does anyone really know if the energy used in prepearing and cleaning the tin can is less than the recycled value of the can? (for teh record I am concerned about global warning, but the scaremongering and bare faced lies put out by the Government really make me question what we can do to prevent it and the value they attacht to their soundbies)
Answers:
I agree with what you are saying. I try to recycle as much as I can, but now I just put bean cans straight in the normal bin, to much energy to clean it.
Who says you have to clean the can? I don't, since the recycling process involves melting all the cans down, and the organic materials burn off.
The trransportation process wastes more fuel than the recycling is worth, you're right. The evidence for this? Homeless people only collect aluminum, never any other recyclable. You could put a pile of steel cans that weighed 10 tons out in the alley, and nobody would bother collecting it. But one lonely aluminum can? It'll get picked up.
Rince the tins in the dish water when you 've finished washing up
Find some iron oxide (and other metallic oxides, not least tin, but let's keep it simple)
Dig it up (blasting, huge diggers, conveyors) along with many tonnes of rock - you get a few scraps of the iron oxide with bucketloads of useless stuff
Crush it all to powder
I think there's a further refining process that I'm not sure of.. then.
Heat (ferociously) with a bed full of carbon (coal) so that the carbon will gobble up the oxygen from the iron (it's the opposite of burning - you are putting energy into the iron instead of getting it out)
Somewhere in that lot is a gob of molten iron.
You still have to shape it into a recepticle for foodstuffs.
Or, you could just wash the can.
The point is taken. Recycling is not free. But the energy inputs for metals are so huge that it's no contest.
Recycling isn't only about reclaiming the value of the "used" item, it's also about not using the space to discard the item. If you don't recycle it, then it goes with the rest of the trash. Where does the rest of your trash go? Have you included the cost of it's "final resting place" in your figures?
Also, in figuring the cost of the recycling process, it's assumed that you will do your share of the work in conjunction with other things. You wash the container with the water you've used to wash your dishes. You're not sanitizing the recyclable, why do you need HOT water? You take the container out to the shed when you go out.
You wouldn't wash each glass under a running faucet, you fill a sink. You don't take each used item out to the bin, you have a garbage bag in the house. Conservation is about everything, not just the tin can.
if you rinse the can with cold water immediately after you've used it, it will come clean. usually only needs washing if you leave contents to dry xx
You've deliberately set this condition up to prove yourself right, but a lot of the conditions you specified don't have to be accomplished in the way that you described.
If you consider it as a one-item-at-a-time deal, why bother. The thing is, your ten seconds of effort can accumulate to a lot of savings in the long run as compared to the initial mining and refining of the material. In addition, you aren't hogging landfill space, another precious commodity (particularly in urban areas) or causing even more trash to be dumped into a harbor somewhere (Is this even really a "waste solution"?). Most "tin cans" aren't tin, they're tinplate steel, or steel with tinplate tops (steel is a combination of iron & carbon). Tin itself is environmentally quite hazardous, although very little is soluble under regular conditions, should acid rain become a serious problem considerable tin leaching from waste facilities could become a massive environmental disaster.
You don't have to use soap to rinse your container. You can use plain water. The idea behind rinsing the cans is just to reduce odors and the possibility of you or anyone who handles recyclables from getting ill due to bacteria growing in remaining foodstuffs. If you're really ecologically minded, collect rainwater, rinse many cans at once in a bucket, and then use the water to feed your outdoor plants; since there's no soap it'll be perfectly safe. Another idea is to use your dirty dishwater before you flush it down; you've consumed no more water than if you'd not intended to recycle in the first place.
You contest that you can count the heat of walking out the door to the recyling, but isn't the same thing necessary for taking the trash out? Instead, perhaps you should keep a bag for rinsed recyclables in your kitchen along with a daily trash bag and take them out together, preferably when you already had a reason to be going out-of-doors. If you don't have curbside pickup, bring your recyling with you to recycling drop-offs when you go out for your other errands such as grocery shopping. Many grocery stores accept recyclables in their parking lots, so you won't even burn an extra millilitre of gas to drive there.
In the long run, integration of recycling activities will reduce your overall consumption of resources AND diminish your contribution to waste. Yes, it seems a bit silly on the individual scale.. but if 20,000 households recycle just 2 cans at 1 oz. of metal reclaimable per can each day of the year, that adds up to 1,825,000 pounds (912.5 tonnes!) of tin each year in their community that don't go into the waste facility.
I hope this helps you a little on the economics of recycling.
Currently, there is no doubt that it costs more to recycle steel, glass, plastic, & paper than they are worth using our current methods of recycling. What matters is until our society gets into a regular habit of recycling, the cost will exceed current value. Recycling in general is friendlier to the environment & more energy efficient. But if only 10% of our population recycles, how will we make the recycling process cost effective in energy use &, collection, & reuse? We can't. As a nation, we need to develop the habit of sorting & reusing.
Europe is way ahead of us in recycling, pollution control & energy conservation. They are not as rich economically, in resources, air to breathe, clean water & space to get away from pollution. They have more incentive. We seem to have our collective heads in the sand by putting our recyclables into landfills & incinerators, making the materials useless..We are running out of space, air,, water, & resources.The whole planet is running out. Meanwhile, the US has less than 5% of world population using about 30% of all available resources. If this was another country we were talking about, we would call them greedy. Guess what the rest of the world is calling us?
Wars are usually fought over resources or religion. I think we are in for big trouble, here.
No. As you have detailed in your question. Since the cans will be melted down during recycling, why bother cleaning them at all. surely the melting process will kill any nasties.
I know they ask you to wash them, but you are right, all your actions negate the benefit of recycling the tin.
I refuse to waste time and resources, the tins go unwashed into the bin. I have been doing it for years, the bin men have not complained yet
The only disadvantage in not cleaning them is that it attracts flies and wasps in warmer weather.
We have a hosepipe ban, cleaning an old tin can with water is just a waste, plus if you heat the water, you have probably created some green house gases somewhere along the line.
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Based on the above this tin can must be very valuable if it is worth recycling. Does anyone really know if the energy used in prepearing and cleaning the tin can is less than the recycled value of the can? (for teh record I am concerned about global warning, but the scaremongering and bare faced lies put out by the Government really make me question what we can do to prevent it and the value they attacht to their soundbies)
Answers:
I agree with what you are saying. I try to recycle as much as I can, but now I just put bean cans straight in the normal bin, to much energy to clean it.
Who says you have to clean the can? I don't, since the recycling process involves melting all the cans down, and the organic materials burn off.
The trransportation process wastes more fuel than the recycling is worth, you're right. The evidence for this? Homeless people only collect aluminum, never any other recyclable. You could put a pile of steel cans that weighed 10 tons out in the alley, and nobody would bother collecting it. But one lonely aluminum can? It'll get picked up.
Rince the tins in the dish water when you 've finished washing up
Find some iron oxide (and other metallic oxides, not least tin, but let's keep it simple)
Dig it up (blasting, huge diggers, conveyors) along with many tonnes of rock - you get a few scraps of the iron oxide with bucketloads of useless stuff
Crush it all to powder
I think there's a further refining process that I'm not sure of.. then.
Heat (ferociously) with a bed full of carbon (coal) so that the carbon will gobble up the oxygen from the iron (it's the opposite of burning - you are putting energy into the iron instead of getting it out)
Somewhere in that lot is a gob of molten iron.
You still have to shape it into a recepticle for foodstuffs.
Or, you could just wash the can.
The point is taken. Recycling is not free. But the energy inputs for metals are so huge that it's no contest.
Recycling isn't only about reclaiming the value of the "used" item, it's also about not using the space to discard the item. If you don't recycle it, then it goes with the rest of the trash. Where does the rest of your trash go? Have you included the cost of it's "final resting place" in your figures?
Also, in figuring the cost of the recycling process, it's assumed that you will do your share of the work in conjunction with other things. You wash the container with the water you've used to wash your dishes. You're not sanitizing the recyclable, why do you need HOT water? You take the container out to the shed when you go out.
You wouldn't wash each glass under a running faucet, you fill a sink. You don't take each used item out to the bin, you have a garbage bag in the house. Conservation is about everything, not just the tin can.
if you rinse the can with cold water immediately after you've used it, it will come clean. usually only needs washing if you leave contents to dry xx
You've deliberately set this condition up to prove yourself right, but a lot of the conditions you specified don't have to be accomplished in the way that you described.
If you consider it as a one-item-at-a-time deal, why bother. The thing is, your ten seconds of effort can accumulate to a lot of savings in the long run as compared to the initial mining and refining of the material. In addition, you aren't hogging landfill space, another precious commodity (particularly in urban areas) or causing even more trash to be dumped into a harbor somewhere (Is this even really a "waste solution"?). Most "tin cans" aren't tin, they're tinplate steel, or steel with tinplate tops (steel is a combination of iron & carbon). Tin itself is environmentally quite hazardous, although very little is soluble under regular conditions, should acid rain become a serious problem considerable tin leaching from waste facilities could become a massive environmental disaster.
You don't have to use soap to rinse your container. You can use plain water. The idea behind rinsing the cans is just to reduce odors and the possibility of you or anyone who handles recyclables from getting ill due to bacteria growing in remaining foodstuffs. If you're really ecologically minded, collect rainwater, rinse many cans at once in a bucket, and then use the water to feed your outdoor plants; since there's no soap it'll be perfectly safe. Another idea is to use your dirty dishwater before you flush it down; you've consumed no more water than if you'd not intended to recycle in the first place.
You contest that you can count the heat of walking out the door to the recyling, but isn't the same thing necessary for taking the trash out? Instead, perhaps you should keep a bag for rinsed recyclables in your kitchen along with a daily trash bag and take them out together, preferably when you already had a reason to be going out-of-doors. If you don't have curbside pickup, bring your recyling with you to recycling drop-offs when you go out for your other errands such as grocery shopping. Many grocery stores accept recyclables in their parking lots, so you won't even burn an extra millilitre of gas to drive there.
In the long run, integration of recycling activities will reduce your overall consumption of resources AND diminish your contribution to waste. Yes, it seems a bit silly on the individual scale.. but if 20,000 households recycle just 2 cans at 1 oz. of metal reclaimable per can each day of the year, that adds up to 1,825,000 pounds (912.5 tonnes!) of tin each year in their community that don't go into the waste facility.
I hope this helps you a little on the economics of recycling.
Currently, there is no doubt that it costs more to recycle steel, glass, plastic, & paper than they are worth using our current methods of recycling. What matters is until our society gets into a regular habit of recycling, the cost will exceed current value. Recycling in general is friendlier to the environment & more energy efficient. But if only 10% of our population recycles, how will we make the recycling process cost effective in energy use &, collection, & reuse? We can't. As a nation, we need to develop the habit of sorting & reusing.
Europe is way ahead of us in recycling, pollution control & energy conservation. They are not as rich economically, in resources, air to breathe, clean water & space to get away from pollution. They have more incentive. We seem to have our collective heads in the sand by putting our recyclables into landfills & incinerators, making the materials useless..We are running out of space, air,, water, & resources.The whole planet is running out. Meanwhile, the US has less than 5% of world population using about 30% of all available resources. If this was another country we were talking about, we would call them greedy. Guess what the rest of the world is calling us?
Wars are usually fought over resources or religion. I think we are in for big trouble, here.
No. As you have detailed in your question. Since the cans will be melted down during recycling, why bother cleaning them at all. surely the melting process will kill any nasties.
I know they ask you to wash them, but you are right, all your actions negate the benefit of recycling the tin.
I refuse to waste time and resources, the tins go unwashed into the bin. I have been doing it for years, the bin men have not complained yet
The only disadvantage in not cleaning them is that it attracts flies and wasps in warmer weather.
We have a hosepipe ban, cleaning an old tin can with water is just a waste, plus if you heat the water, you have probably created some green house gases somewhere along the line.
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