WEBVTT - Recycling Update: How’s It Going? 0:00:01.120 --> 0:00:04.560 Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from how Stuff Works 0:00:04.600 --> 0:00:14.280 dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast again. I'm 0:00:14.360 --> 0:00:19.800 Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chaz Bryant, there's Jerry Jerome 0:00:19.920 --> 0:00:23.599 Roland over there, and this is Stuff you Should Know again. 0:00:24.880 --> 0:00:28.480 Why are you say it again? Well, so, before we recorded, 0:00:29.240 --> 0:00:31.120 I want to tell all of you, Chuck confided in 0:00:31.240 --> 0:00:34.800 me a tabit of concerned. Right, can we reveal all 0:00:34.840 --> 0:00:37.320 this or is this going to get edited out? We'll reveal. 0:00:38.080 --> 0:00:41.600 So we we have done an episode on recycling again 0:00:42.120 --> 0:00:46.760 or before this is again? Um? Before it was from 0:00:46.760 --> 0:00:49.480 my understanding, it was the premise was is what you're 0:00:49.560 --> 0:00:53.760 recycling actually getting recycled? Right? That was the basis of it. 0:00:54.000 --> 0:00:55.880 That's kind of everything, and then we just kind of 0:00:55.880 --> 0:00:58.680 went over recycling here there. Yeah, I mean it was 0:00:59.800 --> 0:01:02.800 it was year two of the show. It's about a 0:01:02.840 --> 0:01:05.480 half an hour in linked that was long for back then, 0:01:05.640 --> 0:01:10.279 and probably eight minutes of that covered the garbage patch, 0:01:11.560 --> 0:01:13.959 which we went on to do in an episode just 0:01:14.080 --> 0:01:17.560 on that did. Yeah, for sure, we talked about the 0:01:17.640 --> 0:01:20.280 eight minutes of the garbage patch something. Yeah, I mean 0:01:20.319 --> 0:01:22.560 the name of the episode was recycling in the Great 0:01:22.600 --> 0:01:27.000 Pacific garbage Patch. Did we combine those two into one? 0:01:27.120 --> 0:01:29.959 I don't know. I think I'm having some sort of 0:01:30.080 --> 0:01:35.560 weird like flashback or yeah. So here's the deal, though, folks. 0:01:36.120 --> 0:01:40.720 We're redoing recycling. Updating is what it's called. We're updating 0:01:40.720 --> 0:01:43.399 with new information. And there may be some of the 0:01:43.480 --> 0:01:46.520 same stuff. But I listened to that episode, and we 0:01:46.520 --> 0:01:49.000 weren't very good at what we did back then. I thought, 0:01:50.080 --> 0:01:53.040 I thought we. I'm almost positive we did a separate 0:01:53.040 --> 0:01:55.880 episode on the Great Pacific Garbage We may have. But 0:01:56.040 --> 0:01:59.520 all of this to say is don't freak out and 0:01:59.520 --> 0:02:02.080 say you as are repeating yourselves. Are we Are we 0:02:02.160 --> 0:02:05.680 already there? Because no, we're not. No, No, this is 0:02:05.720 --> 0:02:09.000 an update. This is so important, and things have changed 0:02:09.120 --> 0:02:14.760 enough since what two it may have even been nine. Yes, 0:02:14.960 --> 0:02:17.799 quite a bit has changed since back then. As a 0:02:17.880 --> 0:02:22.440 matter of fact, Um, we've gotten better recycling, we've gotten 0:02:22.919 --> 0:02:28.560 worse at recycling. Simultaneously, recycling has turned into a huge business. 0:02:28.600 --> 0:02:31.880 We understand it more. And then there's been major colossal 0:02:31.960 --> 0:02:37.760 changes just this year to the global recyclable material commodities 0:02:37.800 --> 0:02:41.720 market that is going to change everyone's life one way 0:02:41.800 --> 0:02:45.080 or another. If you care at all about recycling because 0:02:45.120 --> 0:02:48.679 of China. Yeah, and you know what, we'll we'll get 0:02:48.720 --> 0:02:50.240 to that, but I'm just gonna come out and say 0:02:50.280 --> 0:02:55.480 it good for China, all right, but depending that one. Right, 0:02:55.919 --> 0:02:57.840 we've been putting pins all over the place. I'm afraid 0:02:57.840 --> 0:03:00.640 that we have just bins everywhere. No, we've been going back. 0:03:00.880 --> 0:03:02.840 I don't think we've left a single pin in place, 0:03:03.240 --> 0:03:06.239 which is unusual for us because we do that a lot. 0:03:06.360 --> 0:03:08.760 And I also want to say that it's nice that 0:03:08.760 --> 0:03:12.000 we're all three together again. Yeah, Jerry is back again. 0:03:12.120 --> 0:03:14.639 She keeps leaving, but she's back, and she has a 0:03:14.680 --> 0:03:17.760 summer cold. Yeah, that's just the worst that that to 0:03:17.840 --> 0:03:20.000 me is like that is a clear indication that you 0:03:20.000 --> 0:03:23.200 have been working too hard. If you go on vacation 0:03:23.200 --> 0:03:26.000 and get sick because you're like work, work, work, and 0:03:26.000 --> 0:03:28.800 then you relax on vacation and your your immune system 0:03:28.800 --> 0:03:31.200 goes down. You interesting, you gotta take it easy, You 0:03:31.200 --> 0:03:35.080 gotta you need like a step down vacation like a 0:03:35.280 --> 0:03:40.200 work and then staycation and then vacation. Jerry. Jerry gave 0:03:40.240 --> 0:03:46.440 a thumbs up, sickly thumb it's a little pale green. 0:03:47.240 --> 0:03:51.280 Uh so chuck, Yes, I think I think also, Uh, 0:03:51.440 --> 0:03:54.160 we agreed that you're going to participate even more and 0:03:54.200 --> 0:03:57.880 I'm going to participate less. Well, the last one it 0:03:57.960 --> 0:03:59.640 was pretty funny to listen to. You should give it 0:03:59.640 --> 0:04:02.160 a listen. Oh, we'll see if you notice. Oh I've 0:04:02.160 --> 0:04:05.400 noticed before, like sometimes I'm just like cringing and pinching 0:04:05.440 --> 0:04:08.960 the bridge of my nose, like shut up, josh. Uh. 0:04:09.000 --> 0:04:11.320 So that is the last we will speak of that episode. 0:04:11.480 --> 0:04:14.200 And let's just pretend like we're starting a new or 0:04:14.360 --> 0:04:19.719 updating recycling. What is it? So let's talk about recycling. Yeah, 0:04:19.720 --> 0:04:21.880 one of the three the third best of the three rs. 0:04:23.560 --> 0:04:26.320 That's your favorite one, or it's the your least favorite 0:04:26.320 --> 0:04:28.320 of Well, it's not the least favorite, it's it should 0:04:28.360 --> 0:04:32.479 be the third option. As a green human, you should 0:04:32.480 --> 0:04:35.440 try and reduce and reuse first. Yes, And that's why 0:04:35.480 --> 0:04:37.880 they put them in that order, because recycling is the 0:04:37.880 --> 0:04:40.440 the last line of defense. Yeah. I thought it just 0:04:40.520 --> 0:04:41.920 kind of float off the tongue a little more. I 0:04:41.960 --> 0:04:43.919 didn't realize that they had them in order. It's in 0:04:44.040 --> 0:04:47.479 order of preference. Well that's cool, okay, So you it 0:04:47.600 --> 0:04:51.279 is best to reduce reuse and then when all else 0:04:51.400 --> 0:04:55.560 fails recycle. That's an ideal world, right, yeah, because if 0:04:55.560 --> 0:04:57.280 you go to a website and you look up like 0:04:57.400 --> 0:05:00.480 can I recycle my toilet paper tubes and the recycling 0:05:00.520 --> 0:05:04.000 ben Sure. Yeah. But if you go to like you know, 0:05:04.080 --> 0:05:05.840 tree Hugger and all these other sites are like, well 0:05:05.880 --> 0:05:08.719 you can, but what you should really do is this, 0:05:09.360 --> 0:05:11.760 And then it's they first, find a way to not 0:05:11.839 --> 0:05:14.360 use toilet paper at all, and so you don't have 0:05:14.400 --> 0:05:17.000 those that would be the reduce. Turn it into the 0:05:17.160 --> 0:05:19.880 stand for like a pipe cleaner tree. Well, that's everything else, 0:05:19.920 --> 0:05:22.799 that's the reuses. They're they're like, there are so many 0:05:22.839 --> 0:05:25.039 crafty things you can do with toilet paper too. You 0:05:25.040 --> 0:05:27.599 can use it as a telescope, which will eventually end 0:05:27.680 --> 0:05:31.160 up in the trash. You can use it as a harmonica. 0:05:31.279 --> 0:05:34.800 Maybe I can do this all day. We should so, 0:05:34.960 --> 0:05:37.600 actually I don't think we should. So when you recycle 0:05:37.680 --> 0:05:40.359 that toilet paper too, when you drop it into a 0:05:40.520 --> 0:05:43.440 bin out front, you may notice that you're also dropping 0:05:43.480 --> 0:05:46.760 in like glass like you're your old like Captain Morgan's 0:05:46.800 --> 0:05:52.920 bottle or um it took you eight years to drink? Sure, uh, 0:05:53.040 --> 0:05:55.960 you're drinking them run these days? Oh, I love rom 0:05:56.400 --> 0:05:59.120 I'm not big on Captain Morgan, but I love rom alright, 0:05:59.160 --> 0:06:01.640 It's one of my highest favorite I'm like, wow, I 0:06:01.720 --> 0:06:04.080 really like Rum. I say that every time I take 0:06:04.080 --> 0:06:06.600 a sip of rum. Just look at my glass and go, wow, 0:06:06.640 --> 0:06:14.360 I really love romdd everyone in the house Momo rolls, 0:06:14.520 --> 0:06:19.600 rolls her little eyes, um, big eyes, so um. You 0:06:19.800 --> 0:06:22.280 dump all this stuff together in a single bin, and 0:06:23.120 --> 0:06:25.520 you may stop and be like, wait, wait, this is crazy. 0:06:25.680 --> 0:06:27.880 How am I dumping all this stuff in a single bin? 0:06:28.000 --> 0:06:30.640 Didn't we used to have to separate? Yes, we did. 0:06:31.040 --> 0:06:34.839 But thanks to the event of single stream recycling, people 0:06:34.920 --> 0:06:37.719 recycle a lot more stuff than they ever did before. 0:06:38.120 --> 0:06:41.680 Recycling participation is up. You may have noticed, like back 0:06:41.720 --> 0:06:43.680 in the nineties, early two thousands, they gave you like 0:06:43.680 --> 0:06:47.400 a little tiny bin. Now you get like a big 0:06:47.440 --> 0:06:49.800 old garbage can with wheels on it so you can 0:06:49.839 --> 0:06:52.560 put even more stuff in it. That's how much recycling 0:06:52.600 --> 0:06:56.760 participation is up. Programs all over the country, everybody's recycling. 0:06:56.960 --> 0:06:59.000 So on the one hand, it's really good that we 0:06:59.080 --> 0:07:03.680 have single streamer cycling because it makes people more likely 0:07:03.760 --> 0:07:08.080 to recycle. On the other hand, it also makes us 0:07:08.120 --> 0:07:11.120 more likely to recycle stuff that we really shouldn't be 0:07:11.160 --> 0:07:15.720 recycling or or using as much up to begin with. Right, 0:07:15.720 --> 0:07:18.480 But even if it's stuff that, like, um that, even 0:07:18.520 --> 0:07:21.720 if you're you're reducing and reusing, you people still have 0:07:21.760 --> 0:07:24.240 a tendency to throw stuff in that recycling ben even 0:07:24.240 --> 0:07:27.880 though it can't be recycled. Yeah, with that one article 0:07:27.920 --> 0:07:31.000 you sent called it aspirational recycling. Yes, like, I don't 0:07:31.000 --> 0:07:32.480 really know if this can go in there, but I'm 0:07:32.480 --> 0:07:34.080 gonna do it because it makes me feel good, right, 0:07:34.120 --> 0:07:36.720 I hope, So I hope it can be recycled. So 0:07:36.840 --> 0:07:39.160 that doesn't sound like that bad of a deal, you know, 0:07:39.240 --> 0:07:41.360 if like you're like, okay, well it can't be recycled, 0:07:41.360 --> 0:07:43.240 so it doesn't get recycled, it cares you know, it 0:07:43.320 --> 0:07:47.120 just disintegrates into nothingness magically. Right, it's actually not what 0:07:47.240 --> 0:07:50.160 happens that stuff ends up at the landfill. Right, So 0:07:50.200 --> 0:07:53.560 you're basically saying, here, recycling company, throw this away for me, 0:07:53.600 --> 0:07:56.320 will you. Yeah, And if you listen to our show 0:07:56.360 --> 0:07:59.800 on landfills, which was a good one, yeah, um, we 0:08:00.000 --> 0:08:03.240 we sort of had glowing praise for landfills and that 0:08:03.360 --> 0:08:06.480 was I think in terms of in the context of hey, 0:08:06.560 --> 0:08:09.440 if you're going to have a landfill. They're really have 0:08:09.560 --> 0:08:12.480 made leaps and bounds from the old days. Yeah, for sure, 0:08:12.600 --> 0:08:17.840 but obviously we want to do this instead of the landfill. Yeah. 0:08:17.880 --> 0:08:21.520 The ideal situation would be for us to UM to 0:08:21.680 --> 0:08:25.120 basically close the loop on our all of our materials, 0:08:25.680 --> 0:08:28.440 on our metals, on our plastics, on our paper and that, 0:08:29.040 --> 0:08:31.080 and figure out a way to reuse them. And now 0:08:31.560 --> 0:08:33.960 there's enough of everything, and we never have to cut 0:08:34.000 --> 0:08:35.959 down another tree, we never have to dig up another 0:08:36.000 --> 0:08:38.000 piece of box site, we never have to do anything. 0:08:38.000 --> 0:08:40.800 We've got enough, and then we just have these perfect 0:08:40.840 --> 0:08:45.599 like reusing UM reprocessing techniques and we've just got to 0:08:45.679 --> 0:08:48.000 close the loop of these materials. That would be ideal. 0:08:48.040 --> 0:08:51.319 We're pretty far from that, right, um, But it is 0:08:51.360 --> 0:08:55.040 a good step in the right direction that we are recycling. Right. 0:08:56.280 --> 0:08:58.520 So when you recycle, when you put that stuff in 0:08:58.559 --> 0:09:01.199 that bind, we're gonna get to all this really great stuff. 0:09:01.240 --> 0:09:03.240 I just tease something that you don't even know what 0:09:03.280 --> 0:09:06.720 I'm talking about yet, dear listener, what box eye. That 0:09:06.840 --> 0:09:10.800 was one thing, um, But the the aspirational recycling turns 0:09:10.800 --> 0:09:13.400 into play later on. So when you recycle, you put 0:09:13.440 --> 0:09:15.559 it out on the bin, and then some people come 0:09:15.600 --> 0:09:17.439 up and what looks like an old garbage truck or 0:09:17.480 --> 0:09:20.720 a modified garbage truck, except it's usually much cleaner, maybe 0:09:20.760 --> 0:09:24.480 a pleasant blue or pleasant green color. Uh. And there's 0:09:24.480 --> 0:09:29.400 no juice usually dripping out of the back garbage juice. Um. 0:09:29.720 --> 0:09:32.720 And they pick it up and they cart it off, 0:09:32.840 --> 0:09:36.880 and that begins the the plastic bottle or the toilet 0:09:36.880 --> 0:09:41.520 paper tubes journey. Yeah. And um, this is a grabstar article. 0:09:41.640 --> 0:09:44.319 It's nice to work from one of those. Again. Head 0:09:44.360 --> 0:09:46.680 points out though, that when things are recycled, it's pretty 0:09:46.760 --> 0:09:50.480 rare that, um, you get the same thing as the 0:09:50.600 --> 0:09:56.360 original material. So like that soda can, that beer can 0:09:56.840 --> 0:10:00.400 may not end up a beer can. Right. Does that 0:10:00.440 --> 0:10:03.120 make you sad that person out there listening. Um, well, 0:10:03.160 --> 0:10:05.480 that's that's what I was saying. Like in an ideal world, 0:10:06.000 --> 0:10:09.440 it would it would become another beer can, right, Yeah. 0:10:09.720 --> 0:10:12.760 But we're not there yet because when we recycle stuff, 0:10:12.760 --> 0:10:15.880 it degrades. Yeah. And that's why you can't recycle paper 0:10:16.360 --> 0:10:18.520 and think that it's going to be the next thing 0:10:18.520 --> 0:10:21.920 that you print something on. Uh, it's not gonna come 0:10:21.960 --> 0:10:24.800 back like clean Lily White does printer paper No, and 0:10:24.840 --> 0:10:29.280 that's called downstream recycling, where that that office paper you 0:10:29.360 --> 0:10:33.319 printed on that you recycle ends up becoming like, um, 0:10:33.480 --> 0:10:37.120 a coffee clutch for your coffee. And then you recycle 0:10:37.200 --> 0:10:40.760 that and it becomes low grade like napkin, and then 0:10:40.800 --> 0:10:43.160 after that it just basically ends up in landfill because 0:10:43.160 --> 0:10:46.280 it can't be recycled, an then it becomes airport toilet paper. 0:10:47.120 --> 0:10:51.000 It's just the lowest form of paper. Yeah, it's pretty bad. 0:10:51.640 --> 0:10:54.480 Like it's just you can see right through it. Yes, 0:10:54.640 --> 0:10:57.800 doesn't do anything anything, It just provides a false sense 0:10:57.800 --> 0:11:01.600 of security and then your fingers go right there. Uh uh. 0:11:01.880 --> 0:11:04.800 Up cycling is a little different, and that's pretty rare, 0:11:05.200 --> 0:11:07.480 but that's when something is made more valuable than the 0:11:07.520 --> 0:11:11.439 original product. Yeah, and I like the example that egg games. 0:11:12.800 --> 0:11:14.800 You could take a hub cap and turn it into 0:11:14.800 --> 0:11:19.160 a decorative bird bath. Yeah, that counts. Good job, ed. Hey, 0:11:19.240 --> 0:11:22.360 I'm all about that. Uh, found Art, like those people 0:11:22.360 --> 0:11:25.520 do a valuable service. We should redo that episode, remember 0:11:25.520 --> 0:11:30.440 that one found Art that we didn't do that? Now 0:11:31.800 --> 0:11:35.520 I think you're joshing. No really, I'm promised. All right, 0:11:35.679 --> 0:11:38.480 I'm gonna have to look that one up. Uh, let's 0:11:38.480 --> 0:11:42.199 talk about the history a bit though, because Ed makes 0:11:42.280 --> 0:11:45.679 great pains to point out that it's interesting that, um, 0:11:45.800 --> 0:11:48.440 most people probably think like man in the seventies, in 0:11:48.480 --> 0:11:51.920 the sixties, that's when it all started, But recycling actually 0:11:51.960 --> 0:11:56.520 kind of started because of the Industrial Revolution. Yeah, And 0:11:56.559 --> 0:12:01.800 it wasn't like necessarily it didn't have green and d well. No, 0:12:01.960 --> 0:12:04.280 it was more like do you remember when we did 0:12:04.320 --> 0:12:07.640 the extinct job titles when and we talked about armors 0:12:07.679 --> 0:12:09.320 and you can't find a suit of armor from the 0:12:09.920 --> 0:12:13.440 fourteenth or fifteen centuries because they reused that stuff that 0:12:13.559 --> 0:12:15.760 was just par for the course back then. Yeah, Like 0:12:15.840 --> 0:12:19.760 things were just too valuable to throw away. You just 0:12:19.800 --> 0:12:22.160 found a way to reuse it. And that was pretty 0:12:22.240 --> 0:12:25.680 much the way people lived for many many years until 0:12:26.240 --> 0:12:31.160 basically the post war economic boom led to this consumer 0:12:31.559 --> 0:12:35.640 society that we live in today where it's just very 0:12:35.720 --> 0:12:39.920 very cheap to produce stuff, including like packaging and materials, 0:12:40.400 --> 0:12:43.000 and we use it out the yen yang and we 0:12:43.120 --> 0:12:46.160 just throw it away typically. And it wasn't until the 0:12:47.440 --> 0:12:51.480 I think the first Earth Day that recycling came back again. Yeah, 0:12:51.520 --> 0:12:53.200 and that's when it definitely had a more of a 0:12:53.280 --> 0:13:00.000 green tent on it. For sure, which is good. Um 0:13:00.240 --> 0:13:02.079 add points out to that that you know, there were 0:13:02.080 --> 0:13:04.880 some leneers here and there. I think recycling the United 0:13:04.920 --> 0:13:08.440 States really had its heyday in the nineties. That's when 0:13:08.440 --> 0:13:11.360 I first remember it becoming like this thing is a 0:13:11.440 --> 0:13:15.320 thing now. Yeah, And I've got a couple of stats here. Um, 0:13:15.360 --> 0:13:20.400 it peaked in actually it peaked in recent years. And 0:13:20.440 --> 0:13:25.199 this is you know, I believe how many tons are 0:13:25.240 --> 0:13:29.040 diverted from the landfill. So if you're going by that stat, 0:13:29.080 --> 0:13:31.920 it peaked in two thousand eleven at thirty four point 0:13:32.040 --> 0:13:36.640 seven Um, what is that million tons? Yeah, there are 0:13:36.679 --> 0:13:39.280 thirty or four point seven percent. I would think, oh yeah, yeah, 0:13:39.320 --> 0:13:43.040 thirty four point seven percent of the hundred and whatever. 0:13:43.400 --> 0:13:45.200 What have we send today? About a hundred and fifty 0:13:45.200 --> 0:13:48.360 million tons? I saw, so I saw different things, like 0:13:48.400 --> 0:13:51.319 I think that that's from the e p A. Right, yeah, yeah, 0:13:51.320 --> 0:13:53.319 Actually in the eighties it was about a hundred and fifty. 0:13:53.320 --> 0:13:56.760 Now we're down to about a hundred. I think that's 0:13:56.800 --> 0:13:59.800 going to the hundred million tons that's going to the 0:14:00.000 --> 0:14:03.680 and fill. Yes, yeah, yeah, but but our recycling is up, 0:14:04.440 --> 0:14:09.360 But are I think our actual waste production overall is 0:14:10.040 --> 0:14:15.160 up to Yeah, and more people of course, Stu, Yeah, exactly. 0:14:15.400 --> 0:14:17.839 But that's that's actually a thing that we'll talk about 0:14:17.840 --> 0:14:22.640 that recycling masks. Um Like, we're throwing away way more 0:14:22.720 --> 0:14:25.960 stuff and luckily we're recycling more than ever, so we're 0:14:25.960 --> 0:14:29.000 actually putting less than ever in the landfill. But if 0:14:29.040 --> 0:14:31.840 we would do that first thing, reduce, and then the 0:14:31.840 --> 0:14:34.840 second thing we use, we could really have a significant 0:14:34.880 --> 0:14:38.840 impact on it without recycling. Yeah, for sure, recycling is 0:14:38.920 --> 0:14:42.160 much What would be your guests as to the the 0:14:42.240 --> 0:14:45.960 number one thing recycled in the United States? My guests 0:14:46.000 --> 0:14:49.320 would be aluminum cans, that is all the way down 0:14:49.320 --> 0:14:56.720 to number eight. What, um, I'm gonna say, rubber chickens then, well, yeah, 0:14:56.840 --> 0:15:01.800 you nailed it, um, acid batteries. Batteries are the number 0:15:01.800 --> 0:15:06.040 one thing. Like people, what multiverse did you come from? Today? 0:15:06.160 --> 0:15:09.239 I think people understand, they seem to have an understanding 0:15:09.280 --> 0:15:13.480 that you just don't throw batteries away anymore. What do 0:15:13.520 --> 0:15:16.200 you do with them? You recycle them? Where do you 0:15:16.240 --> 0:15:19.840 recycle them? Seriously, you throw batteries away, I just like 0:15:19.880 --> 0:15:23.800 throw them in the closest body of water I can find. Well, 0:15:23.840 --> 0:15:26.280 they were known to float. Where do you recycle these? 0:15:26.280 --> 0:15:28.560 Like in your recycling bid. Well no, I mean you 0:15:28.600 --> 0:15:30.480 have to take them somewhere. Where do you take them? 0:15:30.520 --> 0:15:33.840 Like a recycling place? Yeah, like like there are places 0:15:33.880 --> 0:15:36.480 that accept batteries. Are you talking about little batteries? Are 0:15:36.480 --> 0:15:39.200 you talking about car batteries? Lead acid batteries? Is that 0:15:39.320 --> 0:15:42.440 a car battery? Actually, I don't know. I think that's 0:15:42.440 --> 0:15:45.280 a car battery. Okay, yeah, yeah, I know you recycle cars. 0:15:45.480 --> 0:15:48.160 That makes sense because you get a little juice when 0:15:48.160 --> 0:15:50.280 you buy your new battery if you plunk down your 0:15:50.320 --> 0:15:52.760 old one. Yeah, that would make sense. But still you 0:15:52.800 --> 0:15:56.840 would think aluminum Kansas number eight, Yeah, number two was 0:15:56.880 --> 0:16:00.960 corrugated at boxes number three, steel number four or his newspaper, 0:16:01.560 --> 0:16:03.800 and then all the way down to number numbers eight 0:16:03.800 --> 0:16:06.360 and nine or soda and beer cans and bottles. That 0:16:06.560 --> 0:16:10.200 is really bizarre. Yeah, but that you know, how did 0:16:10.200 --> 0:16:16.080 they say Brenstein? I don't know. I'm not sure. But 0:16:16.240 --> 0:16:18.600 at any rate, we've we've been bouncing around over the 0:16:18.680 --> 0:16:21.920 last decade, somewhere in the thirty two to thirty five 0:16:22.000 --> 0:16:25.360 percent range. So peaked is a percentage of waste diverted, 0:16:25.520 --> 0:16:29.720 Like you can't say peaked then, like it's been inching downward. 0:16:30.160 --> 0:16:34.280 I predict it's going to continue to inch downward, and 0:16:34.280 --> 0:16:37.120 then it's going to start going up again more than 0:16:37.760 --> 0:16:41.080 the peak, the recent peak. Yeah, in the next ten 0:16:41.120 --> 0:16:44.480 to fifteen years. That's my prediction. Would be great. In America, 0:16:44.520 --> 0:16:46.720 if you wanted to know, is number five in the world, 0:16:47.440 --> 0:16:52.840 behind Austria, Germany, Belgium, in Switzerland as far as um 0:16:53.080 --> 0:16:57.120 most recycling participation or something. Yeah, diverting the most tonnage 0:16:57.200 --> 0:17:01.720 away from landfills. Number what number five? That's not good, 0:17:02.200 --> 0:17:06.119 it's okay, And and numbers three through six are virtually tied. 0:17:07.040 --> 0:17:10.280 It's really Austria and Germany or like ten percent twelve 0:17:10.320 --> 0:17:14.040 percent more those guys will recycle anything. Uh. And then 0:17:14.119 --> 0:17:17.439 America's only city on the list. Take a guess there, 0:17:17.480 --> 0:17:19.359 I bet you know that one. I M say Portland's 0:17:19.720 --> 0:17:24.879 good guests, Seattle closer, uh, further away somewhere in Wyoming. 0:17:25.440 --> 0:17:28.840 San Francisco is the number one city or recycling. It's 0:17:28.880 --> 0:17:31.359 the only American city to make like the All Star 0:17:31.440 --> 0:17:35.879 Recycling list. So I think that means we're done, right. 0:17:37.400 --> 0:17:40.359 I'll bet we didn't mention that before in the last episode. No, 0:17:40.560 --> 0:17:42.840 oh yeah, we're not mentioning that should we take a break. 0:17:42.840 --> 0:17:44.800 Then let's take a break, man, all right, we'll talk 0:17:44.840 --> 0:17:47.080 a little bit more about landfills and all kinds of 0:17:47.119 --> 0:18:14.639 recycling stuff. All right, Chuck, I think this is going 0:18:14.760 --> 0:18:18.520 very well. So far. Great, So let's get back to 0:18:18.680 --> 0:18:21.280 that process we kicked off and then abandoned, and now 0:18:21.280 --> 0:18:24.159 we're getting back to it. When you drop something in 0:18:24.200 --> 0:18:26.679 your recycling bind and the people come and pick it up, 0:18:28.000 --> 0:18:34.119 and it begins this beautiful journey of discovery, coming of 0:18:34.200 --> 0:18:38.679 age maybe of um, really coming to understand oneself. For 0:18:38.800 --> 0:18:42.960 the say, plastic water bottle that you set off, and 0:18:43.040 --> 0:18:46.000 when it's collected, depending on where you are, it may 0:18:46.040 --> 0:18:49.399 be either collected by a city worker or a worker 0:18:49.440 --> 0:18:53.080 for like a private company, um, and it will be 0:18:53.119 --> 0:18:57.240 taken somewhere along this chain. What this is a big picture, 0:18:57.240 --> 0:18:59.879 and this is something I didn't quite understand fully but 0:19:00.040 --> 0:19:04.320 for until this time around researching this article, Like that 0:19:04.800 --> 0:19:10.160 water bottle or that beer can, or that toilet paper 0:19:10.280 --> 0:19:13.480 roll you just threw out that you just recycled, You 0:19:13.600 --> 0:19:16.560 just threw it away as trash. It's just it's being 0:19:16.560 --> 0:19:21.119 put into a different trash stream, the recycled stream. Right, 0:19:21.800 --> 0:19:24.800 So When you do that, it becomes you were saying, here, 0:19:25.440 --> 0:19:28.520 this actually has value. I don't want anything in return 0:19:28.680 --> 0:19:31.200 for it. I just want the peace of mind that 0:19:31.320 --> 0:19:34.080 it's going to have another life. It's going to stay 0:19:34.080 --> 0:19:36.800 away from the landfill. You do whatever you want with it, 0:19:37.000 --> 0:19:41.879 and it enters with that exchange into a global commodities market, 0:19:43.760 --> 0:19:48.639 where it goes from a sorting facility to a place 0:19:48.640 --> 0:19:52.359 where it's put together with other stuff similar to its kind, 0:19:52.640 --> 0:19:56.119 sent into put into bails, and then sold on the 0:19:56.160 --> 0:20:00.919 commodities market to be reprocessed back in of raw materials 0:20:01.160 --> 0:20:04.240 and then sold the manufacturers who use those raw materials 0:20:04.400 --> 0:20:07.800 to make new stuff that you then buy that then 0:20:07.920 --> 0:20:12.240 you hopefully ideally recycle and the whole process continues again. 0:20:12.960 --> 0:20:14.800 That's what happens when you drop it in a bin 0:20:14.880 --> 0:20:17.760 and it goes off. That's ideally. Yeah. And China, like 0:20:17.800 --> 0:20:21.040 we mentioned, is a big I think, like the number 0:20:21.040 --> 0:20:25.160 one buyer of US garbage. They were until like late 0:20:25.240 --> 0:20:31.280 two thousand seventeen ish when they said no on certain things. 0:20:31.600 --> 0:20:35.520 So here's why I said, UM, good for China. UM. 0:20:35.720 --> 0:20:39.520 China said that they did not want to be the 0:20:39.560 --> 0:20:43.040 world's garbage dump any longer. And um. One of the 0:20:43.040 --> 0:20:47.439 reasons why why recycling rates kind of started to climb 0:20:47.440 --> 0:20:51.080 in the eighties and nineties is because there was a 0:20:51.160 --> 0:20:53.719 market for this stuff. Right. If there had never been 0:20:53.760 --> 0:20:56.119 a market for it, it just would not have been viable. 0:20:56.119 --> 0:20:59.119 It would have cost too much to pay somebody to 0:20:59.240 --> 0:21:01.800 reprocess it. But the fact that you could sell it 0:21:01.840 --> 0:21:04.600 to somebody who could then reprocess it and then sell 0:21:04.640 --> 0:21:08.200 it as raw materials to manufacturers that men have value 0:21:08.240 --> 0:21:10.520 to it. So okay, now we've got like something going here. 0:21:10.880 --> 0:21:13.000 And the way that this was able to go, the 0:21:13.040 --> 0:21:15.440 reason why there was value to it is because China said, 0:21:15.440 --> 0:21:18.520 you know what, We're gonna become manufacturers to the world. 0:21:18.760 --> 0:21:21.720 Give us all materials you can you can send us. 0:21:22.119 --> 0:21:25.240 And one of the things they got into was reprocessing 0:21:25.280 --> 0:21:29.160 things like paper and plastic, and so countries around the world, 0:21:29.280 --> 0:21:33.240 especially in the West and the developed West, started sending 0:21:34.400 --> 0:21:38.600 all of their trash, but they're recyclable trash to China, 0:21:38.640 --> 0:21:41.720 and China would reprocess it, make it into like little 0:21:41.720 --> 0:21:44.440 plastic toys or paper goods or whatever, and then sell 0:21:44.480 --> 0:21:47.600 it to the world. And because of that, recycling was 0:21:47.680 --> 0:21:49.960 able to take off well. China finally said, you know what, 0:21:50.240 --> 0:21:53.239 this is not working any longer. We're actually on our 0:21:53.280 --> 0:21:56.800 feet economically more than we were before. And you guys 0:21:56.800 --> 0:22:00.399 have been sliding in a lot of your trash with 0:22:00.480 --> 0:22:04.000 these recyclable materials, and we don't want it anymore. Well, 0:22:04.080 --> 0:22:08.760 and China had has not historically done a great job 0:22:09.119 --> 0:22:12.439 with their own trash, like they hadn't even sorted that 0:22:12.480 --> 0:22:14.800 out much less to be able to take on all 0:22:14.840 --> 0:22:17.159 this trash from all over the world. And we're talking 0:22:17.280 --> 0:22:21.560 hundreds of millions of tons of recyclable materials and I 0:22:21.600 --> 0:22:25.159 saw something like ten percent of that weight was just 0:22:25.240 --> 0:22:28.400 straight up trash that was slipped in with this stuff. Yeah, 0:22:28.440 --> 0:22:30.960 it says here and estimated one point three to three 0:22:31.000 --> 0:22:36.119 point five million metric tons enters the oceans from China's coastline, 0:22:36.320 --> 0:22:38.960 right because it just was falling out of this out 0:22:39.000 --> 0:22:43.120 of the recycling stream, right, unbelievable, and into the into 0:22:43.119 --> 0:22:46.560 the oceans. That was how many tons, one point three 0:22:46.560 --> 0:22:49.720 to three point five million metric tons, So that's out 0:22:49.720 --> 0:22:52.920 of like twelve million metric tons worldwide, So about a 0:22:53.000 --> 0:22:55.760 quarter of the plastic entering the ocean was going into 0:22:55.840 --> 0:22:59.119 it from China. Yeah, that's a huge amount, Right, So 0:22:59.240 --> 0:23:02.159 China finally said this is not okay, this is not sustainable. 0:23:02.240 --> 0:23:04.760 We're just we're stopping, like we're not going to accept 0:23:04.800 --> 0:23:06.919 this any longer. We're not going to accept that any longer. 0:23:07.080 --> 0:23:09.720 And the stuff we do accept can't be any less 0:23:09.720 --> 0:23:14.159 than one percent to half of a percent impure, meaning 0:23:14.680 --> 0:23:17.520 like if we're buying a bail, a giant biale of 0:23:17.600 --> 0:23:21.320 plastic bottles, no more than half of a percent of 0:23:21.400 --> 0:23:26.280 that bail bail's total weight can be anything but the 0:23:26.359 --> 0:23:29.520 plastic bottles that we're buying. So this this is a 0:23:29.520 --> 0:23:32.800 big deal because the world's market since the nineties and 0:23:32.960 --> 0:23:36.800 as far as like recyclable materials has been sent to China, 0:23:36.880 --> 0:23:40.600