Be careful Mr Pickles!
Telling the truth!
Labour stasi and thought police will be feeling your collar!

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Most of the recycling is made up from cardboard or paper, Which is combustable, go back to the old coal fire and put the paper and cardboard on there for free heating.(and if you have a back boiler free hot water)
the only thing that should be recyled then is cans and glass bottles, Bring back the 10p deposit bottles.
Sometimes I think we are going backwards in the name of progress!

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erik pickles is right, that recycling is a scam, when we get back in, we will cancel all recycling and go back to weekly bin collections, labour are wasting your money on phoney environmental regulations, there is no need for them, we have plenty of landfil sites still left, and we can burn the rest for much needed power, the recycling is a joke, personally i dont bother, its a way for the council to get even more money out of me, let them sort it out i say, socialist stooges have ruined this country, just because holland has no landill sites, the uk does not need to follow european waste policy, we have plenty of old quarry sites to fill, recycling is a waste of time and money for leftie loons bent on nannying us, david cameron will empty your bin more often, get rid of labour and get rid of recycling rubbish

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Have always been sceptical about the real truth behind recycling! I despair with our goverment! and have no faith in David Cameron being any better! he is the plonker who put a useless B&Q windmill generator on his house without planning premission for political effect!

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Sorry Tory Boy; but I believe you are either misinformed or living in hope, the only way we do not need to follow EU waste policy is if we renegotiate the treaties and that is not going to happen.
It is not Conservative policy to either renegotiate EU waste policy or to scrap recycling, in fact on October 1 2008
Eric Pickles himself said “Under a Conservative Government, the weekly bin collection will be back and recycling will go up.”
Compare your slogan “get rid of labour and get rid of recycling rubbish” to that of the Conservative party “Vote Blue go Green” this was backed up with a 22 page pamphlet describing exactly how the Conservatives will increase recycling.

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its daily mail reading conservatives like tory boy not bothering to recycle which is the problem in this country, recycling is a low tech simple cost effective clean green solution to our problems with too much packaging and people need to keep up the good work and ignore the conservatives

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Lets face it all our politicians play the green card in one way or the other! in truth none of them will ever put enough money into recycling for it to work properly :-(

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As consumers, we can all play a part in reducing waste, by buying second-hand (saving money, energy and resources in the process) or buying recycled products.

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According to a Friends of the Earth report on recycling released on February 14th 2008 …

In 2005, 37% of waste in the 27 EU states was recycled, saving around 158 million tonnes of carbon emissions.

By increasing the recycling rate to 53%, annual carbon savings would rise to 247 million tonnes.

At a recycling rate of 65%, annual savings would be around 303 million tonnes – the equivalent of taking 51 million passenger cars off the road.

In the UK we recycle about 30% of our municipal solid waste.

In Germany they recycle 61% and in the Netherlands it is 63%

How can Mr Adams aver that the market is saturated when the Germans and the Dutch are already recycling twice as much as us?

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The problem with an ideological stance combined with support for an eco political party is the propensity to argue against and deny facts, because they conflict with the ideology.

It really does not matter how many plastic bottles it takes to make one fleece lined jacket if the makers are not making them because people are not buying them.

And it might be true that all the newsprint manufactured in the UK is now made from 100% recycled material but it is also true that the de-inking process during recycling produces one million tonnes of toxic sludge per year in the UK which is sent to landfill!

The waste collected for recycling is not being recycled because the bottom has dropped out of the market and no one wants it – this waste material is therefore having to be stored and some of it eventually ends up in landfill sites anyway.

The con as I said is listing it as being recycled when it is collected and not when it has been recycled, this subterfuge might help us meet EU targets and avoid fines, but it does nothing for the environment. In fact it is probably worse for the environment than simply sending it strait to landfill sites, if the transportation and processing costs to the environment were included.

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I am not saying the bottom has fallen out of the market, the recycling professionals, the government and government agencies are, this has been reported widely in the media.

I am not arguing against the fact that recycling has its own benefits that are unrelated to the landfill question and can stand on its own as an advantage to society.

Problem: we have too much waste which is creating an environmental nuisance when it is placed into landfill sites because it emits harmful greenhouse gas.

Someone suggests it would be a good idea to recycle as much as possible. (This of course is only one of the available methods of dealing with the problem, the waste could for instance, be used to create electricity.) except that opens a whole new can of EU regulations.

Anyway we now get a whole raft of laws regulations and targets, backed by fines from the EU on the country and fines on the local council from the government to force compliance on meeting recycling targets.

We now enter a phase where it becomes paramount to meet those targets otherwise we all end up paying for the fines.

What has happened is the recycling has become the important object of the exercise, not the original environmental nuisance.

We end up creating more of an environmental problem because more energy is consumed and more greenhouse gases are emitted in the recycling process than would be used to manufacture a new product. But worse we end up not actually recycling but instead just sorting the waste into piles of different materials and then shipping those piles overseas with no control over what happens to them after that and now because of the economic downturn we cannot even ship the stuff out of the country, and are having to pay for increased storage capacity.

If we want to cut down on the emission of methane from landfill sites that is where the fines should be imposed that is where they will be most effective.

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Apologies for missing your post before I added #22, Mr Adams.

I will respond here to 4 of your misrepresentations in #21.

1) You said ‘I am not saying the bottom has fallen out of the market, the recycling professionals, the government and government agencies are, this has been reported widely in the media.’

Yes, problems have been reported in the press, but it is FALSE to suggest that these companies and agencies are telling people not to recycle (which is the thrust of your contribution).

In fact, Oswestry Waste Paper welcomes ‘all customers large and small’ on its website. Pink Skips and Parry and Evans are not turning waste away, are they?

Local councils (90% of whom are meeting or exceeding their recycling targets) and the Recycle Now website want people to recycle MORE, not less (#16), and I think people who want a sustainable economy in the future should all be supporting these companies and agencies.

2) Even if the markets for certain products like mixed plastics have weakened- it is FALSE to suggest that this is the case with ALL recyclables.

The bottom has NOT fallen out of the market for glass and plastic bottles, and people are still buying 100% recycled newspapers + fleeces.

If you are concerned that there is no market, then surely if you are arguing in good faith about the benefits of recycling, then it would be better to urge people to buy recycled and support these markets.

Everyone knows that recycling is not just about putting out your rubbish; it is also about COMPLETING THE CYCLE and BUYING recycled, too.

3) Thirdly it is FALSE to say that all our waste goes overseas.

(See John Franklyn’s list in comment #4 in this thread http://www.shropshirestar.com/2008/12/27/questions-about-recycling/ for details on where our waste goes)

4) You said in #21 ‘more energy is consumed and more greenhouse gases are emitted in the recycling process than would be used to manufacture a new product.’

This is completelyly false, as the report I cited in #17 made clear.

Any schoolkid knows that recycling reduces energy consumption, waste and resource consumption, greenhouse gas emissions and it reduces environmentally damaging mining and timber activity.

Finally let’s be clear about the alternatives to recycling:

-Household waste, which is not recycled will DEFINITELY end up in landfill, with all the problems that brings.

-And incineration (which you euphemistically called ‘electricity generation’) is not popular with the public ( see the PAIN Telford site), as well as creating greenhouse gases and potentially harmful pollution.

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Recycling is portrayed as something new, when it has been going on for years. What is new is that those that us do recycle get nothing in return from our local council’s whereas years ago, at least we would get a goldfish from the rag and bone man!!

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I have just been on the phone to Oswestry Waste Paper, and asked the gentleman who runs it whether the situation for him is as bad as you have described (‘the process is breaking down’, ‘stockpiling since October’, ‘ha[ving] to incinerate’, [sending] to landfill’, ‘vermin’).

He said that none of these was true of his business.

He replied that the situation was ‘not brilliant’, but that it was better than a few months ago, largely as a result of the fall of sterling.

Although he is not selling to British paper-mills, he is shipping paper to China and Indonesia, where there is a market.

He said that he is definitely NOT stockpiling and that he is definitely still collecting waste paper.

He finished by saying that he has been in the recycling business for 30 years and that there have always been peaks and troughs.

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With the greatest of respect, I feel that I HAVE rebutted your points quite clearly and you do not need you to summarize them for me again.

Instead it would be great if you could say what you think of the idea in #26 paragraph 7.

To ‘create markets for the salvaged material, sufficient to pull recyclable waste through the system’, governments could provide carrots and sticks for producers/manufacturers to include a certain quota of recycled material in their products (which would complete the resource CYCLE).

What do you think of this idea?

The gentleman from Oswestry Waste Paper did NOT agree with you that the system had ‘broken down’.

Nor was he stockpiling paper.

In fact he is very positively continuing to collect it and wants people to continue doing so.

The advice from Recycle Now and from Oswestry Waste Paper is to KEEP RECYCLING.

If you aver that ‘the main problem is emissions from landfill sites’ then why do emissions from incineration not concern you?

If you feel that emissions are the main problem then recycling is the solution because it reduces energy consumption, waste and resource consumption, greenhouse gas emissions and it reduces environmentally damaging mining and timber activity.

Incineration does none of these, and in fact accelerates the above processes because there is no incentive for conserving resources.

Finally judging by your contributions to these debates ( http://www.shropshirestar.com/2007/10/11/writer-fails-to-note-evidence/ http://www.shropshirestar.com/2007/10/22/another-stealth-tax-plan/), where you deny what David Attenborough refers to as the ‘truth about climate change’, would it not be fair to say that emissions don’t really bother you anyway and that readers might be justified in seeing them as a bit of a red herring in this debate?

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That of course is his prerogative, but to connect this with your question; if the government must use sticks in this (case fines and taxes) to create a product then it will leave itself open to accusation of a tax scam in the event that they have created a product but not the market for that product.

What they have done is to use the sticks to create the product but have not created a market for the product. It is common sense that if the processed product has to be exported to China and can only be exported because of the recent fall in the £ then there is no home market for the product and therefore the system has broken down.

From the point of the householder there is no difference, so factually whether we go for resource recovery or energy recovery the waste still needs separating, so I do not argue against the advice from Recycle Now and from Oswestry Waste Paper to KEEP RECYCLING. And of course only some material is useful in energy recovery and some material has greater value if recycled.

Good question! The main problem is emissions from landfill; however I am not comparing emissions from energy recovery ie. electicity from incineration to landfill but instead to emissions from the recycling. Both “resource recovery” and “energy recovery” create emissions that are I understand comparable.

The whole scenario is built on the desire to reduce emissions from landfill sites: recycling is the answer our government has introduced. However the recycling only delays the eventual outcome as at some point the material cannot be re-recycled and will either be incinerated or go for landfill.

Energy recovery produces “energy” recycling does not they both produce some emission but both improve on those emissions from landfill.

I would hope that readers and you would be able to understand that not being convinced by the global warming argument hardly disqualifies me from making a reasonable comment on the environment and as you said Carbon dioxide is 20 times less heat-trapping than methane and is thus vastly preferable. Also not being a convinced GW devotee is not the same as not caring about the environment or not acknowledging that we do produce too much waste which is creating a problem.

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The headline of this thread uses the inappropriate word SCAM, albeit in inverted commas, and so do you, Mr Adams, so let’s be clear what a scam is in the true sense of the word.

A scam, in the true sense of the word, is a CRIMINAL swindle, such as the Ponzi scheme used by Bernard Madoff to defraud investors of $50 billion or more.

But please be straight with us, Mr Adams.

You are not in the slightest bit interested in scams in the true sense of the word, just as you are not in the slightest bit interested in greenhouse gas emissions, as I pointed out at the end of #29.

If you were genuinely interested in scams, then action to uncover other hidden Madoff–style scams in the wake of the financial crash would be more important to you than loosely-worded attacks on a vitally important policy to reduce waste.

If you were genuinely interested in scams, then the inexcusable lack of transparency in offshore tax havens, which facilitate multi-billion scams and tax-avoidance, would be more important to you than your paeans to incineration.

The word ‘scam’ has nothing whatsoever to do with the UK government, which -for all its faults- operates in an open, transparent, democratic and accountable way to ensure wise and sustainable resource use in our economy.

Correct use of language is vital.

A spade = a spade.

Madoff’s fraud = a scam.

Destroying resources inefficiently = incineration

Prioritising reduction, re-use and re-cycling with fiscal carrots and sticks = sustainable.

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Thanks for getting back, Ken.

First of all, it is important to re-iterate that I utterly reject your use of the term ‘scam’ to describe a sensible, sustainable policy, which saves energy, prevents unnecessary emissions and reduces the need to mine/ extract/ cut down new materials.

Even when transported 8ooo miles the advantage of recycling over landfilling is as much as 1300kg-1600kg of CO2 saved for each tonne of waste, according to a study by the Waste Resources Action Programme (Wrap) (reported in the Guardian, on 19 August 2008 under the headline ‘Sending waste to China saves carbon emissions’).

If you are unaware of the devastating effects of mining in poorer parts of the world, I recommend Mvemba Phezo Dizolele’s 5-minute video ‘Congo’s Bloody Coltan’ on the Pullitzer Centre of Crisis Reporting website.

Recycling metals in the rich world and new mining in the poorer world need to be linked in the public’s mind, in my opinion.

As for your last post, you are probably right to say that I could not possibly know whether you see UK waste policy as being more shocking than the $50 billion Madoff scam.

I apologise.

Perhaps, then, YOU could clarify which of the two you believe is more deserving of the epithet ‘scam’.

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I, too, have an interest in the way we are governed and in honesty in public life.

That is why in previous debates with you I have highlighted the deceit of the world’s wealthiest corporation, Exxon, to deny the anthropogenic causes of climate change.

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I’m astonished that you have not heard of Madoff’s scam, which has been big news since the story broke just before Christmas and is easily found by researching on the internet or the SS site (see http://www.shropshirestar.com/2008/12/15/european-banks-count-cost-of-madoff-fraud/ ).

Bernard Madoff is a former chairman of the NASDAQ stock exchange, whose Wall Street investment firm was shut on December 11, 2008, when he was charged with perpetrating the largest investor scam, ever committed by a single individual.

By his own admission, Madoff scammed investors out of $50 billion, perhaps more.

Madoff’s scam worked well because he gave the appearance of being very selective about who was allowed to invest with him, and people felt he had a “perceived edge” on the market and was able to time his trades well.

In my opinion the sheer scale of the deceit involved ($50 billion) and the length of time Madoff perpetrated it (decades) suggests that if we are genuinely interested in a) scams, b) the incalculable damage those scams do and 3) a broken-down system, which facilitates those scams, then our focus ought to be on the international financial system, not on a sensible and sustainable waste policy, which is moving in the right direction, albeit with a few teething problems.

Now, you know about the Madoff scam, I would be interested to know your views on his deceit.

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Ah, Tony Lewis from Canada, whose main argument in this debate ( http://www.shropshirestar.com/2007/08/30/climate-change-to-blame/ ) was the completely ridiculous and untenable line that global warming is not affected by mankind, and that education consumes more fossil-fuel energy than any other ‘industry’.

Before we talk about waste policy, Tony, it would be great if you could comment on these scientific institutions, which state that climate change is caused by mankind:

the IPCC, the science academies of Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, Italy, India, Japan, Mexico, Russia, South Africa, the UK and the USA, as well as the International Council of Academies of Engineering and Technological Sciences; European Academy of Sciences and Arts; Network of African Science Academies; the International Council for Science; the European Science Foundation; the American Association for the Advancement of Science; the Federation of American Scientists; the World Meteorological Organization; the American Meteorological Society; the Royal Meteorological Society (UK); the Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society; the Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society; the Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences; the American Geophysical Union; the American Institute of Physics; American Astronomical Society; the American Physical Society; the American Chemical Society; the National Research Council (US); the Federal Climate Change Science Program (US), the American Quaternary Association; the Geological Society of America; Engineers Australia (The Institution of Engineers Australia); the Stratigraphy Commission of the Geological Society of London; the European Geosciences Union; the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics; and the International Union of Geological Sciences.

Would you not agree, tony, that these institutions know more about the climate than you or I ever will?

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Huw,
I stand to be corrected … 40% of newsprint used in the UK is manufactured from recycled fibres – with 60% of newsprint originating from northern forests..mainly Sweden, Norway and Canada. However, without the “new” recycled fibre mix (used at British plants) the system could not work as fibres cannot be recycled more than 6 or 7 times.
It is, as a rule, more expensive to produce recycled paper than using virgin fibres (this may not be the case in the UK??).
In buying and selling paper in my business I find the demand for recycled paper has diminished. Recycled papers have generally much shorter fibres thus presenting print, dust and mechanical problems……..all adding to the cost and most customers are not willing to pay.
My company produces about a half-tonne of waste paper each month… which I send for recycling which costs a lot more than if I took it to the landfill. However, because of the distances in this country and the lack of facilities for recycling I’m not sure that this is the right thing to do.
Moreover, as I sell blank and printed paper to government agencies who are not interested in paying extra for the ‘greener’ product I wonder if the efforts of my company are worthwhile. Other recyclable materials from my office such as aluminum have lost their value altogether….what do we do here?

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Ken Adams speaks a lot of sense and expounds his viewpoint clearly and lucidly.

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Huw, I most certainly conceded that 100% of newsprint manufactured in the UK was produced from post-consumer waste. This is 40% of Britain’s newsprint requirements the rest being imported, using mostly virgin fibres.

At present there is a worldwide glut of pulp in which case newsprint prices will likely come down. Manufacturers in the UK may or may not be able to produce their product at a competitive price. Nevertheless I hope they will, not only because of the environmental advantages, but also because of the expertise, investment and work that has gone into establishing these enterprises.

However, Great Britain is in a unique situation in this regard – with such a burdening population and few forests, using post-consumer waste – is much more viable than in other countries. In Scandinavia and elsewhere the pulp industry provides jobs especially where forests are managed and replanted. Many students here pay their way through university and college by spending their summers planting.
As I pointed out in my last post it is questionable if recycling paper is of benefit to the environment (in this province). It certainly costs my company a lot more to ship it to a plant where it may (or may not be recycled) especially with the huge distances involved.

Huw……the topic of this particular forum is recycling – not climate change. The forum on climate change came to an abrupt halt and I was unable to respond to your questions.

I have not side-stepped your points but explained some of the problems facing businesses when it comes to dollars and cents – we must take a practical, logical road and not always an ideal or ideological one.

Indeed Huw – to influence more people in this regard might it be a a good idea to quit the never ending confrontation and find areas in which you, I and others on this forum might agree? And perhaps, just perhaps, you might concede that many of us have a great deal more experience in recycling and living on less than you and others of your generation.

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If people are interested in a less wasteful society and want to play their part in reducing waste and living more sustainably, (as I believe most people are) then I suggest that they treat the myths and mis-representations promoted by known denialists like Ken Adams and Tony Lewis with great caution.

It is a common myth that the collection and sorting of recycled materials uses more energy than manufacturing using new materials or pulp.

However, it is false.

Even those who side-step points about the damaging effects of mining around the world (see #35 Mvemba Phezo Dizolele’s 5-minute video ‘Congo’s Bloody Coltan’) must recognise that, in most cases, manufacturing from recycled materials uses much less energy than using virgin materials.

It is important for people to understand that there is a ‘denial industry’, which is attempting to confuse the public about this and other environmental issues.

You can find out more about this ‘denial industry’, their tactics and their funding by reading Sharon Beder’s excellent book about big corporations war on environmentalism (Global Spin, Green Books, 1998).

In this book you will see how corporations play a major role in setting the political and the public agenda through their use of public relations, lobbying, and funding of third parties such as media (see inappropriate title of this article), think tanks, and business organizations.

When the stakes are so high, it is vital that these people are confronted with the truth as often as possible.

Preferably in public forums.

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I do not hide the fact that I am unimpressed with the Global Warming arguments, I find the whole IPPC method raises many questions, these cannot be simply answered by calling anyone asks those questions a denialist. But I have already addressed that point.

I did not side step the point about mining at 35# I ignored it, as we are not debating the pros and cons of recycling as I have not argued against recycling.

My point is; recycling has become the point of the exercise not the reduction of methane emissions from landfill sites, and that recycling alone is not the answer to the problem of too much waste.

My secondary point is the ideological attachment to recycling is standing in the way of looking at alternatives I think Huw Peach has proven that point.

Denial industry, There are many questions about the disposal of our waste that may be legitimately raised and need a legitimate answer, questioning a policy is not the same as denying the existence of the problem. Also branding those who question denialists is not an answer, it is a way of avoiding the questions.

And how do we arrive at the truth if not through the testing of theories by questioning.

The truth: (we have all seen the photographs) There are literally piles of materials that have been collected and have not been recycled.

The truth: (Confirmed by Huw) No British Printer is taking in any new stocks of paper.

The truth: The recycling industry is driven by the amount of rubbish we produce, it is not driven by demand for the product. This means as we have seen, as soon as demand drops the industry is very quickly consumed with the problems of over production, because it cannot cease production, it cannot keep a system of supply and demand in balance and therefore cannot retain its profit margins.

The Truth: Demand for the product must be increased, if there were to be any hope of dealing with the problem of too much waste by recycling, even then recycling alone cannot deal with the problem.

The Truth: there are other methods of dealing with our rubbish that could be introduced to compliment recycling that would have beneficial effects such as using rubbish to fuel energy production.

I agree totally with Huw Peach when the stakes are so high, it is vital that people are confronted with the truth as often as possible. That way we can find the truth, not by swallowing untested views of anyone but by opening our minds.

Of course the first question would be exactly how high are the stakes?

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So next time you choose a product that states ‘Made from’ 100% recycled material you may actually be buying something which actually may have very little recycled material in it at all. Also there is very often no information as to whether the recycled content is pre consumer or postconsumer waste. Sweeping up some waste in a factory and reprocessing it and marketing that product as 100% recycled is just a con.

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I did not choose to discuss paper, because this was my ‘strongest card’, as you said in #50, but merely as a courtesy to you, Mr Adams, because you had made paper the focus of your ideological attack on the recycling system.

As Mr Franklyn’s list attests, paper is the only recyclable material, which goes overseas.

You decided to side-step stronger cards like points about THE BIGGEST SCAM IN HISTORY (Madoff), the damaging effects of mining (‘Congo’s Bloody Coltan’) and cutting down virgin forests and the resultant moral imperative to recycle.

Your claim that I was – uniquely in this debate – driven by ideology, whereas you were unburdened by any worldview, was the biggest mis-representation, however.

Anyone making this unbelievable claim, after being outed you as a climate change denier, who relies on ideologically-motivated ExxonMobil-funded sources for their mis-information ( http://www.shropshirestar.com/2007/04/25/climate-criticism-unfounded/ #11 ), would be crimson with embarrassment if this debate was happening live in a public forum.

The source of Mr Adams’ information, the Heartland Institute and SEPP (see above link), which Mr Adams, quotes in the above link are PARTISAN conservative research groups, partly funded by Exxon Mobil.

Fred Singer, who is behind SEPP, is not only notorious for denying anthropogenic climate change, but also for denying the damaging effects of smoking.

Britain’s foremost scientific institution, The Royal Society, was so concerned about the ideologically motivated mis-information emanating from Ken Adams’ favourite Exxon-funded think-tanks that they wrote a letter to Exxon which was reported in the Guardian on 20 September 2006 (‘Royal Society tells Exxon: stop funding climate change denial’). (http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-files/Guardian/documents/2006/09/19/LettertoNick.pdf

I am happy to admit that I have a worldview, Ken.

But I recommend that readers do not ‘swallow untested views’ of Mr Adams, because his views have been tested, and he has a proven record of mis-representing the facts.

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There IS something deceitful about the letter-writer saying that ‘only 11% of waste is made up from from household rubbish’, when in 10 minutes of googling I can find DEFRA’s official ‘Waste Strategy factsheets’, which clearly states in the Facts and Fictions section at the bottom that ‘MUNICIPAL WASTE IS PREDOMINANTLY HOUSEHOLD WASTE’ (my capitals).

For a specific example of this, see the Camden council website.

Camden Council ‘manages more than 134,000 tonnes of municipal waste each year, around 85,000 tonnes of which is household waste and the rest, around 49,000 tonnes, is commercial waste.’

(http://www.camden.gov.uk/ccm/content/press/2007/february/council-says-lets-talk-rubbish-with-tough-new-waste-targets.en;jsessionid=AE82EAF2C2B0D9F91E8A29F39E99AC56.node2 )

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This debate started because John D Evans, the letter writer at the top of this thread made the highly dubious claim that waste collection was being used as ‘a tax-raising measure’.
He then made the outrageous claim that this was some sort of ‘scam’.

It has been my objective in joining this debate to show that

a) there is nothing remotely deceitful about encouraging everyone to reduce what they throw away and to reuse, recycle or compost where they can.

b) there is nothing remotely deceitful about gearing the fiscal system to prioritize recycling and reject disposal systems like incineration, which waste valuable resources

c) it IS deceitful to attempt to persuade people not to sort their recycling (#6) and say there is no point in recycling, when other EU countries recycle over TWICE as much as we do (UK barely recycles 30%; Germany recycles over 60%)

d) to show that increasing recycling not only saves energy, but that it reduces the need to mine, with all its dreadful impacts on the local populations ( see Canadian NGO, Mining Watch, miningwatch.ca or, if in a hurry, the video about Coltan mining in Congo)

e) in a world of scams it is bizarre for Ken Adams to claim, on the one hand, to be interested in ‘scams’ and honesty in public life to then (i) propagate information, which the Royal Society calls ‘mis-information’, and (ii) to be so indifferent to the biggest scam in history (Madoff)

f) Ken Adams, as can be seen from his angry EUREALIST site, is just as partial (or ‘ideological’) as myself.

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By the way, Tony, could you give younger readers some ‘grandfatherly advice’?

They might be interested in knowing -as recycling reduces energy consumption, waste and resource consumption, greenhouse gas emissions and environmentally damaging mining and timber activity- why ‘soldiers’, anonymous bloggers and people with ‘vastly more complex lives’ than them are telling them that it’s a waste of time and we should just burn it.

They might also be wondering why people with lots of expertise and experience like Ken and immensely complex lives like you, Tony, are lecturing their generation not to be concerned about sustainability or climate change.

Thanks for adding the point that the younger generation, who have to live with the consequences of our current wasteful habits, have more to lose, Tony, old friend.

If any younger readers want to know what ‘vested interests’ are, just let me know and I’ll make an attempt at a definition.

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I never mentioned anything against recycling aluminium, its a very worthwhile thing to do, in fact metal recycling is one of the areas that recycling actually works! It definitely can be ’100%’ recycled and with significant environmental benefits, unfortunately 60% of metals collected for recycling is shipped abroad, seriously degrading any benefits.
The reason we are unable to find out the exact recycled content of paper is that the manufactuers hide behind the ‘made from 100%’ phrasing of their advertising. I believe it should be made clear the amount of recycled content contained in recycled paper and its origin, ie pre or post consumer waste. Incidentally my full name is Colin Friedlos, I work in the waste industry and I wish to comment truthfully on the very many aspects of post consumer recycling which I find morally unacceptable.

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Thanks, Ken Adams, for confirming that there is an ideological line in your argument.

Thanks Colin Friedlos for admitting that you work in the waste industry.

Thanks also to Tony Lewis for confirming that you are defending your industry with your contributions.

At least we have got the vested interests aspect of this debate out in the open now, and readers can understand what motivates

a) me to push for more recycling and to oppose incineration

b) Tony and Colin to defend their industries

c) Ken to pursue his line on the evils of the European Union

Now that this is transparent for all, I am sure the debate will be better for being more honest and open.

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It is impossible to defend an industry that is often indefensible!
It has been proven that it is far better environmentally to send our waste to a local, modern state-of-the-art energy from waste plant than transport our muck to some hell-hole in China see
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=E4r3krs8eEY
For years it was often denied from official sources that our rubbish was being exported far away, now the cat’s out of the bag, only the truly deluded can possibly imagine that there are environmental benefits in terms of CO2 emissions or anything else in this activity. We are merely sweeping our problem under someone elses carpet all on the name of ‘The environment’!
For any remote chance for recycling to work, the waste must be collected locally, recycled locally and then the loop must beclosed by people buying the goods. Unfortunately very little of this is being achieved.
Scams such a goods being manufactured using a small amount of pre-consumer waste and then being marketed as being ‘made FROM 100% recycled’ are now the norm. The best use for glass is re-use but the glass industry has dismantled virtually all of the very efficient glass reuse systems we had over the last few decades in favour of ‘single use DISPOSABLE bottles’. The glass industry therefore manufactures billions more bottles each year whilst hiding behind the notion of glass recycling being good for the environment. (and most green or mixed glass is never recycled back into bottles or containers and although collected for recycling can be either landfilled or exported).
Paper recycling does not save trees. It is a serious misconception that paper recycling ‘saves trees’ and I quote from WRAP: ‘There are a number of people and organisations who assert that recycling paper saves trees. This is not the view of WRAP. For many years the forestry and paper industry have cultivated trees as a crop to supply wood for the manufacture of paper, with more trees being planted to replace the ones that have been harvested. Although it is important to ensure that trees are sourced from sustainable sources, and that plantations do not displace native species, it is not true to say that recycling paper saves trees.’
See Patrick Moores article:
http://www.greenspirit.com/trees_answer.cfm?msid=30&page=1
It is also stated that paper recycling saves energy, but what is not taken into consideration is that the recycling plants use a great deal of fossil fuel based energy not only in the reprocessing but also the huge transport envelope required to collect and recycle paper. Also one million tonnes of low level toxic sludge is produced annually in Britain from paper de-inking, most of this is landfilled! On the other hand virgin paper manufacurers create most of their energy needs from the waste wood that cannot be used to make paper, therefore a carbon neutral fuel from biomass. Coupled with the fact that tree populations in Britain and Europe are growing in size it has actually been suggested that paper recycling inhibits the planting of trees. A great deal of redundant farmland that was originally forest is being turned back into useful managed forest plantations. These modern forests are almost certainly subject to the stringent rules of the FSC (Forest Stewardship Certification) regarding biodiviersity, impingment on existing woodlands etc. I personally would rather see more trees planted for our timber, paper and fuel requirements. Trees are a natural organic sustainable resource and we should do everything we can do encourage even more forestry.
For years the general public has been seriously misled regarding the validity and effectiveness of much of the post consumer recycling trend. I believe our government encourages this because it fools people into believing that they are actually ‘doing something’ for the environment and that it also provides a convenient ‘vehicle’ for big business to hide behind whilst in truth very little is actually being done to reduce our CO2 emissions.
Sadly I believe, after much research, that if mankind has altered the Earth’s climate as a direct result of our industrial activity over the past couple of hundred years, then there really is very little we can do to, reverse, stop or even slow down this process. China, even allowing for the economic slowdown, will continue to industrialise, 200 old fashioned coal-fired power stations are to be built there by 2020. A statistic of 7 cars per thousand of the population (USA has 800 cars per 1,000), China has acquired Rover cars for next to nothing and will be building vehicles for the masses in the coming years. To acommodate this massive increase, China already has a plan for an extensive network of motorways requiring billions of tons of clinker concrete which will create huge amounts of CO2. And what China does India and other emerging nations will follow.
At this time we find ourselves at or around the point of ‘Peak Oil’ and that production at existing fields will diminish which will mean that other sources such as the oil sands in Canada, Alaska and elsewhere will begin to be exploited along with drilling in Antartica, all causing massive environmental damage. Even the reprocessing of coal into liquid fuels may be employed. This, I believe, will be almost unstoppable. Added to this the silent intention to build more nuclear power stations in the coming years all leads to a depressing scenario.
I had to laugh the other day when I heard Gordon Brown announce that Britain is moving towards a ‘low carbon economy’! Do people really believe this? Its some kind of a sick joke!
Currently we, as a species, burn 80-90 million barrels of oil a day this is forcast to rise to over 100 million barrels PER DAY in the next ten years, we also burn the equivalent of 50 million barrels of coal and 60 million barrels of gas PER DAY and rising!
CO2 emissions will never fall until these figures begin to reduce which will be in about 100-200 years time when we finally run out of the stuff by which time it really will be too late for mankind if we have truly altered our climate.
So recycling and all the other pathetic solutions is really like facing an oncoming Tsunami and throwing pebbles at it…pointless.
Yours faithfully
Colin S Friedlos
(Hopefully tucked up safely in my grave when the Cr*p hits the fan)

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Mr Adams, you said in #62

‘I had a look at the Green party site and found it amazing on how may issues we agree and issues that prompted me to start Blogging in the first place.’

Yet another mis-representation!

This is impossible to believe, when it was clear from this debate ( http://www.shropshirestar.com/2007/10/11/writer-fails-to-note-evidence/ ) that you were unable to even concede that Al Gore’s excellent wake-up call ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ was ‘broadly accurate’.

In fact I find it amazing on how many issues we viscerally DISAGREE.

In #66 you said (-again your chutzpah is truly extraordinary-) that wanting ‘to do what is best for the planet and for the environment’ is an ‘ideology’.

I think most parents teaching their children to respect the world around them and care for their environment would give you short shrift if you started lecturing them that they were being ‘ideological’.

Just because we don’t fall for the mis-information that you disseminate does NOT mean that we are ‘ideological’.

It means that we have learnt INTELLECTUAL SELF-DEFENCE.

We have learnt to see things clearly and understand what scientists like David Attenborough, are truly saying through the fog of mis-information disseminated by dodgy think-tanks in Washington like the Heartland Institute, PR agencies or front groups for big corporations.

You say that incineration will complement recycling.

It won’t.

It will UNDERMINE recycling, because it undermines the important idea that wealth is being re-formulated to be re-used.

Burning it may create a bit of energy, but the resources burnt are destroyed for ever and the CIRCLE IS BROKEN.

You finished by saying, ‘It has been said that “enviomentalism is socialism’s Trojan horse”’

Yes that has been said.

The last time I dealt with this particular argument I was debating with a bunch of BNP activists. (See http://www.shropshirestar.com/2008/03/13/leave-the-politics-out-of-debate/ #23 + 24).

I don’t see ANY common ground between us, Mr Adams, because I find that your indifference to ecological breakdown and the misery this is causing in the poorest parts of the world, is one of the strongest reasons for me to be active and to encourage others to become active.

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soldierf (or Colin) I found your contribution interesting, if a little depressing, but I don’t share your sense of hopelessness.

If I was as pessimistic as you, and felt that everything was futile, I would not feel moved to write at such length.

I am optimistic and feel that my activism, along with the activism of other people, will definitely make a difference.

You say, ‘for any remote chance for recycling to work, the waste must be collected locally, recycled locally and then the loop must be closed by people buying the goods. Unfortunately very little of this is being achieved.’

I say, OK let’s build up our recycling infrastructure.

Let’s be positive and ambitious.

I watched your video-link to Sky News and found it clearly unfair that Chinese people are dealing with waste that WE have produced.

The key is, surely, to expand our recycling infrastructure here in the UK.

At the end of the report there is an interview with Leigh Astley, who owns a recycling business in the Cotswolds.

He says something, which I have consistently argued throughout this debate:

Leigh Astley: ‘We need to have a recycling infrastructure in this country capable of recycling everything that we produce as waste. (And we are producing more and more waste each year.)’

My argument is that we need to SHRINK the amount of waste we are producing each year, through education about reducing, re-using, recycling and composting and introducing zero-waste policies in businesses, schools and other institutions.

And like Leigh Astley, I believe we need to EXPAND the recycling infrastructure in this country, which you, Tony Lewis and Ken Adams are so against.

Incineration will UNDERMINE recycling, because it will remove the widely understood ecological imperative to conserve resources and undo all the positive educational work that is going on.

Researching this, I discovered from the Recycle Now website that Cotswold district council, where Leigh Astley is based, achieved a 51.78% recycling rate for April to June 2007.

This is much higher than the rest of the country, showing that when the local infrastructure is there, people recycle more, because they know that local businesses are benefitting.

The county of Gloucestershire is pushing for residents to have the capability of recycling 70% of their waste.

Here in Shrewsbury Veolia, which favours incineration, aims to increase recycling only to 50% by 2012.

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Thanks for your contribution (#70) saying something about Green Party policies being ‘idiotically’.

Maybe it is my lack of expertise, compared to you, but I don’t understand your first paragraph.

Could you explain it again with specific examples of which policies are ‘idiotically’, so that I can comment on them on a case by case basis?

In your 2nd and 5th paragraph, you even deny that INCREASING RECYCLING will REDUCE LANDFILL.

Yet another mis-representation!

Who is being idiotically now?

Remember the Germans and the Dutch already recycle twice what we do.

Remember also that Cotswolds-based recycling entrepreneur, Leigh Astley, from soldierf’s video-link said

‘We need to have a recycling infrastructure in this country capable of recycling EVERYTHING (my capitals) that we produce as waste.’

Leigh Astley didn’t seem to be that keen on incineration.

Nor do the people of Telford or Shrewsbury ( http://www.shropshirestar.com/2008/12/03/mps-survey-reveals-79-against-burner/ ).

The Independent’s ‘Made in Britain dumped in China’ highlights important international treaties like the 1989 Basel Convention, which bans the export of toxic rubbish from developed countries to poorer ones.

The Independent, as far as I can understand their campaign with my limited expertise, is doing an excellent job exposing an ILLEGAL TRADE in toxic waste exports from Britain to China, and highlighting the fact that the UK is contravening international law.

The Independent is also campaigning against excessive packaging; Greens have been doing this for years.

Where in their campaign does the Independent say that we should be burning our waste, and that Greens’ idiotically attempts to recycle more in this country should be fought tooth and nail by all true patriots?

I don’t need to believe James Hansen and Al Gore’s warnings about the severity of climate change, the consensus is overwhelming ( http://www.shropshirestar.com/2009/01/20/everyone-will-pay-for-airport/ #21 ), sceptics cannot name a SINGLE scientific institution which disputes this consensus, and our window to do something about it is closing rapidly.

The more I learn about the corporate-sponsored think-tanks you rely on for your information, Ken, and the industry front groups disguised as concerned environmentalists like soldierf’s greenspirit.com(#67) the more I want to expose the truth of the situation to readers, who might be taken in.

‘Global Spin’ (Green books, 1997) by Sharon Beder is an excellent starting point to understanding exactly what the biggest corporations in the world are doing to undermine the environmental movement.

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Mightn’t some people, who know that you rely on idiotically conservative libertarian think-tanks for your information, be forgiven for thinking that you are guilty of projection, Ken?

Let’s test out your (I believe, false) claim that there are many issues supported by the Green Party, with which you agree.

Here are our 6 flagship policies:

1) Free insulation for every home that needs it.
2) Free school meals for all state school pupils
3) Safer streets (20 mph limit in residential urban areas, including villages)
4) Living wages for all workers
5) Affordable Homes
6) Green Energy for all (low cost loans for renewable energy)

Which of these do you agree with? Perhaps you (in contrast to the Heartland Institute) share our opposition to the disastrous Iraq War?

The thing is, rather like your contradictory claims about recycling, incineration and Global Warming, I don’t believe you.

So which of our policies do you support, Ken?

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