Recycling

Diatribes? I've got your diatribes! Here's a good one: recycling.

Recycling is not often as simple as it seems. Metal and plastic, yes. Paper and wood, no.

In an ideal (Adam Smith style) economy, recycling would not be a matter of enhancing the environment. It would be a matter of simple economics. Producers, whether:

• of metal,
• of plastic,
• of paper, or
• of anything else,

would cast a cold, calculating eye on the relative costs of acquiring feedstock for their mills from various sources. Which has the lower overall cost (including governmentally-imposed charges for the use of the air, the waters, and of the landfills)? Would it be better to acquire recycled (perhaps many-times recycled!) material from the consumer/customer, or to acquire virgin material from the mine (or the oil well, the quarry, or the forest)? They would post prices accordingly:

• so much per kilogram for recycled material (with, inevitably, one [minor] set of undesirable components, which must be dealt with), and

• so much per kilogram for virgin material (with, inevitably, another [major] set of undesirable components, which also must be dealt with).

Recycling would then take care of itself.

Tragically, however, energy prices have been kept artificially low by "political factors". Some would say that the war in Iraq is a classic example of a petroleum/energy grab (with resulting reduced energy prices), but we don't have to go that far. Energy prices are much more visible than many other prices. Further, politicians -- even the ones who back off from an overt war -- like to be seen as doing something about these more visible things. There are plenty of ways to artificially reduce energy prices, even without going to war.

That fact that no one is prepared to pay the appropriate price for energy-related materials is therefore a political problem. A political solution is thus required, namely, to recycle some materials at a level higher than that which is supported by simple price-based economics. But which materials?

Metal (aluminum in particular!) -- sure, recycle it.

• A lot of energy went into producing that stuff, and a lot of that energy can be recovered with the metal itself.
• Recycling (even when not strictly-economically justified) thus induces the metal producers to not smelt additional raw ore.
• With the recycling of metal, we thus more closely approximate the level of smelting (and of the follow-on pollution of the air, which we all have to breathe; and of the follow-on pollution of the water, which we all have to drink) that would have occurred if energy had been more appropriately (i.e., less politically) priced.

Plastic -- sure, recycle it.

• A lot of hydrocarbons -- coal, petroleum, and natural gas -- went into producing that stuff, and a lot of those hydrocarbons can be recovered with the plastic itself.
• Recycling (even when not strictly-economically justified) thus induces the plastic producers to not purchase additional raw hydrocarbons. After all, these additional purchases of raw hydrocarbons -- for the purposes of producing plastic (as distinct form energy) -- were purely-economically justified only because the price of raw hydrocarbons had been kept artificially low, politically, as part of a broader scheme to keep energy prices.
• With the recycling of plastic, we thus more closely approximate the level of raw-hydrocarbon consumption (and of the follow-on pollution of the air, which we all have to breathe; and of the follow-on pollution of the water, which we all have to drink) that would have occurred if energy had been more appropriately (i.e., less politically) priced.

Paper (and, to a lesser extent, cardboard and lumber) -- nah, don't recycle it.

• Here the problem is not that artificially-low energy prices give an artificial incentive to use raw (as distinct from recycled) cellulose -- paper, cardboard, and lumber.
• Instead, the problem is that the price of raw cellulose is not appropriately reduced by the value of the benefit that it gives to greenhouse gas diminution in the atmosphere.
• This would be a problem regardless of energy prices.

Greenhouse gas diminution? Exactly.

Paper (and, to a lesser extent, cardboard and lumber) provides a unique opportunity to get carbon out of the atmosphere and safely underground (where, ironically, most of it originated -- as coal, petroleum, or natural gas).

In the atmosphere, carbon invariably appears as carbon dioxide, a major greenhouse gas. The roots of a plant (and especially of a tree) take in  the hydrogen and oxygen which make up five molecules of (liquid) water (H₂O).  The leaves of the plant take in the carbon and oxygen which make up six molecules of (gaseous) carbon dioxide (CO₂). From this carbon dioxide and water, through photosynthesis, each plant ultimately produces one molecule of (solid) cellulose  (C₆H₁₀O₅) -- which is the major constituent of the plant -- and six molecules of (gaseous) oxygen (O₂) -- which it releases into the atmosphere:

5H₂O +  6CO₂ → C₆H₁₀O₅ + 6O₂

Ten atoms of hydrogen, seventeen atoms of oxygen, and six atoms of carbon in; six atoms of carbon, ten atoms of hydrogen, and seventeen atoms of oxygen out. Multiply this molecular reaction by a bazillion times a day, and you can see why the plant keeps getting bigger, keeps needing to be watered, and keeps freshening the air.

The process reverses when a molecule of the (solid) cellulose -- plant, paper, cardboard, lumber -- burns (or rots) in the presence of six molecules of (gaseous) oxygen:  six molecules of (gaseous) carbon dioxide and five molecules of water vapor are released back into the atmosphere. Multiply this reverse molecular reaction by a bazillion times a day, and you can see why a burning plant shrinks to an ash which has a volume and weight which is a tiny fraction of that of the original plant. You can also see why it is so dank and hard to breathe downwind of a fire.

The problem isn't the water vapor which is released when a plant burns (or rots). That water vapor turns into rain, and then into river water, and finally into ocean. Yes, a forest which rots or burns (and turns into a desert; see slash and burn agriculture) will raise the sea level by a bazillionth of a meter. I wouldn't worry much about that former forest as a water source, though; I'd worry a lot more about the polar ice caps melting.

The problem is all that carbon dioxide which is released back into the atmosphere when the plant buns (or rots). That carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is a major greenhouse gas, and will cause those polar ice caps to melt -- and cause a lot of other global warming problems, too.

So, how do you keep this cellulose -- plant, paper, cardboard or lumber -- from burning (or rotting)? You bury it, and your city's Environmental Services Department very probably already has a landfill where it will bury your cellulose for you.

• What happens if you do recycle paper (and plants and cardboard and lumber)? Not much, actually. In this case, the trees in the forest owned by the paper company rarely or never get cut down and tuned into paper. After all, the paper mill has plenty of feedstock in the form of recycled paper. Why go to the trouble and expense of cutting down trees when it's so much easier and cheaper to do business with the recycling center? Come to think of it, maybe the paper company should just sell that forest to the government. It's not being used for paper production any more, and it would sure make a great State Park.

No, these trees don't get cut down. Instead, they die of old age, fall down, and rot (or provide ready fuel for the next forest fire). Either way, the death of these trees releases copious quantities of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. It's equal to the amount of carbon dioxide that they they took in when they were alive and growing. Long term, the forest is neither a carbon dioxide source nor a carbon dioxide sink. It's neither hurting the atmosphere nor helping it. As I say, not much happens.

• What happens if you don't recycle paper (and plants and cardboard and lumber)? Good things! In this case, every tree in the forest owned by the paper company gets cut down as soon as it is mature, and it gets tuned into paper. A new tree is planted where the old one was cut down. This is done quickly, since the paper mill will need that tree (when it matures) as feedstock. Feedstock certainly won't come from recycled paper! That stuff gets used once and thrown away.

Like the old one, the new tree:

• sucks copious quantities of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as it grows to maturity;
• releases the dioxide component back into the atmosphere as oxygen, a harmless, non-greenhouse gas (also good stuff to breathe);
• sequesters the carbon component as cellulose; and
• gets hauled out of the forest when it gets cut down, taking that carbon component with it.

Long term, this please-don't-recycle-your-paper forest is a huge carbon dioxide sink. It's helping the atmosphere tremendously!

Naturally, this removal of carbon dioxide by the forest can be fully offset if the resulting paper, cardboard, and lumber is eventually discarded and incinerated. The smoke from the incinerator would inject as much carbon dioxide back into the atmosphere as the forest had previously removed. Fortunately, very few communities use incineration as a means of waste disposal.

These considerations are not present when the resulting paper, cardboard, and lumber is eventually discarded and buried. Yes, the landfill will release some carbon back into atmosphere, usually in the form of methane (which is also a greenhouse gas). But it will also retain huge quantities of carbon, and this carbon will never become a component of a greenhouse gas.

The implication is clear. Every sheet of paper that is used once and then discarded is a mighty warrior in the battle against global warming. Every sheet of recycled paper is a lazy good-for-nothing sad-sack in that battle.

And a battle it is! The modern industrial practice of burning fossil fuels for energy takes carbon out of the mines and wells -- and injects it, as carbon dioxide, into the atmosphere. This is a one-way transfer, as distinct from the pre-industrial practice of burning wood. Wood can be burned (transfer of carbon into the atmosphere) for energy only if trees have previously been grown (transfer of carbon out of the atmosphere) to provide the wood.

We'll eventually run out of fossil fuels, and we'll go back to burning wood (and/or forward to nuclear, solar, and other high technologies). Unfortunately, we'll also have injected a lot of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. This artificially-injected carbon dioxide will stay in the atmosphere -- and produce global warming -- until we take affirmative steps to remove it. Let's take some of those steps now!

And let's have the first step be the removal of cellulose -- paper, cardboard, and lumber -- from our recycling programs.