{"id":2204,"date":"2022-01-24T12:25:02","date_gmt":"2022-01-24T12:25:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/citizenscientist\/?p=2204"},"modified":"2022-01-24T12:25:02","modified_gmt":"2022-01-24T12:25:02","slug":"recycling-glass-and-other-household-stuff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/citizenscientist\/recycling-glass-and-other-household-stuff\/","title":{"rendered":"Recycling glass and other household stuff"},"content":{"rendered":"

Many folks feel good when they take waste materials to their local recycling center.\u00a0 What they may not realize is that what they deliver\u2014paper, cardboard, glass, plastic bottles, and cans\u2014are not materials that in in short supply.\u00a0 You will not save the world from running out of aluminum by recycling aluminum cans.\u00a0 What you do<\/em><\/strong> save is energy to refine the aluminum, and the energy savings mean that recycling contributes to mitigating ongoing climate change.<\/p>\n

Glass is a prime example.\u00a0 The energy used to make the bottle is a huge portion of the total carbon dioxide emissions associated with your nightly cocktail (see: https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/citizenscientist\/how-green-is-your-booze\/<\/a> ). It takes only about 70% of the energy to make a bottle out of recycled glass, compared to virgin glass.\u00a0 Virgin class is made by heating limestone, sand, and soda ash to its melting point, emitting a lot of carbon dioxide, usually by burning natural gas.\u00a0 Recycling simply melts the existing glass and reforms it into new product. Despite the energy savings, it is surprising that there is such scant interest in recycling glass.<\/p>\n

The energy cost to transport materials for recycling becomes a significant part of the equation.\u00a0 Resist the urge to drive to the recycling center if that is your only mission.\u00a0 You would need to deliver 63 aluminum cans for recycling to make up for a gallon of gas that you might use to drive there (see:\u00a0 Sixty-Three Cans to the Gallon \u2013 Translational Ecology (duke.edu )<\/a>. \u00a0It is always important to combine recycling with other errands to be run.<\/p>\n

Those who enjoy curbside recycling can assume that the energy used in the collection trucks is less than the energy saved at the recycling plant and thus the value of the recycled materials.\u00a0 This accounts for interest in aluminum cans and cardboard, which are not heavy, compared to glass.\u00a0 An aluminum can that has been recycled is made with only 5% of the energy used to make a new can from raw ore.<\/p>\n

With recycling you are doing your part to slow climate change, but make sure your trips to the recycling center are efficient\u2014collect lots of stuff to deliver and combine the trip with other stops along the way.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

References<\/p>\n

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. 2016.\u00a0 Documentation for Greenhouse Gas Emission and Energy Factors Used in the Waste Reduction Model (WARM) – Containers, Packaging, and Non-Durable Goods Materials Chapters (epa.gov)<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Make sure your trips to the recycling center are efficient<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":517,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[83,5,159,89],"tags":[243,709,710],"coauthors":[6],"class_list":["post-2204","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy","category-faculty","category-recycling","category-sustainability","tag-aluminum","tag-glass","tag-plastic"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5KxUl-zy","post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/citizenscientist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/citizenscientist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/citizenscientist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/citizenscientist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/517"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/citizenscientist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2204"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/citizenscientist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2204\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2205,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/citizenscientist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2204\/revisions\/2205"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/citizenscientist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/citizenscientist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/citizenscientist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2204"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/citizenscientist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=2204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}