Perhaps it sounds strange coming from the Master Recycler Program, but consumers are being distracted by false promises of recycling.

There is rightfully a sense of urgency about the level of stuff produced in the world. Climate chaos is upon us, and products are a major contributor to the greenhouse gas emissions causing the chaos. Our bodies are carrying a toxic load from chemicals in products. Plastic is everywhere.

We want to put a halt to the enormous extraction of our planet’s resources used to make products that we may see for a few minutes. We also cry out at the unjust fact that poor people, Black & Indigenous people, and other people of color get to enjoy the benefits of over-production the least and suffer the burdens the most.

Recycling can help and it’s worth doing, but it won’t cut the problem off at the source.

Ashley Gauvin of Portland Surfrider said it so aptly when she said, “The faucet is wide open on the creation [of products], but we are bailing ourselves out with just a spoon.”

Thanks for recycling. Now, let’s aim for the source.

Recycling paper, metal, glass, and some plastics does help the environment by reducing the need for raw materials. Oregon carefully selected items for curbside collection that manufacturers can use to make new products. When we put the right items in the mixed recycling, and they get recycled, we put a dent in the problem. We save energy, reduce deforestation and mining, curb climate change, and have less air and water pollution. It is a good investment to recycle these items.

Hearing about these benefits, the public has begun to look to recycling to solve more problems than it can. We want more recycling! When in doubt, people err on the side of putting trash in the recycling rather than throwing out. We often hear a rallying cry, “They should let us recycle more in those bins. We demand that all products be recyclable. Corporations should only use recyclable products. Local government needs to invest in more local companies who can take all our waste for recycling.”

Materials make up about a third of Oregon’s greenhouse gas emissions. The hashed area on the top of chart represents the reduction we would achieve with 90% recovery rate. DEQ 2019

Big manufacturers are banking on, and investing in, consumer fixation with recycling. That way they don’t have to do the hard work that is really needed.

David Allaway from Oregon DEQ says that Oregon recycles about half of the waste we generate -and that is pretty good. He agrees we need to be better at capturing these materials, and we need more transparency about where they go. But investing in recycling everything, he says, is not worth it. His research demonstrates that even if we achieved near zero-waste (90%), it would be “grossly inadequate”.

Like Gauvin from Surfrider, Allaway sees zero-waste as a sinking proposition. He says, “It is equivalent to rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.”

We Can Empower Real Change!

Time to redirect our creative energy and political will to move up the hierarchy to make it easier for people to recycle right AND reduce, repair, share, borrow, and reuse products.

Help people recycle right:

Share Recycle or not

Promote Ask Metro 503-234-3000

Support innovative reuse businesses like Go Box.
Borrow from your public Library of Things (Hillsboro, Beaverton, Clackamas) or non-profit tool library.
Shop durable and reuse and maintain and repair what you have.
Organize repair fairs and swap gatherings.
Write manufacturers and ask them to make products durable and non-toxic. Ask them to investigate and make decisions based on the full environmental and human cost of their products from cradle to grave rather than just whether the product is recyclable. Recyclability is not a good indicator that product is okay for the environment.
Advocate for Producer Responsibility laws. Producers must be compelled to invest in the full environmental and social costs of their products. When they have to pay for the costs, they have an incentive to design better products.