The Story of Stuff - Annie Leonard [159]
It is this aspect of recycling that most irritates those with a broader systemic understanding of the problems and broader vision for change. Recycling is easy: it can be done without ever raising questions about the inherent problems with current systems of production and consumption, about the long-term sustainability of a growth-obsessed economic model or about equitable distribution of the planet’s resources. Clearly, sorting used bottles and papers into a blue bin is not going to fundamentally change, or even challenge, the massive negative impacts of the way we extract, make, distribute, use, and share or don’t share all the Stuff in our lives. In fact, because it makes us feel good, because it makes us feel like we’re doing something useful, the worry is that recycling may actually bolster those very patterns of production and consumption that are trashing the planet and distract us from working for deeper change.
Recycling Done Right
But does all this mean we should abandon recycling? No way!
I think the way to go is to look at our waste and figure out who is responsible for what.
It seems to me that green waste—yard trimmings, leaves, and food scraps—fall into the category of our personal individual responsibility. We ate the food and planted the tree, or at least enjoyed its shade. It’s not too much to expect us, then, to manage this green waste responsibly, just as we manage other aspects of our homes. This could mean composting it ourselves or lobbying to institute a municipal composting program, paid for by taxpayer dollars.
Then there’s all the other Stuff in the garbage: the Stuff that is the product of intentional choices in design and manufacturing, choices that were outside our reach of immediate influence.
This Stuff falls under someone’s responsibility—the people who designed, produced, and profited from it. If you, Mr. Ketchup Producer, switch from a recyclable glass bottle to a squeezable one made of multiple plastic resins bonded together that can never be separated for recycling, you need to figure out how to deal with that at the end of its life. If you, Ms. Printer Producer, decide to make toner cartridges that are impossible to open and refill and so must be thrown out while still perfectly functional, then you deal with it. That is your choice, not mine.
The official term for the “you made it, you deal with it” approach—of which I am a huge fan—is “extended producer responsibility” (EPR), which holds the producers of goods responsible for their entire lifecycle. This encourages producers to make improvements upstream, in the design and production phases, to avoid getting stuck with a pile of poorly designed, toxic-containing, nonupgradable junk. As I’ve previously mentioned, there are already strong government-mandated models of EPR in place, notably Germany’s Green Dot system and the European Union’s WEEE (waste electrical and electronic equipment) directive, that illustrate how entirely feasible this approach is.
Zero Waste
True recycling and EPR are both elements of the broader Zero Waste plan. Zero Waste includes, but goes well beyond, recycling. Zero Waste advocates look at the broader system in which waste is created, from extraction to production all the way through consumption and disposal. In this way, Zero Waste is a philosophy, a strategy, and a set of practical tools.
The cool thing about Zero Waste is that it breaks free from the self-defeating “what can we do with all this waste?” paradigm. Zero Waste challenges the very acceptability and inevitability of waste. It seeks to eliminate waste, not manage it. That’s why Zero Waste advocates can’t stand the term “waste management.” Their efforts don’t focus on better waste management, but on moving closer to zero waste. Unrealistic? Maybe so, but it’s the right goal to have. Just like factories have a zero defects goal and airlines have a zero accident goal. They aren’t there yet, but they are really clear about where they are heading. Can you imagine United Airlines