Study Says U.S. Companies Lag on Global Warming – New York Times

Now you’re having this conversation over dinner about recycling (yes, I have had this conversation before with lots of people), and there pipes up this voice which says “Well, I read somewhere that it costs more money to recycle than to just throw it away”, and you think, “waitaminnit, that can’t be right, but where’s the proof?” Well, at least for paper, here it is, and bless the EU for taking the trouble (I read about this in the Environmental Valuation and Cost-Benefit News Blog).

Lifecycle Analysis and Cost Benefit Analysis on Paper Recycling

No, I did not read all 160 pages, but sure did read the Executive Summary…

The LCA review concludes that the majority of LCAs indicate that recycling of paper has lower environmental impacts than the alternative options of landfill and incineration. The result is very clear in the comparison of recycling with landfilling, and less pronounced, but still clear, in the comparison of recycling with incineration. The CBA review concludes that in little more than half of the CBAs, paper recycling has higher socioeconomic benefits than other management options. In the remainder of the studies, the socio-economic benefits of incineration, landfill or other options are higher than those gained from recycling. It is often said that CBAs are generally favourable to other waste management options than recycling. However due to the heterogeneity of the methodologies used in the reviewed CBAs, it is not possible to confirm or to reject this statement.

They looked at 9 different regions and did an LCA and CBA for each. Apparently, and I did not know this, the LCA evaluation system is well standardized and codified, so it is easy to compare results between regions, but the CBA mechanisms are not as well codified, hence more sensitive to the assumptions made.

Fascinating reading aside, the answer is clear, recycle your paper! At least they make it easy in Chapel Hill.

Excellent article in today’s Washington Post

A Dated Carbon Approach

You can even cut carbon using no technology whatever. Mexico City has reduced its output of carbon dioxide by almost 55,000 tons a year by opening one efficient bus route; the key innovation here was the creation of two bus lanes. The new buses run on diesel — not exactly a technological breakthrough. But because they are rapid and frequent, the buses have brought car use down and reduced emissions. So what matters is not just the technologies we have but the incentives to deploy them. The average Western European uses half as much energy as the average American, and that’s not because there’s more technology in Europe. Rather, Europeans have embraced anti-carbon policies ranging from gas taxes to emissions caps, from an absence of extravagant mortgage subsidies that encourage super-size homes to congestion charges for drivers in London and Stockholm.

Sing it, Cap’n Obvious, actually, it is not obvious to a lot of people. Politicians love “research” because they can turn around and say that they are doing something about a problem when all they are doing is postponing the discussion by calling for “new technology” to fix the problem. Scientists like this as well because this means money in their pocket. Research groups, be they in universities or in government institutes, perpetuate themselves by getting more funding to do more research, which leads to getting more funding to do more research while keeping an army of post docs, grad students, research assistants and professors gainfully employed. It’s kinda like reproduction, only less fun! It is a good system and a lot of good work gets done, but for a lot of questions, the answers are already there.

Policy level decisions require that clear cut choices be made, while they are NOT zero sum games, there are winners and losers in most of the decisions, and this current incarnation of politicians do not seem to want to make these kinds of decisions unless the winners are big companies (energy, pharma, healthcare, etc), rich people (tax cuts, etc.) or war.

In 2002, Ireland passed a tax on plastic bags; customers who want them must now pay 33 cents per bag at the register. There was an advertising awareness campaign. And then something happened that was bigger than the sum of these parts.Within weeks, plastic bag use dropped 94 percent. Within a year, nearly everyone had bought reusable cloth bags, keeping them in offices and in the backs of cars. Plastic bags were not outlawed, but carrying them became socially unacceptable — on a par with wearing a fur coat or not cleaning up after one’s dog.

Motivated by a Tax, Irish Spurn Plastic Bags – New York Times

Turns out that you can swiftly alter habits, attitudes, perception and behavior by charging people 33 cents per bag! Plastic bags are a convenience only because they are free.

Also, if you read the entire article, you will realize that ad-hoc, voluntary, or piecemeal approaches by individual retailers, cities or states will not make as much of an impact as a national policy.

All hail Ireland!

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Tags: PlasticBags, Environment