The above headline is from this article at GreenBiz.com. It caught my eye because Safety-Kleen, one of our distribution partners, offers incineration of used PIG® Absorbent products. The absorbents help fuel kilns that make raw material for cement. No waste goes to a landfill, and nearly all of the emissions are clean.

That kind of incineration, called waste-to-energy recovery, actually is recycling, as defined by EPA 40 CFR 261.6. So it’s not really a matter of burning OR recycling.
Still, the GreenBiz.com article does give points that create a sharper understanding of recycling:

• There often isn’t enough demand for recycled materials
• More greenhouse gases are emitted in the recycling process than the manufacturing of a new product
• We often have no idea where recyclables actually go when they’re shipped overseas

By Keith

This entry was posted on Monday, December 15th, 2008 at 9:40 am and is filed under Environmental. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.