Chaz Miller, 40-year veteran of the waste and recycling industry, Waste360, February 26, 2025 (excerpts)
Once again, recycling is under attack. Once again, we are being told that recycling is a lie. That the recyclables we sort and place on the curbside are just mixed with garbage and shipped overseas. That we are sending our trash to unsuspecting countries. Once again, this is not true.
The most recent attack came in a Valentine’s Day The New York Times opinion piece The Story You Have Been Told About Recycling Is A Lie. We are told that we stopped sending our trash to the nearest landfill and instead chose to send it across the oceans. This, of course, is utter nonsense. Why would anyone send garbage overseas when the transportation cost to the nearest landfill and its tipping fee is so much less than the cost of sending it further?
What is particularly egregious is the lack of data. We aren’t told what “trash” is or how many tons we ship to other countries. Nor are we told about the hundreds of millions of tons of metals, paper, glass, plastics and electronics that are routinely recycled throughout the world. Why mess up a good story with facts.
The reality that con artists sell bales of contaminated “recyclables” is nothing new. That’s why the Recycled Materials Association developed specifications defining hundreds of grades of metal, paper, glass, plastic and electronic recyclables. Those specs include strict limits on “contaminants” and “prohibitives” so that buyers get raw materials, not trash.
Instead of sending our plastic recyclables willy nilly throughout the world, the United States is actually a net importer. According to Plastic Recycling Update, U.S. trade data shows that “In 2024, total scrap plastics imports rose by 9% to 492,139 metric tons, while exports fell by about 2% to 409,601 metric tons”. Just over half of that is recycled PET. Those imports are causing problems for American plastic recyclers who can’t compete with their low price.
If you want more analysis of the many flaws in the op-ed, see what Adam Minter and Robin Ingenthron wrote on LinkedIn. I don’t need to repeat their arguments here, but if you are on LinkedIn, read them.
Fortunately, one state recycling association, MassRecycle, has done a stellar job of combatting misinformation. We need more state and national groups to push back against the naysayers and ensure the press knows what is really happening. The Maryland Recycling Network is sponsoring a March 27 webinar “Recycling Works! Tell the Story”. Gretchen Carey, MassRecycles’ President and I will be on the webinar. Join us.
To the author of the Times piece, feel free to attack the con artists and frauds. But don’t make all of recycling collateral damage in your crusade. Join a crew collecting recyclables from the curbside, visit a Materials Processing Facility, meet with the thousands of Americans working in the recycling industry. Recycling is far from perfect and even further from a lie. More