Why Don’t Businesses Recycle?

Woo! A fancy image that'll really get you excited about recycling!

As promised/threatened, today I’m going to briefly return to the environment because of a subject I’ve had a little personal experience with.

Businesses are not very good at recycling. Why should this be, I wonder? Business are, after all, made up of individuals, most of whom probably recycle at home. There isn’t anything magical about business which should make those very same individuals suddenly forget that we’re supposed to recycle, is there?

Well… maybe there is. Yes – it’s our old friend capitalism.

More workplaces recycle than ever. But for those who don’t, and for those who could still do a lot more than merely the token gesture of paper recycling bins placed in various locations around offices, there is actually one important reason behind it.

Businesses generally have to pay for their rubbish collection. Some of them use private companies, because they generate a lot more waste than the average household and they can deal with the much greater quantity. This cost usually gets them a large skip-style bin that everything gets thrown into, no matter what. One place I’ve seen lately, a van repair centre, chucks all the normal waste, like paper, in with all the things related to their work.

Of course, one thing they do recycle is scrap metal. Because that’s worth money. There is an incentive for the bosses to encourage their staff to work in a way that separates out the valuable wheat from the expensive chaff.

They once asked if they could get some extra recycling bins put in, one for paper, one for plastics, one for cardboard. They were told by their rubbish collector that this would cost them money.

So they didn’t bother, and have no intention to. They’re happy to just keep on paying, because the cost of not-recycling is far lower than the costs, both financial and in added inconvenience to staff, for recycling.

That’s why businesses don’t bother. Unlike individuals and families, where environmentalism can appeal to conscience and appeals to consider our impact on future generations, businesses are purely motivated by that bottom line. We may hear a lot about “corporate responsibility” and other such stuff, but it is an extremely rare business that takes all that seriously. It’s mostly just an exercise in PR.

This is why the pace of change is so glacial. Discrepancies like this crop up all over the system. Why are some councils better at recycling than others? For the exact same reason: the more they take, the more it costs in terms of processing, inconvenience and, of course, how much they need to raise from council tax. Some appear to be prepared to take on this burden, and the rising cost of the landfill tax is encouraging the rest to think again.

Recycling has been a way of life for many years now. And yet, the motives that we’re all gently being inculcated into by the government are seriously undermined once we arrive in work.

Joined up government? Merely a pipe dream I’m afraid.

Greenwashing

Taken from the One Planet Living website - note recycling isn't even mentioned, and is only part of the "Zero Waste" strategy...

My recent experience has taught me that, as far as recycling goes, maybe we place undue prominence on it.

The problem with recycling is that by the time it’s done the product already exists. It may have been shipped halfway around the world before then, using intensive agriculture methods or drilled up from the sea bed. The manufacturing process that creates plastics, metals – or even the humble tin of paint –  is by far the biggest battle that needs to be won.

Recycling is actually a tiny part of the battle for greenness. And no, recycling actually has nothing to do with climate change either. There is this rather small and increasingly ignored fact that oil won’t last forever. Nor will gas. These are absolute, guaranteed facts, whether you think the planet really is warming up or the whole thing is a load of leftie scientists making science fit their agenda.

The green battle has to start much earlier in the chain. As the mantra goes, “reduce” and “reuse” don’t really see much attention. Sure, we hear all about buying local. But, at the same time, why is the modern age requiring us to reinvent the wheel? Did we not, even as little as 20 years ago, all get milk delivered from the local milk co-op by an electric milk float in glass bottles that were washed and reused? Didn’t all “fizzy pop” (for want of a better phrase) used to be available in glass bottles that you could take back the shop once you’d finished and get 10p deposit back?

“Make do and mend” was the old mantra. It really ought to have come back into fashion during this recession… but it’s clear that it hasn’t been deep enough to truly make us change the way we live. To usher in a new era of austerity that clearly permeated Britain – if not most of the world – during World War II and short after.

No. In a few years time we’ll all be back to buying white goods which last no more than a few years, or any other consumer electronics which are deliberately designed to fail after such a short while. After all, there’s no profit if your radio works for 30 years solid. There would be no innovation either.

This is the battle that needs to be won. Someone needs to be honest and say that we simply cannot go on like this. But who is going to be the bravest to say that, “sorry, you really can’t holiday abroad any more”. Or, “I’m afraid strawberries will no longer be available in midwinter”. Or, “No, I’m afraid private car use is no longer possible”. Why should we throw away our comfortable modern existence?

What would we really do if someone told us, for example, that short-life, refrigerated milk is to be banned? Isn’t it crazy that there is a whole industry that requires the huge amounts of energy moving the product around the country and kept at the right temperature throughout? This goes the same for any chilled food that can’t be frozen. Though for all I know the extra energy required to freeze things may actually cost just as much despite the longer-life benefits.

This is the problem with focusing on recycling.

It is a distraction which makes us feel like we’re all doing something positive, but the real issues remain unresolved. Recycling is uncontroversial, which is why politicians love it. They can be superficially green. Underneath it all, they must be intelligent enough to realise that they are fighting the wrong battle.

They just don’t have the guts to admit it.

Sadly – this is the price of democracy.

(For more on the subject, visit the One Planet Living website)