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Maddox in his anti-SOPA statement makes following claim:

[people think that...] Painstakingly recycling every single shred of garbage in your home makes a difference. It doesn't. Even if you, your neighbors, and everyone you've ever met recycled everything and reduced your waste output to zero, it wouldn't even make an observable impact on overall waste production in the world. Household waste and garden residue account for less than 3% of all waste produced in the US. That's less than the average statistical margin of error, and most people don't even come close to producing zero waste.

Are these factual numbers? 3% seems quite low.

vartec
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  • @Chad: he's listing number of futile "non-actions" ppl take, like signing on-line petitions, changing FB profile picture and recycling, which according to him have no real world impact. – vartec Jan 19 '12 at 15:28
  • So I assume you are talking about the environmental impact as opposed to economic impact. I can easily demonstrate economic impact and show how at least 4 people have jobs in Peoria IL to deal with recycling that would not be needed with out. That would qualify as observable economic impact if nothing else. – Chad Jan 19 '12 at 15:38
  • @Chad: impact on waste production. – vartec Jan 19 '12 at 15:49
  • @Chad: Prius is, allegedly, about CO2 emission reduction, and recycling as I understand it, is about reducing waste production (what is actually being recycled is after all not wasted). – vartec Jan 19 '12 at 16:47
  • OK attempt number 2: I do not know that recycling is about reducing waste production. Its kind of like ranting that your **Car** is never going to get you to the moon but the **Car** is meant to navigate roads. (And a Prius is a car which is what i was going for) – Chad Jan 19 '12 at 17:02
  • I Think you need a claim that says that recycling is about waste reduction. I always thought it was about conserving our natural resources. – Chad Jan 19 '12 at 18:06
  • @Chad, I have heard the complaint many times that non-recycled items go into landfill, and landfill sites are a resource that shouldn't be wasted. [[e.g.](https://www.facebook.com/pages/Landfills-The-true-evil/137485389690001?sk=info)] Is this sufficient? – Oddthinking Jan 20 '12 at 01:36
  • @Oddthinking - Certainly, that is a claim that can be addressed. IE we can see how individual recycling could have an impact on an individual landfill. And it should be possible to show how the recycling programs in various cities have(or have not) taken some of the strain off of municipal landfills. I do not think that showing the truth(or fallacy) in that claim addresses the global waste impact when you lump in things like mining waste and ash and construction waste that does not go into municipal landfills. – Chad Jan 20 '12 at 14:06
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    This claim actually requires accepting the implied claim that individual waste has an observable impact on global waste production. That we need to reduce that waste production. And that the only pertinent reason for recycling is to reduce that waste. I think that there are benefits to recycling that go beyond waste reduction. So rejecting recycling (as the original claimant seems to do) because it does not have an observable impact on waste production is kind of like rejecting a granny smith apple for not being red. – Chad Jan 20 '12 at 14:19

1 Answers1

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In Europe, the data show larger numbers than the claim. According to European Topic Centre on Sustainable Consumption and Production:

Municipal waste represents approximately 14% of all waste generated.... [T]he largest fraction is paper and cardboard at 35% of the waste stream, followed by organic material at 25%.

The overall low percentage seems to arise from a definition of waste that includes many categories. Mining waste is the largest component:

Mining and quarrying activities give rise to the single biggest waste stream at 29% of the total quantity of waste generated in EEA countries. It has been shown that approximately 50% of the material extracted during extraction and mining activities in Europe becomes waste.

The next-largest component is Construction and Demolition waste.

Larry OBrien
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    A lot of municipal waste comes from commercial rather than household sources. – Henry Jan 19 '12 at 18:37
  • That would depend on how much commercial activity is present in a given municipality. – auujay Jan 19 '12 at 20:02
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    One way or the other, "your waste output" is small compared to "overall waste production" largely because "overall" includes categories such as mining waste whose inclusion is not necessarily intuitive or relevant to the evaluation of recycling. – Larry OBrien Jan 19 '12 at 21:46
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    Just to make sure I understand: household waste accounts for a small percentage of overall waste (apparently more than 3%, but still small). *But* if we ignore mining waste, which presumably isn't stored in the same sort of landfill sites, it accounts for a large percentage. Is that right? – Oddthinking Jan 20 '12 at 01:38
  • @Oddthinking Essentially, but of course it depends on your definition of "large." But "Construction & demolition waste" is almost as large a percentage as mining waste (in Europe) and that may go into the same landfills as municipal waste. – Larry OBrien Jan 20 '12 at 02:14
  • @Oddthinking I do not know that we can say that based off of this. If we accept that 100% of individual waste is deposited in the landfill. And 50% of all inorganic waste at the landfill is individual that is 1.5% of global waste. Anecdotally since we started recycling our trash is now probably close to 75% food waste with the other 25% non recyclable plastics and fouled containers (Food bearing paper products that can not be cleaned for recycling). Those figures make that number in the ballpark range I would expect. – Chad Jan 20 '12 at 18:47
  • @Chad, I am scratching my head trying to see how that conflicts with my summary. I'm confused, sorry. – Oddthinking Jan 20 '12 at 21:55
  • "Just to make sure I understand: household waste accounts for a small percentage of overall waste (apparently more than 3%, but still small)." I am saying that your numbers do not necessarily show more than 3% of overall waste. Using the figures I thought would be conservatively high shows that 3% is about right. – Chad Jan 23 '12 at 14:49
  • Also, my untrained mind would assume that mining waste consists largely (not entirely) of harmless rocks... – user253751 Dec 19 '19 at 18:00