Recycling to save the planet: another great environmental hoax

Most recycling probably is a net environmental cost in terms of wasted energy, additional transport and separation costs, and collateral environmental negatives. These negatives include illegal dumps in every state and territory (often containing toxic material), growing stockpiles of unwanted recycled materials (a lot of which is now ending up in landfill anyway), and regular fires at recycling centres (that put toxic fumes into the air of cities).

Underlying the entire hoax is the notion that sending garbage to landfill (generally the cheapest option) is inherently undesirable and to be avoided. For densely populated countries lacking disposal sites or for toxic waste, this idea may have limited validity. Incineration does, however, provide an alternative (that can also generate electricity) and is widely used in places like Singapore.

Australia itself has abundant land and (for its major centres) plenty of potential landfill disposal sites. Consequently, disposing of household and industrial waste used to be cheap and easy.

There had been common re-use of containers, particularly glass bottles, until about the 1960s. [We still re-use gas cylinders and the like without subsidy.] Re-use of glass bottles became uneconomic in developed countries because of rising real wages (though that did not stop a number of State governments from re-introducing such policies). Unsubsidised re-use of glass bottles still occurs in the Third World, because low wages continue to make it viable.

The slippery slope that has led to excessive and uneconomic attempts at recycling started with savage increases in tip fees. [I will use Canberra, where recycling has been heavily promoted by its Labor-Greens' Government, as an illustration of absurd attempts at recycling, as well as to show the sharp difference between government rhetoric and reality.]

In Canberra, in order to promote recycling, households are issued with two main wheelie bins: a modest 240 litre bin for general garbage (collected weekly) and a 360 litre yellow-topped bin for recyclables (collected fortnightly). The general garbage bin is deliberately small in order to force residents to recycle. Households can also purchase a bin for green waste. In the ACT, household waste (self-delivered to the tip) currently attracts a landfill fee of $98.45 per tonne, and $68.15 per tonne is the rate for clean soil or bricks. Commercial waste attracts a much higher disposal fee of $170.55 per tonne.

The ACT in November 2011 also taxed "single-use" plastic bags. The tax applies to all retailers in the ACT for lightweight polyethylene polymer plastic bags. The Territory government has made a feature of its "green" credentials with policies such as "No Waste", and a move towards 100 per cent of electricity sourced from renewables.

A 2017 submission from the ACT's Minister for Transport and City Services claimed that:

...the ACT is one of the leading jurisdictions in waste management in Australia with around 70 per cent of waste generated in the ACT being reused or recycled. In 1996 the ACT was the first jurisdiction in the world to adopt a "No Waste" strategy .

Recycling therefore has been "highly successful" in the nation's capital, if its local politicians are to be believed. The unmentioned reality, however, is that it has involved much collateral environmental damage.

The first unintended consequence of high landfill fees in Canberra was a sharp increase in illegal (often night-time) dumping of rubbish on surrounding rural roads. The bureaucratic response was the erection of (ineffective) "no dumping" signs, which also called on citizens to report offenders.

A further related consequence (initially) was diversion of (especially commercial) rubbish to small tips in surrounding NSW, as far as 100km away. This eventually forced councils in these areas to place full-time attendants at these tips (many of which subsequently became uneconomic to operate and were closed). Those country tips that remain open (far fewer in number) now charge fees.