Is recycling really a stupid idea driven by people
too willing to believe that their minute actions can change a
culture built on conspicuous consumption? Writing in the New York
Times Magazine June 30, John Tierney answers “yes.” In fact, he
says, “Recycling is garbage.” Citing studies by conservative think
tanks such as the Cato Institute, Tierney concludes that landfills
have plenty of room to sprawl and are generally benign, that
markets for recyclables just aren’t there, and that we plant more
trees each year than we log for paper. What’s almost worse, Tierney
adds, is that recycling advocates goaded the government into
enacting expensive and unnecessary modifications for packaging.
Letters from environmental groups have poured into the Times,
taxing Tierney for leaning heavily toward the printing and
packaging industries. A 17-page rejoinder by the Environmental
Defense Fund takes on Tierney point by point; some key objections:
We may have plenty of trees, but we don’t have enough intact
forests. Recycling newspapers prevents surviving forests from
turning into tree farms. Writers Richard Denison and John Ruston
also point out that landfills are not “innocuous’: One out of every
five sites slated for cleanup under the nation’s Superfund program
for toxic wastes is some city’s former dump.
The
EDF response, Anti-Recycling Myths, is available by calling the
group’s Washington, D.C., office, 202/387-3500, or through e-mail
to the World Wide Web at www.edf.org. The New York Times can be
reached at 229 W. 43rd St., New York, NY 10036 (212/556-1234) or on
the web at www.nytimes.com.
*Betsy
Marston
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Recycling gets rapped.
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