National Recycling Day is coming up on Tuesday, Nov. 15, so Maine is now recognizing its own recycling week with several entities trying to get the word out about the importance and benefits of the three Rs: Reduce, reuse and recycle.
Biddeford will celebrate Recycling Day today from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the transfer Station at 371 Hill St., with a paper shredding event. Residents are invited to bring confidential papers for shredding and make a donation to the Friends of Community Action Food Pantry while they’re there.
According to the State Planning Office, Maine has one of the highest recycling rates in the nation, at 38 percent, and 98 percent of us have access to a recycling program of some sort. Those numbers are cause for celebration, since we’ve come a long way from the days of sending our reusable materials to the dump or incinerator without a second thought, but there’s more work to be done.
Trash disposal is big business and always has been. It’s no secret that we have a finite amount of space for landfills and that both burial and burning of trash can have negative environmental impacts. We all pay big money to make sure that our bags of waste are taken away each week, whether we have to drop them off ourselves or not. Oftentimes, out of sight means out of mind, so it’s a good idea to use this week of awareness to really think about our trash and what happens to it once it leaves our homes.
In this area, most communities contract with Maine Energy Recovery Company for waste incineration, which in turn produces electricity. Incineration sounds like a great idea until the smell and the air pollutants are factored in, but that must be balanced with the possibility for groundwater contamination from landfills and the fact that land has become a precious commodity. There’s simply no pretty way to get rid of our waste ”“ it will always have some sort of impact on our environment.
That is why it is so important to cut down on our trash production by reusing whatever we can. It’s disheartening in this day and age to see piles of cardboard, plastic or tin cans in people’s curbside trash piles. Those items are easy to recycle and can be turned into new product for future use. According to statistics from the Maine Waste Management and Recycling Program website, enough plastic bottles are thrown away in the United States alone each year to circle the Earth four times. Such a disgusting image should be enough to convince anyone to make that extra effort to recycle.
It’s also upsetting to get Styrofoam packaging when we purchase a product from a store or get a non-recyclable takeout container from a restaurant. Sustainable options are available, and it’s important that we as consumers stress the fact that we want to see businesses use earth-friendly products. To continue to do otherwise now that we all know better, is not only folly, it’s a path to our own demise as a species, and indeed, as a planet.
Recycling is not only the right thing to do for planetary health and longevity, it also has benefits that fall into that one category of all-consuming importance in daily life: Money. In Biddeford, for example, it costs residents $42 for every ton of waste that is incinerated at MERC. So for every ton that is kept out of the incinerator, Biddeford is not only saving that $42, it’s also bringing in revenue from the sale of recyclable material. So far this year, recycling has brought in about $170,000, according to the city’s Solid Waste Management Commission.
Unfortunately, Biddeford has continuously refused to institute a curbside recycling program, citing cost concerns, despite the fact that neighboring communities such as Saco have embraced the effort. Instead, Biddeford residents must bring their own recyclables to the transfer station and sort them by hand ”“ and even then, the only plastics accepted are No. 1 and 2.
Hopefully, in the near future, all York County towns ”“ and someday, the entire nation ”“ will realize the importance of supporting curbside, single-sort recycling programs that allow residents to easily and conveniently recycle all types of glass, plastics, paper, cardboard, metals and other materials, rather than the limited systems to which some of us now have access.
Perhaps this recycling week will be an inspiration to some of the new city councilors who were elected Tuesday to pick up that torch.
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Today’s editorial was written by Managing Editor Kristen Schulze Muszynski on behalf of the Journal Tribune Editorial Board. Questions? Comments? Contact Kristen by calling 282-1535, Ext. 322, or via e-mail at kristenm@journaltribune.com.
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