Our little local paper recently reported that six percent of the people in Lee's Summit, MO, recycle. Six percent. That means that 94% of the people in this town find it prohibitively difficult to throw their pop cans and water bottles into a recycling bin instead of the trash can.
Now, I'll admit that I'm not a great environmentalist. My house is too big, and from the looks of my utility bills, not terribly efficient. I get plastic bags at the grocery store (although I do reuse them as trash bags) and when we need or want something, we tend to buy new instead of used. But I find this statistic a bit horrifying. I mean, it's not like we have to actually turn our garbage into new products. We just have to place them in a different container. Is it really that hard?
This pathetic number is particularly disturbing to me because our town has curbside recycling. It costs an extra five bucks a month--a Starbucks. Big deal. I place a bin full of my aluminum, plastic, newspapers and cardboard--I don't even have to separate it--out with the regular trash. Once a month or so I haul my glass and magazines to the local Resource Recovery Center, about five miles away. Not difficult. (And as a side note, I have to say that beer drinkers are excellent recyclers. The brown glass container is always full.)
The most challenging part for me has been training the people I live with to follow my lead. But I know that if I nag, rag and bitch long enough, they'll do what I want just to shut me up. Actually, I've found this to be an excellent strategy for getting just about anything done in my household.
This is just how it is done here. It was somewhat difficult to get the hang of yellowbag (recyle), blacktrash (refuse), brown (organic/compost type) and paper separating. Now it is second nature. We can probably go 6-8 weeks without taking the large wheelout container of refuse out. There is SO much recyclable and paper. I prefer to recycle, but admit that if you don't have curbside it is much less appealing. Having curbside and not even trying...not cool.
ReplyDeleteEuropeans seem to have all that figured out so well. And you said it--if you just start doing it, it becomes second nature. Thanks for the comment! Hope you guys are well...can't wait to get you back in the states!
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