I saw an episode of "Penn & Tellers BULLSHIT" last night. The show was about the truths and myths of recycling. Is recycling a benefit to the environment and does it save natural resources?

Which ever view you take, one interesting fact popped up: 40% of all of the recycled trash ends up in a landfill site anyways.It turns out that aluminum cans were the only thing that is being recycled at a profit. It simply costs more to recycle paper products than what you can buy wood which was grown on a tree farm for just this purpose.

Using trees as a renewable resource is not only a better bargain it also saves the environment from the chemicals necessary to bleach and process recycled paper. Other recycled products cost more to transport, sort and reprocess than they ever will fetch on the market.

The result of all the recycling in the USA was that every single municipality subsidizes recycling in their communities. The taxpayers are paying for that feel good feeling. The environment is getting short changed as well because more resources are used in recycling than we get in return.

The good news is that there are plenty of landfills in the USA. There are also plenty of adequate sites waiting to be taken into use. These aren't old fashioned garbage dumps. These are modern environmentally friendly landfills. The EPA has strict regulations concerning  construction,  usage and maintainance of these sites and these rules are strictly enforced. There is no sepage of toxins or water pollution, in fact you can't even see any garbage because everything gets covered with dirt.

Eventhough 40% of the garbage that you painstakenly sorted into different colored bins still ends up in a landfill it is by no means a waste of resources. The methane gas produced by decaying garbage is used for heating homes and producing electricity! That's what I call putting garbage to good work.

On top of all that goodness, when the hole is filled up and the last layer of dirt has been grated over all that garbage, you can build a park or a bird sanctuary or  even a golf course on it.

Now that's good design!