I try to do the right thing, recycle right etc. Return the beer cans for the travel fund, do a buddy a solid and leave beer cans to the shopping cart pickers. So what happens? Some asshole picks out the milk cartons and other non refundables and dumps them on my lawn and takes the bag!! Next week I’ll be waiting with a hose.
This article appears in Aug 7-13, 2008.
maybe, instead of a hosing down the inconsiderate ‘shopping cart picker’, you could simply separate the recyclables from the garbage that’s not, into separate bags, which is how it’s supposed to be done anyway, right?btw, beer in a can… ewww yuck
no…nonrefundables (i.e. milk cartons) are still recyclable – they don’t have to be separated out from the refundables.
imo, it would actually make more sense to do the separating at a garbage/recycling depot, where equipment automatically sorts through the discarded materials.it’s not like the technology to make that happen doesn’t exist. essentially, build a factory to auto-sort garbage and divert (from the landfill/incinerator) whatever materials that can be recycled.
I think this would be a good option for able-bodied and -minded people claiming social assistance to contribute in some way to their rehabilitation. Except I don’t want to insult them by calling it rehabilitation, or by suggesting hey deserve to work with garbage. But you know what I mean. Sort of a community contribution / return to work thing.
Beer, regardless of how its sold, is supposed to be consumed from a glass. Producing beer in a can actually protects the beer from spoilage better than does beer in a bottle — and if you ever saw what comes out of the brewery beer bottle washer when they get the used bottles back from the recyclers you would never buy beer in a returnable bottle ever again.
yeah keith, but compared to glass bottles, aluminum cans require about 10x as much (precious) energy to produce; glass is also more readily recyclable than aluminum AND glass is REUSABLE (after washing), whereas cans must be recycled back into raw aluminum… to make more cans. it’s more environmentally conscientious to use glass, instead of aluminum, afaik.and let’s not forget about bisphenol A, the carcinogenic crap & endocrine disrupter that some (many?) cans are lined with, to retain freshness and prevent the metallic ‘flavour’ from leeching into the beer/beverage/food
Well, techie, you’re repeating what is in the brainless media, but what you don’t know is that testing indicated that the can lining is a non-issue; that the energy used to recycle aluminum is largely renewable (i.e. hydroelectric) energy; and that the energy and environmental impacts of an industrial-sized bottle washer which needs trememdous amounts of steam/hot water and uses some very nasty chemicals makes the two technologies a wash. Add to that the energy costs involved in shipping heavy glass as compared to lightweight aluminum and you have a very interesting equation. For me I have abandoned glass in favor of cans.
Sounds like the great paper or plastic debate. Don’t forget that buying local microbrews and drinking at brewpubs or chugging Keiths avoids the impact of having to transport your beer over long distances regardless of packaging in glass or aluminun.