Murray Bookchin, waste and recycling

It is the classic story. Several years ago I was browsing through a second hand bookshop, one of the great pleasures in life, and stumbled across Toward an Ecological Society. It was a collection of essays by an author I'd never heard of, Murray Bookchin. It proved to become one of my favourite books of all time, and especially the title essay.

In brief, Bookchin argues that society needs to move from a central approach of domination - dominating women, people, animals, nature in general, and recognise itself as a part of a whole. He contrasts ecological thinking with environmentalist thinking. Ecological thinking is revolutionary, seeking to reform society in a technologically advanced harmony with nature. Environmentalist thinking is geared around maximum exploitation (or domination) of nature.

I get this. As an environmental engineer, my career is all about doing what is required to minimise environmental impact. It presumes it can know the impacts of actions in extraordinarily complex and non-linear systems. It never asks how the question can be reframed such that the question of environmental impact becomes inconceivable. An analogy - we don't walk down the street looking to minimise broken limbs. It is inconceivable that we should harm ourselves.

Bookchin also writes of human scaled technology. This is where things come close to home for waste management, and indeed, he makes explicit reference to the failures of centralised, monumentalist waste management. To take it further, he is critical of the "economies of scale" and "leave it to us" approach of waste management which ultimately leads to monster landfill, incinerators and other base level waste systems. This is everything a human scale waste system is not.

A human scale system involves humans. It works with humans to reduce their waste in the first place, then engage in sorting their waste, and ultimately using high technology to process waste. It is an approach of great subtlety.

It doesn't need these elaborate efforts at "community engagement" to convince people that they really do need this big plant which will solve their problems. Instead, it responds to the desires of people to actually engage. It is increasingly plausible as people move from trusting "experts" to trusting the crowd, increasingly likely as technology leaps forward. Our waste plants are getting smaller, and people are doing more themselves.

Toward an Ecological Society, Murray Bookchin. Image courtesy of Amazon

Ultimately, the tale of Bookchin is a tale of hope over despair. We can control our destiny. It is reasonable to know your world. We can live in a world that is not free of waste, but rather enables each of us to put out waste back into the productive economy. We can change the world one decision, one action at a time.

And most importantly, we can build business models around this. We can build business models that engage with people, deliver on their core values, prevent waste to landfill and are profitable. All at the same time. This is only impossible if we lock ourselves into the domination mindset, the "grow or perish", "big is best", "economy of scale" inanity.

It is an opportunity that is set to become real as intelligent people gather around heretical ideas. It is the future I want to live.

As for Bookchin, he passed away in 2006, 85 years of age and having lived a life filled with crystal clear polemic.

The lessons from scrap steel recycling

In yesterday's blog Scrap steel - the greatest recycling story ever?, I pointed out how significant scrap steel is as a recycling sector. The sheer size of scrap steel recycling through the Electric Arc Furnace obviously diverts large quantities of material from landfill, but it also saves immense quantities of energy and thus greenhouse gases.

Electric Arc Furnace, image courtesy of Made in China

 This is all good, but more interesting is what lessons can be learned. My view on why scrap steel is so heavily recycled is:

Steel is integral to industrial societies

Steel is used in so many applications, from consumer uses like cars, through to heavy duty industrial application such as reinforcing for concrete. Indeed, it is so pervasive that it could be said to define the current era. All of this means that there are a great many buyers each looking to use it in any number of applications. The market drives this.

Translating to other materials, it is vital to let markets drive recycling, a point I return to over and over. Recycling without a market is just another form of waste disposal. Markets thrive where there is competition, and so developing a myriad of uses for the materials within waste will encourage its recycling.

Steel from scrap is high quality and uses less energy to make than from iron ore

It always helps if product generated from recycled material is of high quality. It especially helps if there are energy savings (though these tend to net out through pricing of scrap steel when compared with other raw materials such as iron ore). 

Sometimes these attributes are inherent in the product. Steel, aluminium and glass all recycle into high quality products using less energy. Sometimes it is a decision made by the recycler. In deciding how to sort for materials, the quality of the end product is determined. Failing to remove steel (ie nails) from timber recycling plants means that the chip cannot be used for particle board manufacture.

Steel is a cornerstone of the American economy

The point here is similar but different to my first. Being linked into the dynamic, innovative American economy means that there will always be a seething mass of engineers and entrepreneurs looking to do better. This is one of the great features of the American culture, and why America recycles more than 80% of its steel, far better than any other economy.

Other materials have a great prospect if they too can hitch their wagon to a culture of innovation. You can imagine, for instance, palladium's use in electronics driving all sorts of recovery innovation. This will be the subject of a future blog.

Steel is easily extracted

Being magnetic, it is easy to remove steel. Similar processes can and are being invented for other products, but here is where materials processing engineers with some lateral thinking could be game changers. We need to support this, encourage it, drive it.

Steel is dense and easily transported

There is a lot of cost in moving space around. If you can get a lot of weight into that space, then you are increasing the transport efficiency. Less dense materials can be made more dense through compactors, and this must be (and is) a first step for any recycling operations.

Waste paper baler, photo courtesy of Alibaba

Steel is high value

Leaving perhaps the most important to last - steel has a value that is high and preserved as it moves through the economy. This enables a vast web of collectors consolidating to larger and larger entities, all profitable in their own right. The ecosystem thus created is vital. Container deposit schemes seek to create the same system of cascading value through legislation. Not as good as a natural market, but sometimes these sorts of steps are needed. Any long term recycling and upcycling venture must be financially worthwhile for all participants.

So my thoughts. I'd be keen for comments on how the success of scrap steel can be, and is being, translated to other materials.

Scrap steel - the greatest recycling story ever?

When we think of recycling, we tend to think of plastic, glass and paper. The sort of stuff we see around the home and put out into the recycling bin. This is important, but the real story in recycling is scrap steel.

Global trade in scrap steel, 1998-2010

The chart above shows immense tonnages of scrap steel used annually - over 500 million tonnes per year. The whole report "World Markets for Recovered and Recycled Commodities: The End of the “Waste Era”..." is fascinating, and well worth a read.

This is obviously not the same as the 1,000 million tonnes plus of iron ore traded each year, but not grossly less. A bit sobering for Australians accustomed to feeling that they are building the world out of the Pilbara.

So why is this? Why is scrap metal so successful when we can't do the same for plastics, rubber or all the other commodities. I don't quite know, and would love to hear ideas, but my take is:

• Steel is integral to industrial societies, and useful in so many applications. As a result, there are likely to be many buyers
• Scrap steel makes high quality steel with lower energy requirements through the Electric Arc Furnace
• Steel is a cornerstone of the American economy, and formed the basis of its industrial revolution. This in turn led to a massive eruption of energy and innovation which characterises the American economy
• Steel is easily extracted, being magnetic.
• Steel is dense, and so easily transported
• It's high value, and this value can be passed down the line to a network of collectors

The trick, and a problem worth considering, is how can this be translated into other commodities? 

What is the shift that is needed to make other commodities roar like steel? 

How can Garbologie disrupt the status quo to make new industries form and grow? 

Critical mass for upcycling

If you want to divert waste from landfill, recycling or upcycling, you need to think about critical mass for your business. This is the point at which the business can not just sustain itself, but grow to fill its market.

The conventional approach for waste management is to take waste at the very end of the line, apply some significant processing through big licks of capital, and end up with a product that's not particularly good. This sort of business needs to be big to achieve its critical mass. "Economies of scale" apply here.

To me, the clever approach is to intervene far earlier in the waste process. Rather than taking a mixed up mess of trash, garbage, rubbish, waste (call it what you will), you approach it earlier in the waste generation cycle. 

You can get out large amounts of material for upcycling with little capital, instead investing in human capital (customers and your own staff sorting it out). Of course, it won't get 100% of the good stuff out, but it will do a lot for a little.

This is the elegant approach to upcycling. Approach critical mass by reducing the scale of the problem. Rather than try to recover timber from a mixed waste stream, offer a discount for segregated timber. Rather than attempt to sort through a mixed up bulky waste stream at landfill, have staff work with your customers to sort it out beforehand. 

The capital requirements are reduced, space, uncertainty, everything shrinks to a manageable problem. Furthermore, by treating your customers as humans, you probably also have happier customers with greater loyalty.

It really is that old adage about how you eat an elephant - one bite at a time. 

Or to flip it on its head, the reason why we do so poorly in upcycling is because we can only frame the problem as an elephant towering above us. Break it down, shift your perspective, and suddenly the problem becomes a whole series of solutions that grow upon themselves.

Garbologie is liberated!

Garbologie has been hiding under Upcycle for several months now, struggling to break free from the inherent tensions of a full time job and a family life not to be abandoned. Both are important, and so Garbologie/Upcycle gives.

The exciting news is that I am now working 4 days a week in my normal job, leaving a day a week to pursue Garbologie. I celebrate this with a new name for the blog, a new post and a taste of what Garbologie is to become.

Garbologie will turn waste management on its head. It will do this on the three pillars of Thinking, Guiding and Doing. Thinking through writing, expressing opinions, being a thought leader. Guiding through consulting, advising organisations on how they can do better in waste management. Doing through establishing our very own network of waste facilities to demonstrate what we say.

Expect to see a lot of activity in thinking, growing into activity in guiding and, in a year, the first waste facility launched. Follow us to track our progress.