The Tin Lizard

Recycling Headaches

Recycling really boomed, 10 to 15 years ago, as cities and other jurisdictions were encouraged by federal policies, as well as by the realization that recycled materials could be sold.  Places that up to then hadn't bothered to recycle much began to get serious about it, while those that already had programs started to expand them, taking in more and different materials.

One of the key factors enabling the upsurge was a move in many places from "dual stream recycling," in which households and businesses were required to separate paper from bottles and cans, to "single stream," where everything could be recycled via one container.  The local sanitation authorities, if effect, took on the job of sorting, relieving the individual citizen from that "chore."  Separating may not seem all that onerous, but the effect was to increase significantly the volume of stuff that was getting recycled, and the number of households and businesses that were participating.  [In my area our smallish yellow recycling bins, about the size of a couple of grocery bags, gave way to a blue rolling cart that's just as big as our trash bin.] 

At roughly the same time, over some years, the types of materials that could be recycled also expanded, to the point that in many areas, people were told that if they weren't sure what was trash and what was recyclable, to err in favor of the latter.  Again, the effect was to get a much higher volume of materials recycled.  [In my own area, for example, even books can now be recycled, not just paper and corrugated cardboard; and where once we had to consider the difference between milk jugs and yogurt cups, now most kinds of plastic are fair game for the blue bin.] 

Now, however, many localities are finding their success in squeezing more recyclables from users has a few downsides:

Too many people are tossing items that can't be recycled, requiring expenditures to separate and dispose of those; the increased volume of some materials creates an oversupply that lowers the price end-users will pay; and even a lot of the recyclable items, when mixed together even with other recyclable materials, become unusable for manufacturers and can't be sold (e.g. glass particles in recycled paper). 

Thus, from being a source of income, many recycling programs have turned into a drain on county/city budgets in short order.  [Again looking at my local situation:  In 2011 my small 24-square-mile county generated more than $600,000 by selling recycled materials; last year, that figure was down to just $11,000 - and we are one of the few jurisdictions in our area still netting a slight profit; many are in the hole.]

Big change!  Officials are looking for solutions, but there appears to be no ideal one.  One interesting point the Pope made last month in his encyclical on the topic of pollution was that, while nature has a pretty effective universal recycling system that works automatically and on a global scale for organic materials, man has not yet created anything nearly so effective for the stuff he creates.      

Natural Selection - The Summer Season

With the advent of summer every year comes the regular spate of serious-to-fatal accidents.  Drunk (or sometimes sober) teenagers smashing up cars after proms, people who can't swim drowning in deep (or shallow) water, folks setting fire to their house or deck with grills, shark attacks at the beach (especially this year), home fireworks enthusiasts blowing away bits and pieces of themselves. 

It's all pretty normal at this time of year, when so many more people are outdoors.  Things do "just happen," but - speaking of fireworks - every now and then crops up a story that just seems designed to illustrate how natural selection works. 

Like the guy who put a firework (a "mortar") on his head and lit it.  He died. I don't know the fellow, and it's reported that he had been drinking, and his Mom says he believed it was a dud ... but still ...   

Automotive Technology "Advances" - Driving Takes A Back Seat

Several car manufacturers are working on cars that will try to do our driving for us.  Volvo, Audi, Mercedes, Google(!) and others already have prototypes on the road, with target dates for first sales to the public just a few years ahead.  Today, I read a driver road test review of the Volvo XC90, which appears to have performed pretty well.

I'm sure the trend toward cars that would do the driving for us is positive, on the whole, as well as inevitable.   The positive part is safety.  The old axiom that most accidents are due to "the nut behind the wheel" is still true, perhaps even more than it used to be, as distractions seem to multiply.  Just ask the fellow who made that daring leap across a drawbridge a few days ago.

The inevitable part is that we seem to pursue technology for its own sake and in automobiles especially, to force feed it to consumers.  When we bought a new car a couple of years ago, we didn't really feel we needed a GPS and navigation system (after all, our cell phones already contained one), but in the brand/model we wanted, the dealer had no cars on the lot, nor within a few hundred miles' radius, that weren't already equipped with it.  The system has proved occasionally useful, but yet not a necessity.   

So if you're 50 or under, maybe even 60, a self-driving car is very likely in your future. You may be able to avoid it, if you're older, and if you want to, as the technology is perfected and the price comes down to the point that it might be offered in nearly all cars rather than just as an add-on toy for the most luxurious makes and models.

Eventually, though, your car manufacturer, like the Greyhound Bus Company of old, will be inviting you to "Leave the Driving to Us."  I like that image, because it's a great symbolic representation of what's really happening in the driving world: 

Driving as fun is slowly disappearing.   

Even though carmakers usually still display their wares in commercials zipping along uncrowded highways in bucolic countryside, or doing fast-paced spins on city streets, the far more usual driving experience for 60-70% of Americans is a slow utilitarian grind through stoplights, road hazards, and the wacky things people do. I still do consider driving can sometimes be fun, especially off the Interstate; and when in the passenger seat I'm often bored silly; but the self-driving car as described in this road test will turn cars into little more than personal buses, and driving into an experience as mind-numbing as riding up a few floors in an elevator.