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Waste prevention and management

Avoiding waste production means above all acting at the level of prevention. As for waste management, it concerns collection, transport, dumpster rentals, the stages of sorting and pretreatment, recovery, then elimination.

Waste: a management problem that dates back forever

Men have long been able to entrust their waste to nature. What could not be used to feed the animals was buried, burned or used to make fertilizer. In the 19th century, hygiene and public health became a real concern. On November 24, 1883, the prefect of the Seine Eugène Poubelle issued a decree requiring owners to provide their tenants with a container for household waste.

As a result of changing lifestyles and consumption, the quantity and nature of waste have evolved significantly. During the second industrial revolution, the manufacture of synthetic products developed, new sources of energy were used, and means of transport diversified. The population is increasing and concentrating, lifestyles and consumption patterns are changing, and lead to less easily biodegradable waste, with greater quantities produced.

Why worry about waste today

Waste can have impacts on human health and the environment if not properly managed. And the predicted scarcity of certain non-renewable resources makes it essential to:

• consume these resources efficiently, hence the urgency of waste prevention;
• take advantage of waste, through reuse, recycling, then energy recovery.

Waste, due to its variability, its quantity and more protective standards for health and the environment, represents an economic burden for its producers, responsible for its elimination. Waste prevention and recycling solutions can help control these costs. Beyond legislative objectives, waste prevention and management are closely governed by regulations, which define responsibilities and objectives. Florida waste policy is strongly linked to that of the federal regulations.

Many stakeholders involved

Waste prevention and management concerns many private and public actors:

• waste producers: households, communities, administrations, economic players;
• local authorities in charge of the public waste service;
• companies dedicated to waste prevention and management;
• companies producing consumer products, which may be required to contribute to the management of these products under extended producer responsibility (EPR);
• local authorities who are responsible for their planning (adequacy between the deposits, their control and their management capabilities);
• the state of Florida.

Priority to waste creation prevention

The priority for waste producers and communities is to reduce their quantity and their harmfulness.

Management for waste recovery

Waste management, which includes the stages of mobilizing waste once produced (collection, possible transport) and treatment, is organized in a very variable manner. While respecting the hierarchy of treatment methods and the principle of proximity, it must aim for the best recovery of waste, adapted to the context of a territory.

The basic waste management circuits are important in Buffalo. Numerous of these processes are the regulars of the landfill who come to select the materials that caneasily be resold or remodeled by them: aluminum, copper, iron, textiles, wood and cardboard, even plastics and papers. It is also several dozen people who live, not without risk, on or near large landfills.

For those, the valuation can go as far as raising goats, cows, pigs and poultry that feed organic matter found in fresh waste, which also risks transporting diseases.

These activities, which are very close to selective sorting on the landfill, but which can also take place further upstream, such as in transfer centers or at the leaving the factories, allow the recovery of sorted materials.

For the organic material, the solution most often considered is the incorporation into the soil of cultivation, directly or after a composting step. Among the main inert materials recycled are metals. These are used for different assignments, such as foundry, fabrication or refurbishment of aluminum pans and crafts (bas-reliefs, toys, etc. for sale to tourists).

Plastics can be melted and molded for manufacturing, at the artisanal or even industrial scale, new plastic products (buckets, basins, signs, table legs, ashtrays, etc.).

However, it should be noted that almost all of these activities are carried out informally, and therefore their transposition into a global waste management plan presents many difficulties and risk of reducing or even eliminating their profitability.

Any organic matter of animal or plant origin will sooner or later be in depending on physico-chemical conditions such as temperature and humidity, colonized by microorganisms.

They will find food and drink there, developing while producing gases and substances having a positive effect (case compost in particular) or negative (toxic substances and / or inhibitors of expected effects) on the surrounding environment.

When this organic matter makes part of household waste (generally for more than half of the mass) and that these are dumped en masse on a site that we will call landfill if the site is not controlled, or technical landfill center otherwise, we is witnessing phenomena that should be made explicit.

The microbiological mechanisms and the means of managing them can be explained to better understand the implications of waste management on the Buffalo communities, including organic waste, and how their impact our health in a sustainabliy prospective.

That is why it is important to use proper waste management and recycling methodologies. Local residents in the State of New York including the city of Buffalo hire Upstate New York dumpers to remove all their junk and unused items.

This way they reduce local pollution in the state of New York, send their waste to the proper landfills for more efficient treatment, and provide recycling opportunitites to local businesses.

Future research will focus on the environmental impacts of landfills and the variability encountered in southern countries. Finally, we can deal with the nuisances produced by the fractions non-organic household waste. It will emphasize the need to remove these compounds, or better to avoid their presence in household waste.

What do dumpsters and oranges have in common? Take a moment and try to answer this question; I’ll still be here when you come back. Did you get it?

You can buy both of them, that is true, although it always makes much more sense to rent a dumpster through a reliable Dumpster Rental Service. That’s not the answer I was thinking of. Here is what they have in common, neither dumpster nor orange has a word it can rhyme with.

I’ll let you process that for a moment. So, we all know “trash” rhymes with “rash” and “berry” rhymes with “very,” but nothing rhymes with dumpster and nothing rhymes with orange. Isn’t the world a funny place?

I was thinking about this crazy coincidence one winter afternoon when I wanted to throw away my orange peel. My neighbors were remodeling their house, and so had rented a dumpster to throw away all of their trash.

I happened to be walking by their house in Irvine at the time, and thought, hey, I’ll just toss my orange peel in their rented dumpster. We are very close friends–in fact, I am the godmother to their baby–so I knew they wouldn’t mind if I used their dumpster service for discarding this small item.

In fact, I had a hunch they might appreciate it, since oranges are renowned for smelling so sweet and neutralizing any other odors. Little did I know, as I was throwing away the orange peel, they were watching me through the window.

They came outside and asked me what I was doing. I said, “I am throwing away my orange peel in your rented dumpster. Orange you glad I didn’t just toss it onto your lawn?” And we all had a good laugh.

Choosing the right company doing waste management in Irvine that will handle your waste disposal, especially if you are in business, is critical, as not only is it necessary that your waste be collected regularly, they should be able to handle different types of waste and dispose them properly.

As consumers are more and more concerned about how “green” the companies they patronize are, you would not want to be associated with practices that are detrimental to the environment. It would be a public relations nightmare.

The same goes in choosing the right dumpster rental service. A reputable company would ensure to provide the right dumpster unit that is not corroded and risk leaking or with cover that has holes in it and run the risk of the unit accumulating stormwater.

Picking a company that is not conscientious about the quality they provide their consumers will put you in a literally messy situation.

Consumers and businesses should be aware that there are still a significant number of waste disposal companies which:

• Does improper recycling;
• Have unreliable service;
• Does not have ecological standards they follow as a company policy;
• Disposes of wastes improperly;

Have environmentally hazardous conditions; andLacks customer service.

So, whether you are just using a dumpster service or a full collection service, be sure to find out more your short-list of possible waste disposal companies to tap.

Waste is not only grossly inconvenient to handle when your company fails you, those waste can also pose some legal and health problems for you.

We can foresee the situation where we will start seeing construction debris at the roadsides soon, to pay for the non-cost effective state-mandated center.

The price on recyclables varies by area/market demand. The price here on Long Beach is down right now. Have read that some recylers are walking out on their contracts to buy them from local collecting authorities because their warehouses are full.

BTW, even the state road crews just dump their old culverts, etc. over a bank somewhere.

A few months back, some city friends of ours got a call from the sheriff in an adjacent rural county. Several bags of their garbage had been found, along with bags of their neighbor’s garbage.

Apparently, the midnight garbage men cruise the nice suburbs and pick up trash bags, look through them for credit card offers/numbers and other financial information and then dump the leavings on country roads. Not always the owners of the trash that dump it. We have recently moved to the country from the city.

We stopped at one of our neighbors’ home and asked him where we could take our trash. He responded that he didn’t know where the dump was because he just takes his trash up into a valley and dumps it. Since he’s only got an acre of land, the valley has to be on someone else’s land.

We found out our township has a convenient service of accepting trash and recyclables twice a month just a couple miles from us so that we don’t have to go to the dump. The only cost is .50 for large plastic bags to use (but you’re not required to use theirs).

Apparently, it’s not convenient enough. I also see “dumps” along some rural roads made up of old farm equipment, trailer homes, etc that are rusted beyond use.
 
So city folks aren’t always the culprits. we are also curious about why some would have to pay to deposit their recyclables. Recyclables are sold as a commodity so it would seem that the dumper of recyclables should not have to pay to dump them.

We see a bunch of outdated farm equipment not worth enough to use valuable inside storage but not completely useless. We might modify, combine or separate some parts to make a tool for a completely different purpose during off seaon when time’s not so rare.

Along some rural roads made up of old farm equipment, case in point some trailer homes that are rusted beyond use, or mobile storage units. Farmers have been using it since 1st trailer park family deserted it.
 
Farmers got the idea from using rusted beyond use bus bodies back before “trailer homes” were invented.

So city folks aren’t always the culprits. When recycling began, aluminium cans in my parts, it was a little extra money on the side and helping the environment.

Now we are noticing the trend toward recycling getting expensive for the consumer. Special plastic bags, accepting only certain types of plastic or paper, paying the trash disposal companies extra.

Don’t get me wrong, as a consumer I feel it is my responsibility to recycle whenever possible and I do but the question is, not so long ago, I could put an extra jingle in my pocket and companies made a profit from the aluminium as well. Where’s the money going when I have to pay someone to take my aluminium cans? Is this the good ole USA middleman makes all the money schemes?

It’s not the country neighbors and it’s not the guy with twice a week trash pickup. It’s the guy who decided to pass on paying for trash pickup because he can take it to the dump himself and save a little money or the guy whose trash hauler leaves his parcel because it didn’t conform to their rules… or perhaps an item such as an appliance which requires an additional fee.

Neighbors have to live with each other and usually have some space to bury their trash on their own place. They should use Long Beach dumpster rental services whenever they have gathered a large amount of junk they want to discard all at once.
 
There certainly are some greedy individuals in the recycling business, but run a spreadsheet showing the costs of collecting, processing, and shipping the “commodities” and you will find that with a few exceptions, it is less than a profitable operation.

Recycling is economically viable because it is a lower cost alternative usually to dumping in a modern high tech landfill with leachate controls, groundwater monitoring, etc.

With recycling some of the usual rules of the market are on their heads. An increase in supply increases the value, rather than vise-versa. Buyers of recycled commodities find it more economic to buy truckloads than backpack fulls.
 
So if you bring in 50 crushed beer cans, the per can value is low to negative. Bring in 10 tons and you got something. Also, the markets are volatile, but the collection efforts need to be long-term. You don’t want your garbage collector to be changing the rules every 2 weeks.

Here’s a point that may upset the free market libertarians: mandatory recycling is necessary to improve the efficiency of the system, provided that it is market based, not just tree hugging.

Bio-degradeable bags or compostable bags for residential and commercial food waste are now available from food waste collection companies.

Many households around the country are being supplied with bio-degradeable bags from their local councils as the “rollercoaster” to divert food waste from landfill continues.

Bio-degradeable bags

Recycling companies now have a dedicated department that supplies local councils or large organisations with the very best compostable food waste bags on the market at the keenest prices.

Because of their extensive buying power they are now in a position to offer all sizes of bio-degradeable food waste bags to local councils and large corporate buying organisations such as breweries and restaurant chains.

With the increase in awareness to recycle food waste both residential and commercial it is of paramount importance to get not only the best bags for the food waste but also at the best price so that a cost neutral or potential saving can be made.

Recycling specialist Orlando Dumpster Rental Boss has used their  range of contacts to make these bags, that conform to EN-13432, which is the internationally recognized standard for compostable and bio-degradeable bags in the US, available to waste management departments cheaper than can be purchased directly.

This part of the business runs alongside their food waste collection service that is currently in operation whereby commercial food waste is collected and disposed of at a nearby IVC ( In Vessel Composting ) facility to turn into into compost.

Food waste recycling on the increase

An interested visitor in the recycling facility can be seen eyeing one of the recycling collection vehicles. Recycling operators provide food waste collection and recycling services and have expanded their food waste collection round in the area after increased demand from hotels and restaurants in the vicinity.

Although the area is not densley populated it still has a vast amount of hotels and restaurants because of the attraction of the to tourists especially during the summer months.

These establishments will all require food waste collections and they are the only company to be offering this service whereby the food waste is 100 % recycled.

For example the entire group are having their food waste collected with startling results. The New Forest Lodge in underwent a three month trial on having their food waste collected and recycled before a further hotel was added along with Beaulieu Hotel and one of the Group’s Inns.

As a result of the success of this forward thinking Hotel Group another leading New Forest Hotel, Bar and Restaurant is about to commence their food waste collection program.

The disposal of the commercial food waste takes place at an IVC ( in vessel composting ) facility where the food waste collected is 100 % recycled. The recycling partner offers a food waste collection and recycling service to bars, hotels and restaurants in the area.

Catering food waste destined to be recycled in the future

Food waste from the catering and hospitality sector is getting more and more recycled.

Catering food waste has been sent via general waste bins to landfill for many years but this is sure to change if a landfill ban for food waste is mentioned in the Florida government’s waste review strategy next month.

With the options for catering food waste to go to either anaerobic digestion plants or in vessel composting facilities around the US increasing then there is no reason why the food waste coming from the catering and hospitality sector should continue to go to landfill.

Catering establishments encompass many forms of food production, and consequently food waste, and although margins within this industry are very tight the difference betwen sending food waste to landfill or having the food waste fully recycled are virtually “cost neutral”.

This is mainly because of the rise in landfill tax that is due to increase again on 1st April as it is set at $56 per tonne.

With the landfill tax rising again over the next few years the difference between recycled food waste and food waste going to landfill will mean that catering food waste will be diverted from landfill once and for all, which is exactly what the Florida government is hoping for.

Recycling companies and leading independent food waste collection and recycling companies in the nation offer a food waste collection and recycling service to the catering industry, whereby all food waste collected is 100 % recycled.

What are the Procedures in Hospital Waste Management

There are various types of waste that we discharge each day. Some can be recycled while others must be properly disposed.

According to Denver Dumpster Rental Center, an appropriate waste management must be taken into action to reduce the risk that it may cause to our lives. Hospital waste management is the process, wherein all types of hospital waste are being disposed properly.

The effect of hospital waste management will benefit almost all individual that is why it is being imposed seriously whether by the local government or national. There are certain procedures that are being followed to make hospital waste management successful.

A good planning is the first procedure of hospital waste management. Through this process it should define the selection of the team or the officers that will be responsible in disposing the hospital waste.

Included to the planning are the options that must be take in consideration in every waste that the team will collect. They must always consider recycling, reuse, and reclamation of the waste gathered. Following the planning procedure is the implementation.

When the planning is already final these must be put into action. Planning without action is useless and it will not help waste management. Another process that must be observed is the classification of the waste of the hospital. It must be well-identified so that you will know those that are hazardous from the non-hazardous waste.

Recycling as well as reclamation is an important procedure in hospital waste management. Through this process the waste that is being thrown are minimized. Of course not all hospital waste can be recycled.

Once all of these are being implemented it is necessary to review the hospital waste management developed. In this way you have an idea if it is working according to what you have plan because if it does not work properly you will be able to make some adjustment.

Managing Hospital Waste Disposal

Hospital waste is one of the most hazardous wastes that need to be disposed properly because it consists of different kinds of chemicals and/or viruses.

If not properly disposed, it may cause harmful effects to our health and even to our environment.Hospital waste disposal must be done accordingly based on the rules of the local and national health organizations.

There are certain rules that need to be followed to be able to make it right. Seminars and trainings are being conducted by the government in order to provide knowledge on how it is being done.

However, there are simple but useful steps that the hospital management can do. One of this is categorizing the hospital waste based on its weight, constitutes, and density.

According to the World Health Organization, hospital waste disposal must be classified into its categories, such as infectious, sharps, pathological, pharmaceuticals, radioactive, and others.

The infectious waste includes material-containing pathogens that came from surgery and autopsies. Sharp hospital wastes are those that have been use in operations, which includes needles, saws, syringes, and blades.

Pathological wastes are the tissues, body parts, organs, and the human flesh.

Radioactive are waste that includes the solid, liquid or gas waste that is contaminated with the radioactive substance.

The pharmaceutical waste perhaps is the most dangerous waste because it includes chemicals and drugs.

Once it is accidentally spilled it might cause serious effect on our health. All these must undergo the appropriate hospital waste disposal.

The significance of hospital waste disposal must be taken in consideration since it might cause danger to our surrounding specially to our health.

If proper hospital waste disposal are not being practice in hospitals more and more people will acquire different kind of harmful disease, such as AIDS, cancer, typhoid, Hepatitis, boils, and many more.

Know the Proper Way of Hazardous Waste Disposal

The main problem that we are having right now is the climate change that has affected the entire countries in our planet.

One of the major reasons of this problem is that we lack the knowledge of how to properly dispose hazardous waste. Hazardous waste disposal is a great start in saving our environment and ourselves from any danger.

Hazardous waste disposal will vary to the type of waste that you are going to dispose, such as batteries, pesticides, paints, fluorescent tubes, and many more.

You can start making your own way in saving our planet by segregating the waste that you have in your home. Do not put in one place those that are harmful and non-dangerous waste.

Put all those harmful materials in a place far from the children, if possible recycle them.

Label the harmful and those that are not so that when the waste collector comes, he will know what are harmful from those that are not dangerous. Hazardous waste disposal for the company’s are far from the household because they releases a huge amount of hazardous waste.

To properly dispose your waste you can coordinate with some government agencies that know the rules on hazardous waste disposal.

We can lessen harmful waste by knowing those that can still be used to the process of recycling. You can always seek for some help on how to recycle these materials, but if you can’t do it ask for some assistance.

Some countries conducts training’s for hazardous waste disposal, wherein you will be thought about hazardous waste and how to get rid of it safely without causing danger to ourselves and to the environment.

Learning the proper hazardous waste disposal is a must to help saving our planet from the continuous effect of climate change.

The United States is the country producing the most household waste per capita in the world among the developed countries, without having the sorting capacities necessary to absorb them, which represents a threat for the environment.

The world produces an average of 2.1 billion tonnes of waste per year, taking into account the solid waste managed by municipalities, that is to say thrown food, plastics and various detritus, enough to fill more 820,000 Olympic swimming pools. Only 16% of the total is recycled, according to this report.

American residents and traders are by far the most likely to produce trash per person among the wealthiest countries: on average 773 kilos per year, more than three times the world average and seven times more than the Ethiopians, Ethiopia being the country that produces the least waste.

In contrast, recycling capacity in the United States is one of the poorest among developed countries, with only 35%, far behind Germany, which recycles 68% of its litter.

The report’s authors warn that China’s sudden decision in 2018 to stop accepting plastic waste from around the world, followed by other countries in Southeast Asia, may further complicate the plight of large waste-producing countries.

Some countries have decided to ban plastic products, either bags or disposable items. However, global production of plastics increased further in 2018 on a global scale, led by Asia and the United States, according to the PlasticsEurope federation.

Two subjects animate the debates of the American Congress: the question of interstate flows of municipal waste and that of the recycling of electronic waste.

Interstate municipal waste flows are today a real problem across the Atlantic. States like Pennsylvania, Virginia and Michigan are now classified as “trash states”, because of the millions of tonnes of waste they receive each year from neighboring states, which do not have sufficient treatment capacity .

For several years, professional associations and service providers in the waste sector, including the very powerful National Solid Waste Management Association (SWANA) and Carlsbad dumpster rentals, have successfully opposed any regulation aimed at limiting interstate flows.

Suddenly, some have put in place dissuasive measures, such as Pennsylvania which used the regional Trashnet program, initially intended to guarantee the technical conformity of waste trucks, to limit imports of waste.

In response to this problem, the Republican representative of Virginia, Jo Ann Davis, tabled a bill that would leave local authorities the right to prohibit the importation of waste in their constituency.

In addition, the text proposes to limit the flow of waste for all municipalities which would decide, despite everything, to authorize the import of waste into their landfills.

In a second bill, Jo Ann Davis proposes to reserve the power to regulate waste flows to states. This provision clearly goes against the ideas of industrialists in the sector who advocate the free market in waste management.

Indeed, the project aims to establish a billing system for landfill costs differentiated according to the origin of the waste (internal or external to the State), as well as a limit to the volumes imported, calculated in relation to the total landfill capacity of each State.

Another subject on the Congress agenda is the management of waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE).

In the wake of the country’s first e-waste recycling legislation, Californian Democrat representatives Mike Thompson and Louise Slaughter have proposed nationwide legislation.

The latter, which was already rejected in 2002 and 2003, proposes that the EPA be the official authority, responsible for designating all electronic devices (computers, televisions, monitors, etc.) to which would be imposed a surcharge of 10 dollars to the purchase, which would finance the recycling of WEEE.

If this text is likely to be again rejected by the Republicans, on the other hand, the project presented by the senators Ron Wyden, democrat of Oregon, and Jim Talent, republican of Missouri is likely to be adopted.

This regulation proposes the creation of a national infrastructure for recycling electronic waste, responsible for ensuring that no device equipped with a screen of more than 10 centimeters can be landfilled or incinerated.

In addition, recycling units processing more than 5,000 screens or computers per year could benefit from a tax credit of $ 8 per recycled unit.

Finally, consumers who send used computers or televisions for recycling to approved service providers would benefit from a $ 15 tax deduction per unit.

However, according to the economic mission of Houston, this particularly ambitious bill seems difficult to apply in the state, because of the significant cost of the tax benefits it provides. The EPA, which is currently assessing the feasibility of such a project through a cost-benefit study, should provide further clarification.

Every second, 100 tonnes of waste from billions produced each year ends up at sea, a large part of which is made of plastic.

Some people call this the seventh continent, what a shame! Floating debris and or microparticles, this plastic waste is deposited on the beaches, dispersed at sea, found on the seabed. What effects do they have on humans and their environment?

Dispersal of this wasted plastic at sea has become a global problem for everyone. While polyvinyl chloride has a higher density than seawater and sinks immediately, the low density polyethylene microdebris remains on the surface.

It is estimated that 30 to 40,000 tonnes of microplastics float on the oceans and can travel long distances, sometimes thousands of kilometers from one continent to another, depending on currents, winds and tides.

A study carried out in 2014 estimated that, in total the entire pollution of the surface of the oceans is estimated at 5.250 billion particles, or 269,000 tonnes of plastics. It revealed that plastics and microplastics were present throughout the global ocean, anywhere and at any depth or any latitude.

Microplastics

In the early 2000s, alerts were launched by Greenpeace and other environmental organizations after the discovery of areas of accumulation of floating plastic waste, what some call the seventh continent.

For some experts, it is an abuse of language. The North Atlantic area, best known to scientists, reports only 1,100 tonnes of microplastics. In the North Pacific, the presence of microplastics is estimated at a few cm2 per hectare.

Plastic accumulation areas in the Mediterranean

There are however areas of accumulation, as in the Mediterranean, an area more exposed to marine litter due to its weak currents and tides, and significant urbanization and tourism.

Plastics there represent 70 to 80% of the waste observed on the coast, on the surface and on the seabed, with notable differences according to the zones: in certain gulfs of North Africa for example, fishermen manage to fish 50% waste and 50% fish! A clean sea, is it mission impossible? Maybe! People need to understand about litter at sea, and they may pollute less, while in the Gulf of Lion, they note a drop of 20 %.

In reality no study is currently complete enough to give answers on the global quantities of microplastics floating at sea in the world or of macro-waste on beaches or the seabed.

The densities on the bottom vary from 0 to 150,000 objects per km2 and the densities of microplastics vary on the surface from 0 to 900,000 objects per km2. The in situ degradation rates, estimated in the laboratory, are also poorly known.

And there is still a lot to discover on the accumulation of waste in abyssal pits where their degradation time is all the longer as there is a lack of light and oxygen.

it is sad to see how human development has led to such degradation of our seas, which after all are the cradle of life. We must stop this growth of plastic pollution before it is too late and the damage created by all this waste becomes irreversible.

Whether for individuals, businesses or communities, the maintenance of green spaces (gardens, parks, roadsides, etc.) produces a certain amount of plant waste called green waste.

100% biodegradable, this waste can still be cumbersome, so we have to find a way to eliminate it, if possible by exploiting the organic matter it contains.

Part of the waste can be left on site if it is not too large and the aesthetic aspect is not essential. They will then decompose gradually by providing shelter for the animals, feeding the fauna of the decomposers and then enriching the soil with organic matter.

If the volumes are larger, it is possible to compost the waste by gathering it in a heap in a corner or, if the region is suitable (weather conditions, absence of fire risk …), to burn it . The ash obtained, rich in mineral elements, forms a very good supplement for crops.

If it is not possible to compost or burn the waste on site (lack of space, authorization, too large volume), there are the recycling centers. There, green waste is recovered by composting, transformation into biogas or combustion.

Biodegradable, compostable, recyclable: the differences

In our daily life, what waste goes to the trash, to compost or to recycling?

What is biodegradable, compostable and recyclable waste?

The terms biodegradable, compostable and recyclable are sometimes used incorrectly. Sometimes also, by marketing experts, in order to sell us one product rather than another. What does biodegradable mean?

The term biodegradable applies to a product – organic matter – likely to decompose, in a favorable environment (conditions of temperature, humidity, light, oxygen, etc.) and under the action microorganisms (bacteria, fungi, algae). A biodegradable product decomposes without harmful effect on the environment. In doing so, it emits in particular water, carbon dioxide (C02) and or methane (CH4). So a banana simply left in the open degrades quickly. In an inert atmosphere, however, it keeps very well.

Another important criterion is time. Because for a product to deserve the qualifier of biodegradable, it is considered that its degradation must occur in a short time, with regard to human time. A dead leaf is thus biodegradable because it decomposes in a few weeks. A plastic bottle is considered non-biodegradable because it takes more than 400 years to decompose.

In the building, bio-based materials (wood, hemp, straw, etc.) are used, but these may have been processed and contain additives which make them non-biodegradable products.

In addition, note that a bio-based product – plastics in particular – is not necessarily biodegradable. Even if it is composed of generally vegetable substances, it can indeed contain non-biodegradable components. When we talk about biodegradation, we are looking at the end of life of a product. And when we talk about bio-sourcing, we are interested in the origin of materials.

Finally, be aware that ecosystems have a limited capacity to absorb biodegradable products. So even biodegradable materials can cause them damage if they are in too large quantities (eutrophication of the oceans).

Compostable and recyclable for new use

A compostable product is also biodegradable. But it is generally a product which is helped to decompose in an industrial unit. This is generally done at temperatures between 70 and 80 ° C, with a humidity level around 70% and an oxygen level of around 20%. After several weeks of (bio) degradation, we obtain a product, compost, allowing the improvement of soil fertility.

Note that in homemade composers, degradation is generally slower, because conditions, temperature and humidity in particular, vary with weather conditions.

Finally, a product is qualified as recyclable when it can, at the end of its life, be reintroduced into the production cycle in place of part or all of the new raw material, in principle useful for making a product. Glass is therefore typically not considered to be biodegradable. It is not compostable. However, glass is recyclable. As for whether it is recycled well in all circumstances, this is another question!