Local resident Les Platt, who has extensive experience promoting recycling and creating opportunities for re-use, is working with BU students to explore new possibilities for the Southern Tier and solve the unequal marketing problems for recycled materials and used products. According to Platt, “The overall goal here is to get as many people as possible studying different aspects of recycling, the obstacles to them, and possible solutions. The ultimate goal is to create realistic cost effective jobs at all levels, from basic labor through management. In the process we will become acquainted with the hundreds of business and professional opportunities available.”
Recycling is, for the most part, very popular with the general public. The more convenient a project is the more cooperative people will be. However, municipal recycling projects are usually not very cost effective for a variety of reasons. Prices of selling recycled materials is variable due to global demands. The recycling infrastructure is inadequate for a variety of practical competitive reasons. Study groups need to understand these dynamics and find productive cost effective ways of addressing them.
For instance, there are many non-profit institutions who collect clothes, household goods and furniture as a source of income to help pay for their good works. What most people don't know is that a percentage of these donated materials go to landfills because the non-profit does not have markets for all of them or because they need repairs that the institution is not set up to deal with.
Most people are also unaware that there is a national and international multi billion dollar infrastructure set up to handle these goods and their constituent materials. One aspect of recycling that is seldom mentioned is that recycled materials displace demand for virgin materials. Therefore there is a vested interest with virgin materials producers to resist using recycled materials. Recycled materials are underpriced in most cases.
By involving both students and community members, Platt says, “I believe we can do all this by studying recycling processes, materials systems, how their accumulated, and utilized. I believe we can create incentives for these studies by setting up recycling projects or interfacing with existing ones. I also believe we can give the general public a vested interest in our activities by using fundraising mechanisms to accumulate recycled materials and create a labor force of at risk youth, ex offenders, and other marginalized people. We can adapt whatever incentives we discover to their needs and improve their chances in life.”
If you are interested in being part of this study effort, contact Les Platt at platt21@ hotmail.com or watch this space for events.
Photo: "Plastic is Forever" water fall made from plastic water bottles byt Peg Johnston and Shawna Stevenson.