On September 15th, DONT MAKE WASTE BANDERA celebrated the efforts of 41 recycle program volunteers and their guests at the Bandera Brewery backyard with food by Sue’s Taco Catering, drinks, door prizes and gifts.
The event, coordinated by Janus Olive and the DMWB board, was sponsored by H-E-B corporation, Keep Texas Recycling of Keep Texas Beautiful, and individual donors Carolyn and Jody Rutherford to show their appreciation of the volunteers’ efforts to rejuvenate Bandera County recycling.
Commercial Trash Collector Cooperation Commercial trash collection companies also cooperate with the county’s recycling effort. Diane Payne, in attendance at the volunteer appreciation event, had this to say: Shout out to Mike Miller, owner and operator of Our Community Waste Management Services, who goes above and beyond for our county. Not only does he collect residential trash, he recycles as well. Our Community collects, sorts and delivers corrugated cardboard, #1 plastic bottles and aluminum cans to the Bandera Recycling Center (DMWB) each week and takes other recyclable items (glass, paper, magazines, books, and #2-7 plastics, aluminum foil and plastic bags) to Comal County’s larger facility. We at Hill Country Reduce Reuse Recycle Project appreciate Mr. Miller’s efforts in
reducing landfill waste.
What About Plastics?
In June of 2018 National Geographic published 50 pages of photos of plastic waste after traversing the globe and its oceans in search of where all the plastics have gone.
Their report noted that plastics were invented in the late 19th Century, but production only took off in the middle of the 20th Century. Plastics were made from the same stuff that was giving us plenty of cheap energy: petroleum.
Production of plastics worldwide increased exponentially from 2.3 million tons annually in 1950 to 162 million in 1993 and 448 million in 2015.
As much as 40 percent of it was disposable and the increase of plastic production has far outstripped the ability of waste management to keep up. So, what’s the solution to plastic pollution?
In a Trash Talk column on May 1, 2024, I agreed with the Center for Climate Integrity, “The Fraud of Plastic Recycling,” when they argued that the majority of plastics cannot be recycled. So, how do we at least manage this problem of plastic waste that is rapidly threatening to endanger hundreds of species of aquatic life?
Single-use plastics— plastic plates and polystyrene food and beverage containers, bottles, straws, cups, cutlery and disposable plastic bags—are cheap to manufacture and a mounting pollution problem for our oceans and the global landscape.
We now have the perfect storm for plastic pollution: the expanded use of disposable plastic packaging in the growing economies of Asia, especially during the global pandemic, following China’s decision in 2018 to stop buying half of the world’s recyclable plastic.
“Biodegradable plastics” have been around since the late 1980s, but they have not lived up to their promise to provide a solution. My family ordered biodegradable bags for our home composter, only to find they would not break down and we were pulling them out at planting time.
We later learned that it would take 130 degrees in an industrial composter to break them down. Further research reveals that use of the label “biodegradable” may actually encourage littering.
Since plastic pollution is a global problem, it will need a worldwide solution on the scale of the international climate accord. But at the individual level, we can begin to change the throw-away culture into one which supports a “circular economy” by reducing, reusing and recycling.
What Can You Do?
We can each play a small part in helping recycling fulfill its promise of managing waste by volunteering to work in this “circular economy.” Most of these are neither difficult nor inconvenient: Give up:
• plastic bags: instead, bring your own cloth bags or ask for paper at the grocery store; collect and deliver your recyclables in reusable bins or cardboard boxes;
• straws: Americans use over 500 million plastic straws every day;
• plastic bottles: use a refillable water bottle instead;
• plastic packaging:
buy in bulk instead of pre-wrapped;
• plastic plates and cups.
Recycle: for certain types of plastics, recycling makes sense since they can be melted down and reformed to extend useful life. Bandera County’s plastic recycling at this time is limited to #1 plastic bottles (polyethylene terephthalate or PET), which can be easily handled and sold to recyclers.
Getting people to recycle may take some ingenuity. One solution to recycling plastic bottles was worked out in Norway, which recycles 97 percent of them.
They provided machines in most supermarkets that ingest bottles and spit out refunds as high as 32 cents per bottle.
Recycling is only one small part of the larger solution to waste management on the roads, in the yards, in the river and the landscape.
To begin the conversation on waste management in our county, invite DMWB to speak to your group on the scope of the problem and what is being done by various groups to help solve it. Contact us by email: dontmakewastebandera@ gmail.com.
