Realizing the Emerging Importance of Recycling Essay

Introduction

All of us may not be aware of it, but the world is throwing away 2 billion tons trash each year. These numbers were taken from Martin Medina’s recent article (Sept.-Oct. 2008) and he added that although recycling programs are already implemented in some parts of the world, heaps are still “piling up in rapidly growing countries like China and India” (Medina 40). Another important fact Medina revealed is that China is now the world’s top garbage producer as it overtook the United States in 2004. Although Americans are recycling double of what they recycled 20 years ago, the efforts are still not enough since almost half of our trash still ends up in landfills (See Table 1).

Table 1. Surveying the Outcome of Trash in Some Countries (Medina 2008, p. 40)

Main body

With this, Brain (Feb 9, 2008) enumerated that we should think of “things that end up in a landfill — stuff like diapers, strong cleaning solutions, paint, rusting metal, motor oil, corroding batteries, electronic components covered in lead and all sorts of other nasty stuff” when combined with rainfall — naturally, these wastes will percolate “through the trash to hurry these chemicals along” to poison our water resources. Also, surveying the data of where the trash end up around the world in Table 1, we can see that maximum number of trash goes to landfills and where space is a problem, incineration is the option (like in Japan). Both landfills and incineration are not quite good for our environment because these can produce greenhouse gases that promote global warming (Lombardi and Platt, August 2008). With the current population of the United States at 305 million, our trash grows and grows exponentially until there is something done to minimize the amount of garbage we take out of our homes. As citizens, it is only right that we do something to curb the burgeoning garbage problem until other multitudes of problems arise from it. Thus, recycling will not only be a solution to an alarming garbage problem, but it is also an easy way to help save energy and conserve resources.

Apart from just getting alarmed about the trash numbers, there are things we can do in order to lessen the amount of garbage we take out of our homes. For example, in our homes, schools and workplaces, electricity is a crucial source of energy to make some of our tools work to help us with our current digital lifestyle. From our cars, laptops, hearing aids, calculators and cellular phones, all these things require that portable electricity that flows from batteries. When there are power interruptions, batteries are used to rev up commuter trains, hospital facilities and military operations. However, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (20 December 2007) reported that “Americans use nearly 3 billion dry-cell batteries every year to power radios, toys, cellular phones, watches, laptop computers, and portable power tools”. The usefulness of batteries in our current lifestyle is undeniably clear. But what is critical is how we get rid of these batteries when they are no longer useful. These batteries contain harmful chemicals that, when improperly disposed, could deleteriously affect our environment. These batteries can contain poisonous cadmium, lead, and sulfuric acid that can seep into our landfills and released into the ocean where it can kill sea creatures. When sea creatures have an intake of these substances, humans and other animals that consume seafood are also at risk.

Millstone confirmed that the biggest use of lead worldwide is for the lead-acid battery that used in most cars and vehicles. Lead is particularly suitable for batteries, because of its characteristics (conductivity, resistance to corrosion and the special reversible reaction between lead oxide and sulfuric acid). When lead-acid batteries are not disposed properly, lead does not break down over time and, in some places, large amounts of it remain in the air, soil and water. Lead poisoning can affect fetuses and children under age 7 because their nervous systems are still developing and because their body mass is so small that they ingest and absorb more lead per pound than adults. Even 10 micrograms (millionths of a gram) of lead per deciliter of blood—the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) standard for lead poisoning—can kill a child’s brain cells and cause poor concentration, reduced short-term memory, slower reaction times, and learning disabilities (Millstone 15). On the other hand, adults exposed to low levels of lead (which once were thought to be safe) may develop headaches, high blood pressure, irritability, tremors, and insomnia. Health effects increase with exposure to higher levels and include anemia, stomach pain, vomiting, diarrhea, and constipation. Long-term exposure can impair fertility and damage the kidneys. Workers exposed to lead may become sterile or suffer irreversible kidney disease, damage to their central nervous system, stillbirths, or miscarriages (Millstone, p. 18).

On the other hand, sulfuric acid on lead-acid batteries can also be detrimental to our environment. Beyond what we know, sulfuric acid can mix with groundwater and soil causing these to become acidic and harmful to plants and wildlife. Commonly known as “acid rain”, sulfuric acid triggers acid deposition that “adversely affected lakes and forests in the northeastern United States, Canada, and Europe”. Due to the “gradual leaching of soil nutrients from sustained acid deposition”, forests and wildlife are even affected with “potential risk depends on numerous factors, including rate of cation (positively charged ion) deposition, soil cation reserves, age of forest, weathering rates, species composition, and disturbance history” (Lippmann, p. 18).

With the onset of concern towards the harmful components of batteries, the Universal Waste Rule, an amendment to the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) was initiated by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 1995 in order to reduce some of the “administrative and financial barriers to collection and recycling of batteries and other potentially hazardous household products” (Ford-Martin, p. 114). The intention of such program is to make “recycling of lead batteries easier and more profitable to recycle would lead to more extensive recycling programs. The rule streamlined the regulatory process for businesses and excluded rechargeable batteries from hazardous waste handling requirements. However, individual states had the final determination over whether or not to adopt the amendment” (Ford-Martin, p. 114).

In recycling lead acid batteries, the process is very similar to the primary lead production process. The main differences are in material preparation before reduction, which affects plant size, since there is no need for sintering. The recycling sequential steps normally are the separation of the plastic case (using hammers or saws), acid removal, separation of the plastic, metallic lead and paste separation, reduction, refining and casting. Acid, polypropylene and lead are recovered in the recycling process (Espinosa et al. 313). Fact is that there are many organizations that can help people dispose their batteries, like Rechargeable Battery Recycling Corporation (RBRC). People can just call their hotline or find a recycling location convenient to them and the RBRC will take care of their waste batteries.

Conclusion

Although battery recycling is just one step of the ladder we have to go through in order to minimize the wastes we make each year, we can still do numerous other things in our homes by recycling things properly rather than putting these materials in a trash bin. By simply separating our trash into biodegradable and non-biodegradable, it will be a great help to reduce our trash. We can sell bottles, newspapers and metal trash to junk shops and we can actually have extra money out of our trash. As the world’s resources are diminished, recycling is not only environment-friendly but it can also produce primary raw materials that can be used for other things. To recycle and reuse waste to the maximum possible extent should not only be promoted in batteries, but to other things as well. In reducing the quantity of unrecoverable waste and disposing toxic wastes as safely as possible, it can benefit people more in a proactive way and we can save our natural resources sustainably so that our children may still enjoy these in the future.

Works Cited

1. Brain, Marshall. “A Lot of Technology Goes into a Making a Landfill”, Tribune – Review/Pittsburgh Tribune – Review, [Greensburg, Pa.]. 2008, ProQuest Newsstand. ProQuest.
2. Espinosa, Romano, Crocce, Denise, Moura, Bernardes Andrea and Tenorio, Jorge Alberto Soares. An Overview on the Current Processes for the Recycling of Batteries, Journal of Power Sources, 135.1-2(2004): 311-319.
3. Ford-Martin, Paula Anne. Battery Recycling. In Bortman, Marci, Brimblecombe, Peter, Cunningham, Mary Ann, Cunningham, William P., and Freedman, William (eds.), Environmental Encyclopedia, vol 1 (3^rd Ed.). Farmington Hills, MI: Gale, 2003. pp. 114-115.
4. Lippmann, Morton. “Acid Rain”. In Breslow, Walter (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Public Health, vol. 1. New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2002. pp. 15-16.
5. Lombardi, Eric and Platt, Brenda. “Stop Trashing the Climate”, Biocycle – Advancing Composting, Organics Recycling & Renewable Energy (2008).
6. Medina, Martin. “Talking Trash (PRIME NUMBERS).” Foreign Policy 168 (2008): 40-41.
7. Millstone, Erik. Lead and Public Health: The Dangers for Children. Philadelphia, PA: Taylor & Francis, Inc., 1997.
8. US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Batteries, (2007).