Little trash, big trash

                We’ve learned all too well that the fruits of modern science and technology have a way of turning into trash—replaced by improved versions, just worn out or made obsolete by new inventions. We’ve also become used to clever disposable devices such as medical inhalers and men’s shavers, that involve complex packaging not easily recycled.  Some discarded stuff, pitched from car windows or blown off the tops of garbage trucks, is an affront to the senses, but it can be picked up eventually.  More insidiously, huge quantities of plastic waste pass through water treatment plants and trash burners, and in various ways get mismanaged.  They are eventually ground into tiny pieces, referred to as microplastics. They’re everywhere: in the oceans, freshwater and terrestrial environments.  In the oceans they are found in every marine species at every level of the food chain, from the ocean’s surface to its floor, pole to pole.  Most water systems are also contaminated with medications and industrial chemicals that zip right through municipal water treatment plants.  So there’s room for a lot of worry about the world of what we might call “little trash”, and not so many bright ideas for how to deal with the problem.

“Little trash” is a collection of serious challenges. In this blog, though, I want to talk about “big trash”: TV sets, laptop computers, cell phones and the like. All such devices contain a lot of metals: lead, cadmium, gold. It would be nice if all such devices were recycled, to recover metals that are actually valuable in their own right, but that could someday find their way into our environment as toxins if simply pitched into landfills. Separating the valuable components from one another and from the metallic chasses and plastic frames is not easy. Many companies accept old products and do the work of separation, but sadly, only about 10 percent of the gold in such devices is actually recovered.  Landfilling is easier—let’s get that new laptop out of the box!

Then there's "big trash", the flood of waste disposal of old renewable energy devices, such as solar panels, batteries from hybrid and electric cars, and old wind energy machines. Renewable energy devices have a limited lifetime. If we can’t recycle them, or if it’s too energy-demanding to do so, we will not have advanced toward truly carbon-free energy production.  Consider the wind turbines seen in increasing numbers across the landscape. Wind energy is a rapidly growing segment of the world’s energy mix. The European Union projects that wind will provide about 14% of total energy by 2020. Let's look at what one of these wind machines involves.  GE has a model that generates up to 1.5 megawatt of electricity.  As you can see from the opening photo, the blades on this monster are big: 116 ft in length, they weigh several tons each.  With each new model they’re getting bigger.  The blades of the current GE model are composed of a glass fiber and polymer blend, with perhaps other materials included, designed to give maximum strength and durability.  The blades are expected to last for 20 to 25 years.  Taking down and putting up, transportation across distances and assembly into a working whole, are major projects.  (There’s also the matter of the gigantic base needed to support a single wind tower.  Fortunately, that should not wear out, so it doesn’t present a recycling challenge.)

Disposal of the old, turbine blades will in time become a big problem. The wind power industry added more than 8,200 megawatts (MW) of capacity in 2016.  It now supplies more than 6 percent of U.S. electricity. Various means might be employed to recycle turbine blades as they wear out.  There are no easy solutions, and all of the possibilities require energy.  But the problem is being worked on.  As so often happens in such situations, inventive people turn challenges into new possibilities.  Let’s hope that creative solutions are found for recycling solar panels and electronics.

 Because recycling has such profound consequences for the health of living systems, governments of the industrialized nations should be concerned about all of this. Where is the US EPA on this topic?  Judging from what I’ve been reading lately, the director of the EPA is likely to be sitting in a sound-proof booth, the better not to hear of such vexing matters.  Burning more coal or natural gas is, of course, no solution, but it goes down well with the base.  Ironically, those folks are the ones who stand to suffer most from inaction on the environmental front.