Newspapers are in your refrigerator

If you can read this, thank a recycling truck. This newspaper is printed on recycled paper.

Printing for the nation's average daily newspaper circulation would require about 500,000 trees, so the industry's heavy emphasis on recycling saves a forest or two. In 1989, the newspaper recycling rate was 35 percent; today more than double that number are recycled. The recycled content of newsprint per issue has also gone up from a nationwide ceiling of 10 percent to more than 30 percent.

Newspapers are all around you. Check out your egg carton; odds are good it was made from old newspapers. Other products from recycled news include cereal boxes, grocery bags, tissue paper, and insulation materials.

Each year about one billion trees' worth of paper of all types is thrown away. Paper and cardboard account for around 70 percent of landfill content. For each ton of paper recycled, 3.3 cubic yards of landfill are spared. It took nearly two dozen trees to produce the same ton.

Monday's Press reported the expansion of curbside recycling. As consistently as north Idaho is growing, that's good news for land use, eyesores, and environmental health (resource conservation and air pollution). Not to mention feeling good about wasting less.

The recycling process itself is better for the environment. Producing new paper from raw materials causes 73 percent more air pollution than does recycling.

So if all this is so great, why must residents pay $2 more to recycle? Isn't it resold for profit? And speaking of paying, is it true that it takes more energy to recycle than produce?

Curbside recycling is a service. Rather than hauling recyclables to schools and other drop-off locations, residents pay for convenience. Profit margins vary by product (plastics - little; aluminum - highest), oil/energy prices, and geography. Recycling indeed costs money (more cost-efficient with higher populations), but so do waste incinerators, transfer, and storage. The amount of refuse diverted from landfills doubled from 1990 to 2003.

To answer the energy question, it depends on the product. Plastic recycling is more energy-intensive and pollutes more than paper, although the overall energy use and greenhouse gas emissions for all recycling is still less than original production, especially when raw materials transport is factored in. Recycling also produces jobs, always a precious resource.

Sources: Recyclingfacts.org, Epa.gov, Naa.org

Sholeh Patrick is a columnist for the Hagadone News Network. [email protected]