Reva McAulay
MHC 200 Weekly Writeup #4
10.1.12
Learning about the history of New York City’s waste was oddly enough the hands down coolest thing we’ve learned about so far. There were so many weird historical events that could be seen in the trash records, not to mention the amusing idea that somebody has been keeping quite detailed records of what New Yorkers throw out for an absurdly long period of time.
The experiment about the air quality was also very interesting. It shows how the results of a study can be so unexpected, considering that it seemed to be aimed towards comparing the air quality of two different neighborhoods but instead discovered that subways put dangerous steel dust in the air. I can’t say I’m outraged either, this is not a case of blatant disregard for environmental consequences or government regulations like the Exxon Mobil thing. Steel dust coming from steel on steel friction while braking is not exactly a crazy idea, nor is the idea that said steel dust would make its way into people’s lungs. It’s impossible to eliminate pollution, and the MTA is only polluting subway tunnels, so only people who choose to take the subway are affected. It’s just one of the risks inherent in every life activity, like the risk of getting hearing damage from the loud noises or falling off a platform. If people care enough to kick up a fuss, the MTA will undoubtedly fix it, albeit probably in the cheapest and easiest manner even if it is less effective or flawed. My guess though, is that, like the hearing damage, even if people knew they wouldn’t so much as pay a few bucks or take a few delays to get it fixed.
With a little bit of digging I was able to come up with some anecdotal information about the old-school soda bottles that had a deposit from the bottling company to encourage consumers to return the bottles so they could be washed and reused. Apparently using plastic bottles and aluminum cans is cheaper, which is a shame since they are not reusable and often not recycled either. The voluntary recycling of glass bottles paid 2 cents on a 5-cent bottle. (http://voices.yahoo.com/coca-cola-cost-then-now-7162898.html?cat=37). When the first deposit law was passed in 1972, a six pack of Coke cans cost $0.69. That’s eleven and a half cents per can, meaning a five cent deposit would get you back close to half the cost of the soda.
Obviously, the deposit carries a lot more weight when its half the price of a beverage rather then a tenth or 1/20 of the price. The additional fact that Michigan, of the ten-cent bottle deposits, has a near 100% recycling rate (compared to New York’s 75%, http://www.bottlebill.org/about/benefits/waste.htm) indicates that lawmakers should consider upping the deposit. Not to mention putting in deposits in the 39 states that don’t have any at all. On the plus side, New York added water and non-carbonated drinks to the deposit bill in 2009 in spite of stores complaining about having to accept cans, and bottles and drink companies complaining that the deposit raised prices and would reduce sales.
In the meantime, at least the mayor excluded incineration from the list of possible new waste-to-energy propositions, so we don’t have to worry about ending up in a Detroit-like situation. Because basically every goal of the city is to avoid being like Detroit in any way. But that still leaves somebody to figure out a cost-effective way to turn garbage into energy, one that is preferably still cost-effective after recycling and composting remove lots of NYC’s garbage.
