Well, we missed another “holiday,” this time being America Recycles Day.  It was Saturday.  Now, treehugger thinks this is a (explitive deleted) holiday, and we should make November 15 Zero Waste Day.  Part of the reasoning is that America Recycles Day is brought to you by the fine people that make things that are put in recyclable despensers: Coke, Bud, Coors, the bottled water industry, and so forth.  It seems also that they’re not too happy with the fact that recycling is a transfer of responsibility from corporations to taxpayers. But what they fail to realize are these very impressive and completely false facts about recycling:

–Every time you say “I don’t believe in recycling,” a fairy dies.

–Did you know that the energy saved from recycling just one can is enough to power the sun for fifty years?

–Recycling comes from the Latin, “recyclicaie,” which means “to be way sexy.”

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A crew for the CBS investigative journalism program 60 Minutes was roughed up at a Chinese electronic waste site. 60 Minutes correspondent Scott Pelley and his crew were in the Middle Kingdom to trace the illegal black market electronic waste in the world’s most populous country. Upon entering a facility in Guiyu, on the south coast of China, the crew was attacked by a gang of workers who attempted to take their cameras. The crew managed to escape and brought back footage of the incident to air on CBS this week.

The workers at the facility had reason to want to take the cameras as their activities are highly illegal even in the loosely regulated world of Chinese industry. Improper dismantling of e-waste for the black market, as was being done in Guiyu, produces some of the most harmful pollutants known to man. The City of Guiyu is afflicted with some of the highest levels of cancer causing agents on Earth while pregnancies there are 6 times more likely than normal to result in miscarriage and 7 out of 10 children have too much lead in their blood.

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The Democratic National Convention starts tonight, so put your party hats on and your plastic bottles and beverage cans in the recycling containers and biodegradable bags provided by Coca-Cola, ’cause they’re in charge of clean up. In addition to collecting bottles and cans from all Convention venues, the Cola King will be using energy efficient coolers, and delivering beverages to  Convention locations in hybrid electric delivery trucks. Here’s more from the press release —>

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Over 7 billion Pepsi cans will be printed with recycling factoids as part of their “Have we met before?” campaign to inform drinkers that the can they’re using has been made from 40% recycled aluminum, and to encourage them to recycle their empties.

Our research tells us that most people recycle, when they remember, said Kate Krebs, executive director of the National Recycling Coalition.

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