I would like to take an opportunity to send a rallying cry to those inventors and entrepreneurs out there innovating new ideas to make the next fortune as embraced in the capitalist system; we need to maximize the "monetization of garbage". How many different possible ways are there to create a process where garbage is used as an input and then transferred to a valuable output? I am not an expert, but I am an economist.
In British Columbia we have a system where each time you buy a beverage in a bottle or can, you pay a tiny deposit redeemable to whoever returns that bottle or can to a recycling depot. This has created an army of people who sweep the streets of cans and bottles. I watch these people earn an income while removing garbage from my streets. It provides a value. This then gets me to thinking; wouldn't it be fantastic if all garbage were worth money? Where I could fill up a garbage bag at home and drop it off at a local depot for $5. Or I can just leave a bag at the end of my driveway and anyone can come by and pick it up and sell it. Companies could theoretically pay a fee to “harvest” landfills.
I think the most likely prospect of monetized waste is in the energy sector. I know they have blast furnaces in BC that burn waste for energy, and it drives the greens crazy. They need to figure out how to control the emissions to ensure that they are not emitting harmful chemicals in the natural environment. Was it sulfur that destroyed all plant life in Sudbury?
Anyway, I would like to encourage inventors, investors, and entrepreneurs out there to get to work on the monetization of garbage. The sooner we can do this, the better. That way next time CUPE's "fat cat" contract comes up for negotiation, we can simply say "go get a new job, we don't need you anymore"...
I love capitalism!
“We are living in a material world and I am a material girl”
-Madonna
That is happening already. There's a process called "thermolytic depolymerization" or TDP. Basically one can make anything that contains carbon (diapers, tires, nerve gas, almost anything non-meetallic that burns)and produce excellent quality crude oil. Changing World Technologies
ReplyDeletehas a demonstration plant that converts turkey offal into light sweet crude. I think this could work really well for Toronto, as they ship their garbage quite a distance.
Toronto's garbage supports many empires, the last thing they want is a solution to what they consider a non-problem.
ReplyDeleteThe blue box 'recycling' program is an excellent example - expensive massive trucks damaging all these little city streets to pick up pop cans and paper that end up in a landfill just as often as not. Well all that diesel fuel isn't being burned for nothing - you need a whole bunch of unionized city workers to drive trucks and repair roads, a big bureaucracy to back that up, environmental 'consultants', contracts for new equipment, more bureaucrats to extract taxes from the people receiving the 'service'... etc. etc.
Yet people in Toronto, having never been to Canada, don't seem to realize how much room is out there - we could do landfills for centuries, and why not since Toronto's garbage goes straight to landfill right now anyhow.
ps. You have a great idea.