Recology

Every morning, I wake up to the hum of the daily news on the radio. These days most of the reporting is on the weak Euro, unemployment across the country, the BP oil spill, or public opinion.

This morning, I woke up to this,  San Francisco teacher Stephen Lavezzo, talking on KQED about his growing passion for sustainability. The key to his conversion to a pro-”green” perspective, he said, was a visit to Recology’s transfer station (aka the Dump). The transfer station tours provide a perspective on what most Americans rarely see: where their trash goes each and every day.

The average American produce between 5 and 7 pounds of trash each and every day. Most of it is not recycled. The discards of a culture that emphasizes consumption of new things almost always find their way into a landfill. A visit to the dump puts it all into a humbling, shame-inducing perspective.

The first time I saw “the pit” where all of the landfill-bound garbage goes, a deep sense of purpose ricocheted through my body. And like Stephen Lavezzo, I decided to educate the people in my life about Recology. What’s also impressive about the transfer station is how much work is done to keep materials out of the pit, including collecting organics like yard clippings and food scraps, for composting. San Francisco has the highest landfill diversion rate in the country.

This morning, as I made my way to the office, a Recology recycling truck, powered by natural gas, passed me on the street. As it did, I felt a renewed sense of pride in the hard work we do diverting recoverable materials, like organics, plastics, clothing, and metal from landfills.