Hey, everybody – Philipp here, and today we’re going to talk about what happens to the recyclable materials that you put out with your trash every week. For most of the country, that means one bin, in which all the recyclables get comingled. The truck comes by, loads the contents…
Hey, folks, it’s Philipp, and we’re talkin’ trash. This week’s episode concerns an important but often overlooked element of solid waste management: the myths and realities of recycling. Recycling is one of the central elements in the quest for a circular economy, and it has a significant impact today. According…
Hey, its Philipp again, with the next installment of Talkin’ Trash. In the last episode, we saw that the landfill industry is becoming more privatized, and more consolidated. Today we’re going to look at why that’s happening, and what it means for you. As to why it’s happening, there are…
By hiding the real costs of landfills to the public, the true value of recycling is hidden, as well as the critical gains from avoiding environmental disasters associated with releases from waste containment. Bad decisions will follow from incorrect price signals to public decision makers when the cost of prevention cannot be compared to the future costs of managing environmental calamities.
A major cause of under-pricing landfills is the failure of landfill companies or the municipalities to account for the long-term liability of existing landfills, in contravention to the most basic rules for recognizing future costs that will be incurred by failing to act prophylactically today.
Clearly, inclusion of these liabilities on the books as required by standard accounting practice will lead to long-term costs for cities and landfill companies and will have an adverse effect on value and stock price. Current accounting of landfills must be modified to cover generational costs. This will finally give the public realistic measures of current costs vs. future risks, including future costs and future impacts on climate change.
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Determining the real-world financial risks of the current system is absolutely necessary for the public and officials to make the choices that will govern the laws on post-closure management and liability for the next generations. It is impossible to evaluate future municipal financial health without these inclusions.
