Richmond County Daily Journal (Rockingham, NC)
August 19, 2007
Reduce, reuse, recycle
the Richmond County Daily Journal Editorial Board
No one wants to be dumped on. It's a message that everyone can
embrace. That's why last week's visit by Lois Gibbs and the Don't
Dump on Us: Keep North Carolina Healthy Tour was welcomed.
Who wants to follow in the footsteps of a place like Love Canal
and its toxic waste dump leaving a waste land of unusable
property? No one does.
The tour wasn't about toxic waste sites, rather it was rallying
support against mega dumps in places like Richmond. The
environmental group SOAR - Save Our Abundant Resources - was
front and center at the rally.
A mega dump here appears to be off the table. County officials
say they aren't talking about one. Waste companies once
interested in Richmond have looked at sites in Scotland County.
Landfills are a necessity in our society. People create waste
from virtually every activity from cooking dinner - packaging
like plastic, cardboard and styrofoam - to getting ready for
"back to school" supplies with excessive packaging,
too.
Environmentalists like SOAR's Svea Strong recognizes the trash we
create needs to go somewhere. While opposing a mega dump, she
supports a smaller landfill sited inside the county. She
advocates more recycling.
Currently the county's waste is dumped in a Montgomery County
landfill. Richmond residents toss everything into the same bin
and all the recycled material is supposed to be removed. The
county's last recycling report to the state showed 25 pounds of
waste per person is recycled. That's not very much.
Some want a landfill and some don't. To really fight the issue,
residents must look at their individual household waste stream
and consider ways to reduce it.
Do you buy cereal in a box or in a bag? Do you buy individually
packaged items or items in bulk? Do you consider buying items
with less cardboard or plastic packaging? Do you recycle your
cell phone or printer cartridges? Do you fix your broken TV or
DVD player?
One challenge to many families is the cost of being green.
A hybrid vehicle may cost double the cost of a non-hybrid vehicle
with the same gas mileage. It may be cheaper to buy a new TV or
DVD player than get the broken one fixed. It may be cheaper to
buy the regular dishwashing detergent than the more
environmentally-friendly brand. New paper may be cheaper than
recycled paper.
While some ideas to recycle may be impractical for families, some
are pretty simple such as saying no to plastic bags when
shopping.
To really fight the landfill issue, each citizen needs to find
ways to reduce, reuse and recycle. It doesn't require action by
an elected official, it requires a lifestyle change by
individuals. If more people took steps to reduce his or her
waste, no one would even have to talk about landfills.
________________________________
Copyright, 2007, Richmond County Daily Journal (Rockingham, NC)
Heartland Publications, LLC All Rights Reserved.
http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Archives?
p_action=doc&p_docid=11B251E4DB199B58&p_docnum=1
Fair Use Notice: This page contains copyrighted
material the use of which has not always been specifically
authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material
available in our efforts to advance understanding of
environmental issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a 'fair
use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section
107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C.
Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without
profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving
the included information for research and educational purposes.
For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml.
If you wish to use copyrighted material from this page for
purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain
permission from the copyright owner.