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Orion Martin ’11 writes again, and this time discusses plastic-related policy in Burma, Australia, and Bangladesh. If recycling alone isn’t a long-term solution to over-consumption of plastic, what is being done to encourage people to cut back?
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For my Buddhism and Ecology class at Carleton, I recently went on a field trip to see the Rice County Solid Waste Facility. The facility, which consists of a landfill, recycling center, and hazardous waste center, is where Carleton ships all of its leftovers once compost and recyclables are removed. In the spirit of understanding the consequences of our actions, we headed out in vans to see for ourselves where our trash is kept. The facility sits on 320-340 acres of land located next to the Cannon Valley Wilderness Area near Faribault, MN. The large mounds of uncapped trash attract lots of wildlife including eagles, turkey buzzards, deer, coyotes, and hawks. Because decomposition in a landfill is so slow, there are always items of food for animals to pick over at the site. To give us a sense of the timescale for decomposition, an employee showed us newspaper clippings from the 1970s which had been pulled out of one of the trash cells. Despite having been in the landfill for almost 40 years, the newspaper was in mint condition, only slightly yellow in color. Newspapers are a good indicator of how fast trash items are breaking down because they decompose more rapidly than most trash items, especially plastics.
As we sat and watched large bulldozers crush the trash to reduce air space, we discussed the challenges they encounter at the facility in processing Carleton’s trash. I was surprised to hear the response.