There is no such thing as garbage, only wasted resources.
All carbon based waste is a potential source of energy, through biogas, waste to oil, gasification or turning it into briquettes to burn in an improved cook stove or heater.
Sewage is a source of nutrients, and treating it as merely a disposal problem misses an important opportunity. After the energy is extracted with a biogas digester, the sludge can be used (with suitable precautions) in agriculture. Composting toilets are another solution, which produce a greater bulk of rich compost compared to the biogas digester, but do not produce energy.
Municipal waste is typically a mess of all kinds of resources:
- food waste that can be composted. This requires education (starting in schools) and a cultural shift.
- plastic, glass and metal that cannot be recycled, due to soiling, or being the wrong type.[1]
- plastics of the wrong type which cannot be recycled - there are processes for converting such materials into second-grade material to make useful products.
- miscellaneous items, e.g. items soiled with food.[2]
- In future it may be practical to use paper and plastic items soiled with food in a waste to energy incinerator(SWERF - Solid Waste Energy REcycling Facility).
Industrial ecology
Industrial ecology is a practice of no waste in industry - every output is used in some way, rather than being allowed to waste.
Notes
- ↑ **In future we can expect the use of bioplastics, which can be more safely recycled, composted or used in a waste to energy process.
- ↑ Is there a simple can the householder can tell what is suitable for recycling and what isn't? A guide to household recycling, with pictures and authoritative information, would be very helpful.[expansion needed]