"Buried Alive," Newsweek, November 27, 1989.
U.S. News and World Report, December 14, 1987.
"Buried Alive," Newsweek, op.cit.
Franklin Associates, "Characterization of Municipal Solid Waste in the United States, 1960-2000," prepared for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 1988.
Lynn Scarlett, "Managing America's Garbage; Alternatives and Solutions," Working Paper #115, Santa Monica, CA: The Reason Foundation, September 1989.
Council of Economic Advisers, Economic Report of the President, Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1988.
Franklin Associates, op,cit. and Allen Hershkowitz and Eugene Salerni, Garbage Management in Japan, New York: INFORM, 1987; and Federal Environment Agency (UBA), Berlin: Federal Republic of Germany, 1987.
COPPE Update, Volume 3, Number 11, November 1989, p. 4.
Facing America's Trash: What Next for Municipal Solid Waste?, Congressional Office of Technology Assessment, June 18, 1989, p. 37.
Ibid, p. 79. Figures for Australia, Bulgaria, etcs, are from less reliable UN sources.
William L. Rathje, "Rubbish", The Atlantic Monthly, December, 1989.
Wall Street Journal July 19, 1990.
Congressional Research Service, May 10, 1990, order code IB90022.
American Legislative Exchange Council, Environmental Monitor, April 6, 1990, Vol. 2, No. 5.
OTA, op.cit., pp 14, 18, 37-38.
The Solid Waste Dilemma: An Agenda for Action, Draft Report of the Municipal Solid Waste Task Force Office on Solid Waste, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, September, 1988, pp. 18 — 20.
The Congressional Office of Technology Assessment's paradigm for solid waste management does not use the term "hierarchy" on the grounds that the term implies a rigid, linear approach to decision making. OTA, op.cit., p. 3.
EPA, op.cit., p 3.
Loc.Cit. p.3.
Vera Lutz, Central Planning for the Market Economy: An Analysis of the French Theory and Experience, London: Longman, Green, 1969, p. 17.
OTA, op.cit., p 2.
Ibid, p. 3.
OTA, op.cit., p. 4.
Ibid., p. 6.
Loc.Cit., p. 6.
Ibid., p. 7.
Loc.Cit, p. 7.
Ibid., p. 6.
Ibid.,p. 18.
Ibid., p. 23.
Loc.Cit.,p.23.
Loc.Cit., p. 23.
EPA Solid Waste Task Force, op.cit., p 2, 17, 18.
"Solid and Hazardous Waste Management," James E. McCarthy, Issues Coordinator Environment and Natural Resources Policy Division, Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, May 10, 1990, p. 10.
OTA, op.cit., p 4.
Ibid, p. 12.
Ibid, p. 13.
Ibid., p. 13.
Ibid., p. 14.
Ibid., p. 17.
Ibid., p. 18.
Ibid., p. 25, note 32.
Ibid., p. 21, particularly note 30.
Ibid., p. 24.
Ibid., p. 25.
George Stigler, The Economist as Preacher and Other Essays, Chicago, III.: University of Chicago Press, 1982, p. 61.
Cynthia Pollock, Mining Urban Wastes: The Potential for Recycling, Washington, D.C.: Worldwatch Institute, 1987.
Resource Recovery: An Essential Tool for Effective Waste Management, Washington D.C.: Institute of Resource Recovery, National Solid Waste Management Association, Bulletin, 1988.
Plagued by Packaging, New York Public Interest Research Group, New York, NY: 1989.
COPPE Update, November, 1989, op. cit., p. 5.
COPPE Update, loc. cit.
William Rathje, Letter-to-the Editor, New York Times, January 26, 1988.
Rathje, "Rubbish," op.cit., p.102.
Packaging, August, 1989.
Council for Responsible Waste Incineration, 1989 Public Report.
"Buried Alive," Newsweek, op.cit., p.76.
Foodservice & Packaging Institute Society for the Plastics Industry, January 6, 1988, p. 2.
Michael Walsh, The Detroit News, December 23, 1989.
"Buried Alive," Newsweek, op.cit., p. 69.
Methods of Reducing Plastics Pollution: Report to Congress, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, April, 24, 1989.
COPPE Update, October, 1989, op.cit., pp. 1 — 2.
The New York City ordinance, introduced and debated in February, 1988, extends to all "containers", but allows exemption for packaging which has no biodegradable or recyclable equivalent. Moreover, if the requirements for meeting this ban would "Cause undue hardship the package would be exempt from ban or tax. Given the vague hints of "Let's Make a Deal" one finds in the proposed New York City packaging ban, enforcing this ban could make for interesting local-government politics.
"Buried Alive," Newsweek, op.cit., p. 76.
"Pennsylvania Town Finds a Way to Get Locals to Recycle Trash," Wall Street Journal, June 21, 1989, p.1.
The Saginaw News, November, 17, 1989.
Rathje, "Rubbish," op.cit., p. 103.
COPPE Update, January, 1990, Volume 4., Number 1., p. 6.
Detroit News, July 2, 1990.
Franklin Associates, March 1988 Report to EPA, op.cit.
Packaging, op.cit.
The demand for any input in the production process is derived from the final market's demand for the product which is produced with that input. When the quantity of a good consumers' demand shows a high degree of sensitivity to final-product price, producers' sensitivity to the relative price of production inputs will reflect that fact. However, how price sensitive the derived demand for any particular input is will depend on its relative cost in the overall production cost scheme. The smaller any particular input's relative cost is compared to total costs, the less sensitive producers will be to any change in its price. A fall in that input's price will not necessarily result in any significant increase in the amount of it demanded, and a rise in its relative price will not result in a significant decrease in the amount of it demanded. Therefore if a particular input accounts for an insignificant share of total production costs, a rise in its price will not result in a loss of quantity demanded. In that respect, sellers of "unimportant" production inputs will not suffer greatly when the price of their product rises. By the same token, the quantity demanded of the input will not greatly expand when its price falls.
It took almost three decades for the more inexpensive electric motor to replace steam driven belts and pulleys in American manufacturing. The reason? Fully depreciated steam engine and belt systems were earning "quasi-rent" for older firms: they were contributing to revenues with out simultaneously adding costs. Quickly moving to new electric engines would have forced the firms to incur massive capital outlays and depreciation costs. Only after new start-up firms began with electric motors and gained cost advantages over older firms did older firms junk their steam and belt power systems. The moral of the story? New materials or new techniques will be used only when competitive market forces compel their use, and not before. Stanley Lebergott, The Americans: An Economic History, New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1984, pp. 354-355.
COPPE Update, Volume 4, Number 1, January, 1990, p. 6.
"Buried Alive," Newsweek, op.cit., p. 71.
COOPE Update, January, 1990, op.cit., p. 6.
Issue Brief: Solid Waste Management, Congressional Research Service, Natural Resource Policy Division, August 2, 1988.
National Soft Drink Association, September 1988, as noted in Who's Responsible for This Mess, Dow Chemical Company, 1989.
Ibid., p. 6.
"Buried Alive," Newsweek, op.cit., p. 69.
Wall Street Journal, March 13, 1990.
Wall Street Journal, June 8, 1990.
COOPE Update, op.cit., January 1990, p. 6.
EPA Report to Congress on Methods for Reducing Plastics Pollution, op. cit., pp. 37-39.
"Trashing a $150 Billion Business", Fortune, August 28, 1989, p. 94.
Franklin Associates, op.cit.
Detroit Free Press, July 7, and July 25, 1990.
Saginaw News. June 6, 1990.
American Legislative Exchange Council, Environmental Monitor, January 19, 1990, Vol. 2, No. 1, p. 12.
Of course! It has nothing to do with the fact that people who might want compost for one reason or another may prefer to buy humis in a brand-name bag from a garden supply store which will stand behind the purity of the product.
Environmental Monitor, ALEC,Vol. 1, No. 2, loc.cit.
Legislative Summary: Plastics and Solid Waste, Dow Chemical Company, January, 1990.
"Solid and Hazardous Waste Management", op.cit., p.4.
American Legislative Research Council Environmental Monitor, op.cit., April 6, 1990, p.4
COPPE Update. Volume 4, Number 2, January 1990, p.2
Cited in COPPE Update, December, 1989, op.cit., p. 2.
EPA Report to Congress on Methods for Reducing Plastics Pollution., op.cit., p.68.
Wall Street Journal, July 19, 1990.
Not everything a household "throws away" is actually thrown away. Both the Salvation Army and Goodwill Industries accept huge quantities of "throw-away" articles and return them to the economy every year.
Edward W. Repa, PhD., "Landfill Capacity: How Much Really Remains", Waste, Alternatives, December 1988, p.33.
"Tomb of Eternal Garbage" The Detroit Free Press, April 17, 1990.
"Landfill Capacity" op.cit., p. 32.
Ibid, p. 34.
Both EPA and OTA acknowledge that modern Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, Subtitle D, landfills pose no threat to public health and safety. EPA, op.cit., p. 66; OTA, op.cit., p. 32.
The term, "Economic resources" is actually a redundancy. Something which has no value in exchange – i.e., no economic value – is not a resource. It's just something that's there, or, as the economic geographers used to call it, just "neutral stuff".
Robert Peters, "Finding A Place To Put Refuse", Waste Age, op.cit., p. 54-55.
Edward W. Repa, "Landfill Capacity: How Much Really Remains?" Waste Alternatives, December, 1988, p. 32-34.
There are technologies emerging which would – as is currently being done in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania – turn garbage into high-quality marketable cellulose fiber or granulated "sand." Closer to home, the Acunet Corporation of Saginaw, Michigan has gained rights to a process developed in Australia for converting garbage into building materials. Private firms have the incentive to look for solutions to "problems." Failure to recognize and take advantage of that fact may be the real source of the solid waste "problem."
"Buried Alive," Newsweek, op.cit., p.59.
COOPE Update, December, 1989, p.3.
Rathje, "Rubbish", op.cit.,
"Tombs of Eternal Garbage", Detroit Free-Press, April 17,1990.
Michigan Landfills: Past, Present, and Future Democratic Task Force on Solid Waste, May, 1990
Robert T. Glebs, P.E., "Subtitle D: How Will it Affect Landfills?", Waste Alternatives, December, 1988, pp 56-64.
Ibid, p. 61.
Glebs, loc.cit.
Ibid.
Ibid
The idea that a landfill operator might be compelled to lower tipping fees is generally not entertained in current discussions of solid waste management issues. However, in the face of competition from out-of-state landfills, New York City recently reduced tipping fees at its old, out-of-date, Fresh Kills facility on Staten Island by 37.5%. Wall Street Journal, July 7, 1990.
Sanitary Landfill Costs in Michigan for Presentation to Special House Democratic Task Force on Solid Waste Disposal. SCS Engineers, December 4, 1989.
"Packaging Bans to Reduce Waste Fall Short of Mark:, by Edward J. Stana, Executive Director of COPPE, December, 1988.
Caroline Price, "Going Around Again," Michigan Business, February, 1990, p. 32.
Saginaw News June 19,1990.
Michigan Association of Counties Solid Waste Survey. 1989-1990. Reported in Democratic Task Force on Solid Waste, Michigan House of Representatives, 1990, op.cit..
"Metro Communities Find Recycling a Costly 'Pay-me-Later' Deal," Detroit News, August 13, 1990.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Wall Street Journal, July 19, 1990.
Even New York has ample land for landfills. Rathje's study reports that New York officials have found over 200 square miles of sound geological space available. The problem there is not so much technical and spatial as it is political.
Kenneth Chilton, Talking Trash: Municipal Solid Waste Mismanagement, St. Louis, MO:, Washington University Center For the Study of American Business, Formal Publication Number 101, September, 1990, p. 9.
The preferred method of burning in both Europe and Japan is the "mass burn," rather than "refuse derived," process on the grounds that mass burn facilities are cleaner and more reliable than refuse-derived plants.
OTA, op.cit., pp. 220-221.
Ibid.
Sweden: A Case Study, Washington, D.C.: Coalition for Responsible Waste Incineration, September, 1990, press release.
Floyd Hasselriis, MME, P.E., "Effects of Burning Municipal Waste on Environment and Health", New York, NY: The American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Report Number 86-JPGC-EC-17, October, 1986.
OTA, op.cit., p.36.
BioCycle Survey of Solid Waste Management Practices, Environmental Monitor, April 6, 1990. op.cit., p. 2.
Chilton, Talking Trash, op.cit., p. 11.
Detroit News, August 13, 1990.
Anyone interested in exploring the evidence on this issue is invited to read my Privatization: Theory and Practice for Michigan, 1988, published by the Michigan State Chamber of Commerce Foundation, Lansing, MI.
"Welcome to Pennsylvania's Dream Landfill", and "Great Landfills Start With Great Care" Waste Alternatives. December, 1988, pp. 14-18; 25-31.
Rathje, op.cit., p. 100.
EPA, op.cit., p. 18.
Public Act 641, Section 13.29 (21 a).
Op.cit., Section 13.29 (24).
Letter and materials from Alan J. Howard, Chief, Waste Management Division, Department of Natural Resources, September, 17, 1990.
Act 641, Ibid, Section (35).
Peter P. Klemchuk, "Chemistry of Plastics Casts a Negative Vote," Modern Plastics, August, 1989, pp.48-53, and "Broad-Based Plastics Task Force Finds Degradables May Worsen Waste Crisis," Inside EPA Weekly Report, Washington, DC:, Environmental Protection Agency, December 1, 1989.
"Recycling Program Causes Privacy Stink," Wall Street Journal, October 5, 1990.
"Coming Around Again", op.cit., p.35.
Gongwer News Service Report #231, Monday, December 4, 1989.
BioCycle Survey, op.cit. from ALEC, Environmental Monitor, April 6, 1990.
"Senate Bill Proposes Expanding Deposit Law," Detroit Free Press, November 11, 1989.
Ibid.
Detroit News, May 15, 1990.
lbid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
"Bill to Halt Burning OK'd", Detroit News, September 21, 1990.
Ibid.
Anyone who thinks that a "time period to be determined by the Council" would not generate, if not openly invite, all the special-interest political pathologies which lawmakers in all political parties both love and abhor, has not been a student of modern American politics. But, perhaps, that's another question.
"County OKs Large-Scale Recycling," Detroit Free Press, June 28, 1990.
"Cities Ponder User Fees to Make Recycling Pay," Detroit News, July 10, 1990.
Ibid.
"Dearborn, Southfield to Start Recycling Trash," Detroit Free Press, March 14, 1990.
"Catching Up With Recyclers" Detroit News, July 2, 1990.
Ibid.
"Oakland County Approves Trash Plan," Detroit Free Press, June 29, 1990.
Ibid.
"Solid Waste Fight Still On Despite Late Start," The Oakland Press, July 31, 1990.
"Financing Solid Waste Management Programs: A Survey of the States," Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service-Library of Congress, Report Number 89-656 ENR, December, 1989, p. 3.
Mr. Harry H. Denman, "Composting Meets the Needs of Today," Detroit News, July 2, 1990.