What's the true number? I don't know, but I do know it's a heck of a lot bigger than here. I saw an interesting youtube video recently where they used RFID trackers to track plastic put in recycling bins in the UK, and it ended up being used in incinerators to power concrete manufacturing in eastern Europe.
There are points against the energy conversion of waste, the most convincing I've heard is this: given that the best thing to do with waste is not producing it at all, if a city/county/state invests in building an incinerator, it won't try to educate its citizens in reducing waste or it will lose its money.
I think this can happen in theory but not in practice (but still, no data to bring on future hypothetical scenarios).
"If we build an incinerator then they won't reduce waste" is putting a social manipulation agenda in front of a today-workable solution. We see this all the time with agencies like the CDC and FDA, which will conflate smoking and vaping statistics on purpose to supposedly reduce nicotine use, when in fact they scare vapers back onto cigarettes and kill people. Or when they obscure the fact that the IFR for Covid among teens and younger is orders of magnitude smaller than ordinary influenza, in an attempt to scare people into getting vaccinations they don't need.
I am categorically against policy decisions predicated on social manipulation.
AIUI, one of the major concerns with trash incineration are its "byproducts [which] include bottom ash, which [in Sweden] is sorted for metals and then recycled as fill for road construction or other projects, and fly ash, which is toxic and deposited in a landfill certified to handle hazardous materials."
So having a set of scrubbers and filters capable of capturing nearly all of that material, as well as conscientious handling of those byproducts, might be among key concerns – perhaps more than any "social manipulation" fears?
Also, one big advantage that Sweden apparently has is its widespread "district-scale heating," which improves the economics of trash burning. Something the USA likely lacks in most places?
Source on 86%.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-08-14/how-would-burning-rubbish-like-sweden-work-in-australia/10115694#:~:text=Sweden%20built%20its%20first%20waste,levels%20than%20most%20renewable%20energies
What's the true number? I don't know, but I do know it's a heck of a lot bigger than here. I saw an interesting youtube video recently where they used RFID trackers to track plastic put in recycling bins in the UK, and it ended up being used in incinerators to power concrete manufacturing in eastern Europe.
There are points against the energy conversion of waste, the most convincing I've heard is this: given that the best thing to do with waste is not producing it at all, if a city/county/state invests in building an incinerator, it won't try to educate its citizens in reducing waste or it will lose its money.
I think this can happen in theory but not in practice (but still, no data to bring on future hypothetical scenarios).
"If we build an incinerator then they won't reduce waste" is putting a social manipulation agenda in front of a today-workable solution. We see this all the time with agencies like the CDC and FDA, which will conflate smoking and vaping statistics on purpose to supposedly reduce nicotine use, when in fact they scare vapers back onto cigarettes and kill people. Or when they obscure the fact that the IFR for Covid among teens and younger is orders of magnitude smaller than ordinary influenza, in an attempt to scare people into getting vaccinations they don't need.
I am categorically against policy decisions predicated on social manipulation.
AIUI, one of the major concerns with trash incineration are its "byproducts [which] include bottom ash, which [in Sweden] is sorted for metals and then recycled as fill for road construction or other projects, and fly ash, which is toxic and deposited in a landfill certified to handle hazardous materials."
So having a set of scrubbers and filters capable of capturing nearly all of that material, as well as conscientious handling of those byproducts, might be among key concerns – perhaps more than any "social manipulation" fears?
https://energynews.us/2013/10/17/is-burning-garbage-green-in-sweden-theres-little-debate/
Also, one big advantage that Sweden apparently has is its widespread "district-scale heating," which improves the economics of trash burning. Something the USA likely lacks in most places?
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/21/climate/sweden-garbage-used-for-fuel.html