ENVIRO DEBATE TOURNEY: Recycling helps the enviroment!

Sources Heartland Once again, Heartland was the middleman for my source. My source was Professor Benjamin; the Heartland article just summarized his findings. Modern Landfills Pro makes an argument against modern landfills, claiming that they do not accept certain items. Pro forgets to mention that those items are not recyclable. Pro has made several cases in favor of recycling, with examples of non-recyclable products; such as food, and fossil fuels. The argument that landfills don’t accept certain items could be turned against Pro, as there are even more items that recycling centers won’t accept. Cost Pro brings up the cost of landfills. Once again, this debate is not about economics or finances; it’s about the impact on the environment. Proving recycling cost more or vice versa does not prove or disprove the resolution. Pro has wasted allot of time debating about economics. Landfills Politics of Recycling Pro has ceded that advocates of recycling do so for political or financial gain, and not to help the environment. While pro is correct, that this within itself does prove recycling is harmful, it does however taint the credibility of recycling advocates. One of the leading advocates for recycling is the manufacturers of recyclable products; such as plastic bags, and plastic bottles. This is because recycling shifts demand away from non-recyclable alternatives, thus increasing production. This is harmful on two ends; the manufacturing during its original production and the remanufacturing during recycling. Recycling has caused the demand to shift away from non-recyclable products, which are safer to produce, for the more recyclable products, the production of which is more harmful to the environment. (1) Straw man Pro claims that I said landfills are cheaper. I said nothing of the short; I clearly told Pro during the last round that this debate was not about economic, and that I would not waste time debating economics. Raw Material Saving Raw Material Recycling only saves raw material when the raw material is nonrenewable. Curbside Recyclables are often separated into 3 categories; paper, plastic, and metal. Paper is a renewable resource, plastic is a manufactured resource, and metal is a nonrenewable resource. When you recycle renewable resources you are decreasing the demand for new raw materials, making it less likely for those resources to be renewed. Manufactured resources are irrelevant to the raw material argument. When you recycle nonrenewable resources, the recycling of those resources often causes environmental issues. When you talk about recycling nonrenewable resources, you have to weigh the positives of recycling with the negatives. The negatives being the environmental impact, and the positives being the resources saved. My opponent’s example for nonrenewable resources was aluminum. Aluminum is the world’s 3rd most abundant natural resource, behind Oxygen and Silicon. (2) Production of Raw Material Pro claims that the production of Raw Material is not always cleaner than recycling, but in most circumstances it is. Pro uses aluminum to prove his point; aluminum is a metal, so it simply needs to be melted down in order to be reused. Pro gives some statistics about how much cleaner it is to melt down the metal, than it is to extract it from ore. His statistics does not take into consideration the cleaning process associated with recycling, where the cleaning of the aluminum produces tons of toxic sludge, which is not created during the original production. It also does not take into consideration the extra emissions created during transportation. (3) The recycling process differs depending on the recyclable material. The recycling process for aluminum differs greatly from the recycling process for steel, due to the difference in their chemistry and usage. (3) Studies of Oakland’s air quality have discovered recycling centers as some of the city’s top polluters, and one metal recycling plant was nearly shut down due to environmental protests by the locals.(1) Recycling Process Concept Vs Practice Pro claims that we are not arguing about the practice of recycling, but rather the concept of recycling. Pro cedes that recycling causes more harm than the original production, but claims that the practice is irrelevant to the concept. If we took the same approach to the original production as Pro takes to recycling, than the practice of production does not matter, only the concept. Pro argues that since we are debating the concept of recycling, that the harmful effects of the present methods are not important. Likewise I could argue that the harmful effects during production do not matter, because there is the potential for production to be completely harmless, provided we have the technology to do so. This entire argument is bias, and one sided. If the logic applies to recycling, it should also apply to its alternatives. Concept of Recycling If it is the concept of recycling that we are arguing than you cannot cherry pick what materials we are debating about. Either recycling is beneficial or it is not, because the resolution was formed as an absolute. To claim recycling is beneficial, but only under certain circumstances, is not an argument in favor of the concept. Without Recycling Landfills not an option There are two cases where landfills are not an option; a.) There are laws preventing them from accepting recyclables b.) There are non-recyclables that would cause issues for the landfill (such as radioactive material). In the case of recyclables, the only thing preventing them is mandatory recycling laws. When it comes to non-recyclables, they can’t be recycled anyways. Not all recycled material is actually recycled, which depends on the city’s recycling program. For example; some cities can handle plastics numbered up to 6, while many can only handle plastics numbered up to 2. Only 6.8% of recycled plastics are actually recycled, because the programs cannot handle the chemical compound of the plastics. (4) The Pacific Garbage Patch My opponent claims that if landfills don’t accept trash, it winds up in the pacific garbage patch. First off, the pacific garbage patch is not visible to the naked eye, and the waste is comprised mostly of microplastics; microplastics are tiny bits of plastic up to 5 mm in diameter. (5) Landfills accept plastics, unless there are laws against putting recyclables in landfills. In the cases of such laws, if the recycling program cannot process the plastics, and the plastics cannot be placed in landfills, where do you suppose the plastic goes? In such cases, mandatory recycling becomes harmful. (4) Economy The economic environment has no effect on the natural environment, so impacts on the economy are irrelevant. Pro’s claim that the economy directly effects the natural environment is not only unfounded, but rather absurd. The environment does have an impact on the economy, but the economy does not impact the environment. A natural disaster can be detrimental to the stock market, but changes in the stock market have no affect the level of pollution in the environment. Recycling fuel I reread my opponent’s original argument, and I misread. A single word (manufacturing) changed the context. Still I already addressed this issue, when I discussed the increased emissions from transportation, and the emissions from remanufacturing recyclables. 1.) http://www.forbes.com... 2.) http://sam.davyson.com... 3.) books.google.com/books?isbn=0470418923 4.) http://discovermagazine.com... 5.) http://education.nationalgeographic.com...