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Spinning Recycling Percentages Spinning Recycling Percentages Wisconsin recycles 38% of it’s solid waste!!!! Perhaps some of you recall hearing this statistic last fall. A few people upon hearing this information called up yours truly and asked, “Bart, what’s up with that?!. I thought we were doing such a good job of recycling and composting in Oneida County, and now I find out we’re less than average?!!”. After talking a few despondent jumpers down from the Highway 51 bridge in Mincoqua, City Hall in Rhinelander and the Starks radio tower, it became apparent that I had to do something. This was my fault, since annually, I have made much to do about Oneida County achieving recycling/composting rates in the mid to upper 30 percents. Now the pride and self esteem of many Oneida County residents was on the line!! It was time to do some serious research! Having finished an exhaustive look at the derivation of Wisconsin’s recycling numbers, (one phone call), I am happy to report that we can still talk trash about Oneida County’s waste reduction prowess. It seems that just like political polls, you have to watch out for recycling statistics and pay particular to the details. In 1997, the last year for which complete data is available, Wisconsin produced 3.93 million tons of “municipal” garbage, and recycled 2 million tons. Now, here comes the mathematics…with this data… we divide 2 million tons…by 5.93 million tons…(that’s landfilled waste tonnage plus recycling and composting tonnages) …. multiply by 100… and get a landfill diversion rate of 38%. Wow, pretty impressive, huh? The biggest problem with the State’s calculations, however, is that industrial wastes are not included. In 1997, 3.5 million tons of industrial wastes were landfilled in Wisconsin. Now if you add that 3.5 million tons of industrial waste to the equation, Wisconsin’s overall recycling rate plummets to 12.5%! While many industries do recycle by-products, my guess would be that Wisconsin’s true recycling rate, including industry numbers, is on the order of 27.85%. By comparison, Oneida County calculated a 1998 recycling percentage of 34% by including all industrial wastes (and that’s with Waste Management not reporting recycling tonnage!). Oneida County’s local industries actually increase our overall recycling percentage. So, there now. You can breathe easy again. All that separating of papers, sorting of glass and removing of labels from tin cans is making a difference. |
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©2004 Oneida County Solid Waste Department
PO Box 400
Rhinelander, WI 54501
PO Box 400
Rhinelander, WI 54501
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