Blog 9: Make-Up For Thursday Field Trip

January 22, 2015

Blog 9: Make-Up For Thursday Field Trip

        On January 15, 2015 the class of Zero Waste and Ethics of Stuff visited the Republic MRF, which is a recycle plant. Based on the class discussion I learned that Republic MRF picks up the trash and recycling from a location, it is then sent to 96th located in Indianapolis, Indiana. Upon reaching the destination, the trash and recycling is separated. The recycling goods are then transformed into subcategories, which are sent to other places. For example, imagine all the trash and recycling goods located at DePauw. The workers of Republic MRF would come pick up their trash and recycling goods with their big amazing trucks, all of it would be sent to 96th street where the trash and recycling goods are separated. The recycling goods then are separated into its own subcategory: glass, cardboard, newspapers, plastic containers, and etc. Then all of these goods are sent to different locations so it can be reused and recycled: all of the glass goes to Chicago, newspapers go to paper mills, and etc.

This is an example of Paul Connet’s attempt of breaking the linear system and recycling and reusing our products. This makes me really happy because I feel that the current linear system the United States is using sucks! I mean big companies and corporations are going into our natural resources and extracting our limiting resources, creating products with toxic chemicals that are only affects us. I mean because of the chemicals in our products, Annie Leonard has come to a conclusion that breast milk has the highest level of toxic. This shows why the government and us, citizens or consumers, need to step in and make sure there is a change in our system. I think the best way to go about this is to create close loop productions, where companies are using green chemistry to create products. If we use green chemistry, we could climate the creation of toxics in our products as well the pollution! Lastly this would create a healthy environment for our citizens.

In addition, these amazing revolutions are occurring. The Republic MRF is a great example of that. Currently in Las Vegas, Nevada they are creating another Recycling facility such as the Republic MRF. The facility will have advanced technologies, which includes highly automated control systems, touch-screen, Data Acquisition monitoring machines, and etc. Best of all the facility will be serving to 535,000 households. It is great to see the movement occurring, we are making a change and it is happening.