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Consumption is a trade, which has increased with the industralization period of the world. Because of the habit of the human to consume more and more, which has appeared with industralization and the increase in production, waste becomes an important problem because of wasting energy for today and because of the pollution wasted materials caused for future. To state an effective solution to this problem, this project aims to create awareness about the problems of recycling in Turkey, by giving the results of the reseaches about the situation of Turkey and what should be. In this case, this project will firstly give information about general process of recyling and some specified reycling processes of everyday consumed products as paper, aluminum and plastic to take attention, secondly, paper recycling will be taken as the topic, which will be discussed in the concept of its applications in USA and Turkey and finally, possible solutions about the problem will be identified in the light of the informations gained by the research.
What’s Recycling?
To give information about the situation of recycling in an effective way, identifying the definition of recycling will be useful for the next parts of the project, therefore, recycling is “a series of activities that includes collecting recyclable materials that would otherwise be considered waste, sorting and processing recyclables into raw materials such as fibers, and manufacturing raw materials into new products.” (USEPA, Recycling, 2004.). This definition of recycling will be detailed in the general process of recycling.
General Process of Recycling
There are three main steps in the general process of recycling. These are collection and processing, manufacturing and finally purchasing recycled products.
The First Step: Collection and Processing
Collecting variables changes from community to community, but there are four primary methods in this step. These are:
* Curbside: It’s a free pick-up service provided to make it easier for people to recycle aluminum cans; plastic bottles; jugs; tin; steel cans; glass bottles & jars and papers. Municipal or commercial haulers pick up curbs. (Town of Friday Harbor, Friday Harbor Curbside Residential Recycling, 2002.)
* Drop-off centers: They accept materials that may not be accepted at the curb. They are mostly sponsored by community organizations. (City of Palo Alto, Recycling Drop-off Center, 2002.)
* Buy-back centers: These are designed for residents who want to receive cash back for recyclables such as aluminum cans, glass bottles and plastics. Manufacturers buy their products back from the consumers to remanufacture the used products into new products. (City of Whitter, Recycling and Hazardous Waste, n.d.)
* Deposit/refund programs: They require consumers to pay a deposit on a purchased product. The deposit can be redeemed when the consumer brings the container back to the business or company for recycling. (IDEM, Fact Sheet: Recycling, 2003.)
Which one of these steps is used, is not important for the next step of process, they all continue with manufacturing.
The Second Step: Manufacturing
After cleaning and separating the recyclables, they become ready to undergo the second step. Currently, products, which are being manufactured with total or partial recycled content, are increasing day by day. Newspapers and paper towels; aluminum, plastic and glass soft drink containers; steel cans; and plastic laundry detergent bottles are some of households which contain recycled materials. Recycled materials are also used in some new areas such as recovered glass in roadway asphalt (glassphalt) or recovered plastic in carpeting, park benches, and pedestrian bridges.
The Third Step: Purchasing Recycled Products
Buying recycled products plays an important role in making the recycling process successful; as consumers demand more recycled goods, the firms would start to produce high-quality recycled goods. (Recycling Process, n.d)
Benefits of Recycling
Recycling is a beneficial activity, which provides various benefits for environment, economy and saving energy. Mainly, recycling guarantees a healthy life in the future by protecting the environment from the harms of the waste and by preserving resources for the future. Because the resources are limited in world, so producing new goods without recycling means more virgin resource in order to produce new goods, which bring the end of limited resources nearer. The benefits of recycling can be summarized with seven headings:
Conserves resources for our children’s future.
Prevents emissions of many greenhouse gases and pollutants.
Saves energy.
Supplies valuable raw materials to industry.
Creates jobs.
Stimulates the development of greener technologies.
Reduces the need for new landfills and incinerators. (USEPA, Recycling, 2004.)
In addition, some statistics can be given to emphasis the benefits of recycling in the concept of saving energy such as:
Recycled Material
%of Energy Saved
Aluminum
: 95%
Copper
: 85%
Lead
: 65%
Paper
: 64%
Plastics
: 80%
Common Recyclable Products and Their Way of Recycling
a. Paper Recycling
Paper is one of the important materials for everyday routine of human life and most of it is thrown away after using once, for example, newspapers, magazines or letters. To reduce the amount of wasted paper, it has to be recycled by a process, which is similar to the process of producing virgin paper, however it differs in the steps of sorting and removing ink. The recycling process for paper begins with a careful sorting. Wasted paper has to be divided in to categories according to the type and color of the paper. Next, the ink must be removed and this is achieved by soaking the paper, which is broken in to small pieces, and by treating it with chemicals, which can remove ink from paper. In some cases, more than one chemical can be used, because of the variety of ink on paper. Then, the wet and shredded waste paper is blended with another materials, which are needed to use to form desired end products. For instance, if white paper will be produced, bleach may be added to lighten it. At this point, wasted paper is a sort of liquid, which is called “stuff” by paper makers and ready to be made in to paper. Then, the stuff is passed through a heavy roller that presses and squeeezes the fibers in liquid. No glue is used in this state, for holding paper together because, long cellulose fibers can achieve this naturally. The paper making machine presses the stuff in to thin slices, which will be dried, planed and packaged for consumers. ( The Process of Recycling Paper, n.d.)
This process of the paper recycling is proper for white papers as letters, computer printouts, books and coloured papers. Although, these types of paper form a big proportion of wasted papers and can be recycled, there are some kinds of paper, which cannot be recycled such as, yellow pages, milk and juice cartons, padded envelopes with plastic bubble protection inside and cardboards (What Types of Paper Can Be Recycled?, n.d.) In addition, it is not possible for all paper products to be made from recycled paper. For instance, brown grocery bags, can be recycled in to other types of paper, however they have to be made from virgin materials with long fibers, which are needed to stregthen the grocery bags. (The Process of Recycling Paper, n.d)
The main material used for papermaking is cellulose, which is gained from trees. To produce paper, trees are cut down and forests are getting smaller. Because of this, the source of absorbing carbon dioxide from air and giving back oxygen is one of the main materials that we need to survive. In this case, recycling preserves forests from being cut. By recycling 1 tone of paper,17 trees can be saved, which can absorb 250 pounds of carbon dioxide each year totally. Also, reycling paper is beneficial for the concept of saving energy because recycling a certain amount of paper costs about half of the energy, which is used in producing same amount of paper from virgin materials. (The Process of Recycling Paper, n.d.)
b. Aluminum Recycling
Secondly, recycling of aluminum can be given as an example for the applications of recycling process on different materials. Aluminum recycling has been used since the early 1900s. However, it was an unassuming activity until 1968. In 1968, the recycling of aluminum cans began to have value on public consciousness. Thirty years later, because of the nation wide environmental campaign, the value and ease of aluminum recycling is recognized. (About Aluminum Recycling, n.d.)
Wasted aluminum cans, which are thrown to recycle bins, begin their process either at local recycling centers, community drop-off sites or charity, collection sites. Then, they are collected at large scrap companies to be baled and sent to aluminum companies for melting. At the aluminum companies, the inside and outside decorations of cans are removed by burning process. After, aluminum is cut in to potato chip-sized pieces and melted with some virgin aluminum, the thickness of the metal is reduced. Finally, metal is put in to can makers to produce can bodies, which will be delivered to beverage companies to be used again. (How Is An Aluminum Can Recycled?, n.d.)
Aluminum recycling is beneficial, because recycling is a part of the natural lifecycle of aluminum. The metal can be simply re-melted by using only 5% of the energy use in producing the virgin metal. Also aluminum can be recycled several times without a decrease of quality. In order to give an example for the benefits of aluminum recycling on saving energy, reycling 1 ton of aluminum saves the energy of 2.350 gallons of gasoline and this energy is nearly equal to the amount of electricity used by an average home in 10 years (How Is An Aluminum Can Recycled?, n.d.) In addition, aluminum recycling has benefits for industry, capital costs of aluminum recycling are lower, recycling plants are smaller and they can be located closer to both scrap companies and market of recycled metal.
c. Plastic Recycling
Plastic is the final material, which will be discussed in the terms of recycling process and benefits of its recycling. Plastic is a petrochemical product and because of this, it cannot be reproduced to its original state. To form used plastic in to new products, firstly plastic is collected, baled and transported to remanufactures for recycling. Then, the collected plastics are sorted according to their colors and types. These sorted plastics are recycled by melting and this creates melted material for forming products through extrusion. During melting process, the polymer chains that form plastic are shortened and this makes plastic harder. Because of the chemical changes plastic has during the recycling process, the recycled plastic gains different qualities from original plastic. In addition, recycled plastic cannot be used for the purpose, which its original form was used for, for example, because of contamination, reycled plastics from beverage or food containers, cannot be used as a product designed for food use. ( Heimlich, n.d.)
In the process of plastic recyling, it is important to classify the types of plastic resins carefully, because of the chemical reactions, which distort polymer chains. For example, clear plastic 2 liter pop bottles, clear plastic milk jugs and clear plastic fruit drink containers all are formed from different resins. To determine the kinds of resins, which form the containers collected by recyclers, the Plastic Bottle Institute determined a bottle coding system in 1988. According to this coding system, the code used on bottles is a three-sided triangular arrow or a triangle with a number in the center of the triangle and the letters below it. These numbers and letters determine the plastic resin. The codes are given below:
Table 1 - Plastics Coding System
Resin
Letters
Resin Types
Examples
#1
PET (PETE)
Polyethylene
Terephthalate
2-liter Pop Bottles, Some Condiment Containers
#2
HDPE
High Density
Polyethylene
Milk Jugs, Laundry Detergent Containers
#3
V
Vinyl/Polyvinyl
Chloride
Some Drinking Water Containers Some Vegetable Oils
#4
LDPE
Low Density
Polyethylene
Flexible Film Bags, Flexible Lids, Plastic Bags
#5
PP
Polypropylene
Jar Lids, Container Closures, Battery Cases, Box Liners, Some Bottles
#6
PS
Polystyrene
Fast Food Foam Boxes, Foam Cups, Meat Trays
#7
Other
Multiple Resin Materials, Some Squeezable Containers
( Heimlich, n.d.)
Plastic recyling is a beneficial activity and the first reason of it is that, virgin plastic resins are made from non-renewable resources such as natural gas used in homes for heating, against the misconception which claims that plastic resins are made from petroleum rafineries’ waste and by recycling plastic, saving energy of the natural resources can be achieved. It is also an effective fact about wasting natural sources that, 8% of oil production all over the world is used for plastic production and in this case, recycling plastic saves an important part of the natural energy. However, plastic recycling is not beneficial as a whole, because at the end of the recycling process, it is impossible to form the original state of plastic, therefore it is not efficient in the concept of achieving the product desired to produce. Moreover, recycling used plastics generally costs more than producing virgin plastics, because the markets for used plastics are diminishing, as a result of the increase in plastic production and reduction in the prices of virgin plastics. (Plastic Task Force Factsheet, n.d.) Because of these negative sides of plastic recycling, it is more useful to consume the products, which are packaged with recyclable paper or glass rather than plastic, by this way, production of more virgin plastic will be reduced and energy will be saved.
Why Paper Recycling
In today’s world, one of the most common goods, which are used in every areas of daily life, is paper. Everyday, million tons of papers are being used for a lot of reasons, for example most of our daily needs are made of paper, such as books, newspapers, bags, napkins, handkerchiefs and correspondence papers. Different than other goods, paper-made goods are mostly for one time use. Therefore recycling and gaining them once more becomes important. Also paper-made goods are mostly produced by using trees as a resource and that causes the massacres of trees everyday. For instance, to produce the whole weekly circulation of a weekly newspaper, 500.000 trees must be cut down and by recycling one of these newspapers saves 75.000 trees. Currently one of the most important problems is global warming and the greenhouse effect; which means higher temperatures because of the high percentages of carbon dioxide in air and that causes climative changes, which destroys the natural balance and natural life such as the melting of the icebergs in the Poles. A greener world can set off the effects of greenhouse effect. In order to have a greener world, today’s botanical resources must be protected and also new resources should be added to current ones. Recycling papers will help in having a greener world, because using recycled papers means using less trees, as well as using less energy and causing less air and water pollution. Here are some statistics about gains from paper recycling:
Using recycled paper means 64% energy saved compared to primary production.
Producing from recycled paper means 35% less water pollution and 74% less air pollution.
These show why paper recycling is so important for a cleaner and greener future.
General View of Recycling in Turkey
Turkey’s paper production is approximately one and half million tons however; total paper usage is more than two and half million tons. There is a remarkable amount of paper, which is imported. In addition, this is regularly reducing. This is affected by the increasing rate of recycle, too. The gathered churn paper amount –means waste paper- is about 1 million of tones, which represents the one third of the total paper consumption in Turkey. Although, Turkey, as a developing country has few recycling firms and activities done by the government, it may be considered as a serious problem that there is neither a specific ministry concerning recycling nor a large company that deals with recycling as is done in more advanced countries. The diagram below shows the usage of the churn paper and recycling percentage in Turkey until 2000. (Dönkasan, 2004)
Group / Year
1990
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
SEKA
62.4
76.8
43.1
69.5
53.6
77.9
56.5
35.9
86.4
Private
265.5
458.9
483.7
570.5
568.8
719.1
703.1
810.7
963.5
Total churn Paper Purchase
328.2
535.7
526.8
640.0
622.4
797.0
759.6
846.6
1,049.9
Paper - Pasteboard Production
967.4
988.1
1,097.8
1,235
1,105.
1,245
1,356
1,350.8
1,567.2
Use Percentage
28.8
46.1
40.8
44.0
50.2
55.4
51.0
52.4
55.2
Churn Paper Import (tone)
24.1
71.4
55.0
75.0
32.9
61.2
39.4
61.9
62.4
Recycling Percent
25.8
29.6
36.5
34.0
33.3
35.8
35.6
35.6
35.4
Recycling in Turkey can be examined by separating it into three parts; general recycling in Turkey which is going to be discussed by showing a company’s process, recycling in Ankara which is explained by examining the local administration and private corporations, and Bilkent University’s recycling activities.
Paper Recycling in Turkey
Dönkasan
Dönkasan, a firm devoted to paper recycling, was established in 1984 in Istanbul. Now, the firm has two more facilities one in Adana and a second one in Istanbul that collect the waste paper in surrounding cities, separating those, making into bales, which means a pressure process done by extremely powerful pressure machines whereby stocking areas are relieved and intra-company delivering fees are reduced. After this process, intermediate products are sent to specific factories. This firm is also a member of the BIR (Bureau of International Recycling), which has hundreds of members all over the world, and it is located in Belgium (BIR, 2004). The firm is at present using a special method of collecting waste paper, which is only used by Dönkasan in Turkey: container system. Containers are specially put to places where churn paper can be obtained easily; those places are mostly industrial areas. The trucks take the container full of paper and leave an empty one. With this system, Dönkasan collect 100 thousand tons of paper each year, which means that the firm actually does a large volume of business that one fifth of Turkey’s paper collect is done by Dönkasan (Dönkasan, 2004).
Paper Recycling in Ankara
Municipality
The recycling process in Ankara is done by several branches, first is the local administration. Recycling process is not an obvious work in the municipality because there is not a separated section concerning the recycle. The Science Department is a part of the municipality, which does jobs concerning the collection of waste and cleaning. However, this work belonged to this department a few years before, last year collecting waste job was adjudicated to Health Department. When the job was belonging to Science Department, in Mamak and Sincan, the garbage was put in a process to maintain methane gas whereby electric could be produced from this gas, therefore the produced electric could be sold in the prices of TEDAŞ (Turkey Electric Distribution A.Ş.) (Personal communication Semseddin Bey, 15.04.2004). Now, the waste is sent to Mamak and Sincan after collection. Therefore, there is actually no electric production from waste, which was done by Science Department before. In Mamak, the garbage is separated on the moving bands to each material as paper, glass bottle, plastic bottle and tin, and some of them are sent to Sincan. Paper and plastic bottles are recycled in the municipality’s own institution. The process is done by a firm named ITC (Invest Trading & Consulting Agency). In the documents of Health Department, it is mentioned that the ITC firm was given a project to build a recycle facility in Sincan (***). Furthermore, the firm was given 18 months to finish the construction and the project did not even start (Personal communication Sema Dervişoğlu, 22.04.2004). Sema Dervişoğlu introduced the firm as a Turkish firm. In fact, it was originated in another country because; it is said in the documents as “Türkiye Ankara Şubesi / Turkey. Because there is actually no website concerning ITC and because the mail address of the firm is not available (***), it seems like a fake firm, which was only created to be shown to the municipality in the contract.
This process shows that there is an unspecified recycling. Paper, tins, cans, any metal materials are collected together and after the wastes are stocked in the facility, they are separated into each item. Municipality does not consider the paper as a single item to be given more importance. Paper is assumed as only a recycle material without considering its huge business in Turkey. This brings that the paper recycling business does not correspond to a privatization industry. One facility, which is the ITC’s institution, deals with all materials. The more specialization the more efficient results are obtained, therefore the recycling facilities are also not separated. In addition, because there are many different ways to recycle paper, there would be more opportunities to recycle in a specialized facility. The shortcoming of specialized recycle facilities in Ankara and in Turkey creates disadvantages in developing process. The Health Department is also performing a pilot program, which means it belongs to only to Health Department, concerning the recycle. It is a firm dealing with the department about recycling.
ÇöpSan
Çöpsan seemed to be a pilot program of municipality until it appeared that the office in the address of Çöpsan does not belong to Çöpsan actually. It was another firm’s address and its name is Zirve Çevre Sistemleri ve Atık Taşıma. This company’s director is Hatice Polat. Even though she maintained that there is no connection between the firms in which she was working and Çöpsan, she was also able to give information and papers concerning Çöpsan (***). Furthermore, a short promotional movie belongs to Çöpsan was available. In the movie, there were trucks named Çöpsan and many staff wearing Çöpsan clothes. That shows inconsistency because the office had no sign of Çöpsan and they could give information like they work in Çöpsan. From Hatice Polat, a list, which shows the firms cooperated with Çöpsan, was obtained (***). In this list, there are hospitals, governmental and non-governmental organizations even AŞTİ (Ankara terminal station). Those firms give their waste, which may be recycled, and Çöpsan does the recycle in their facility in Mamak (Personal communication Hatice Polat, 03.05.2004). However the list was branded with Çöpsan’s stamp, it was obvious that the Çöpsan is not a real company.
The firm seemed to do things about collecting garbage and recycling in Mamak as it is shown in the promotional movie. This process may be true however; the workers of the company of Zirve Çevre Sistemleri ve Atık Taşıma do this in the name of Çöpsan. Therefore, it can be said clearly that there is an indistinct firm named Çöpsan which is showed to municipality as the owner of the job. It is possible that the workers, whose real jobs are the other firm, are shown as workers –again- in Çöpsan. Under easy controls of the government or the municipality, it should not have been hard to establish a fake firm to which many jobs are attributed.
Like municipality, this corporation does the recycling of many materials including paper. This kind of work indicates that there is no facilities of this firm dedicated to a single item –paper- even as a special corporation. These corporations, because they have power to use in more special businesses rather than the government, have to go specializing in recycle to gather more efficiency. More efficiency can be gained because; if a firm dedicates it or a part of it, this creates more feasibility of the process and by this way, firms can follow the latest technology because their whole business would be this. In addition, the firm would feel the necessity of the latest recycle technology more than the work is combined.
Recycling in Bilkent University
In Bilkent, the recycle process is managed by the Support Services in which there is three persons related the recycle progress.
Bilkent is cooperated with the firm Meteksan about paper. Paper recycle boxes are collected twice per week -Mondays and Wednesdays-. The collection of the paper, tin, can, glass is done with the specific boxes of each item. For instance, as anyone can encounter a paper recycle box in Bilkent in many places, there are paper recycle boxes in so many places like library and lab, which were put by Support Services of Bilkent. After collecting these papers, Bilkent sells them to Meteksan Waste Paper Facility, which is in Bilkent, too.
However there are paper recycle boxes in every dormitory and even in every floor, the waste papers are collected hardly ever. It is stated that the proportion of the paper thrown away and the recycled paper is quite low that is stated by the Support Services (Personal communication Sevgi Ural, 07.05.2004).
Evaluation of Recycling in Turkey
The recycling in Turkey is not at a very efficient rate; however some firms as Dönkasan and Doğa Recycle are indicators of the developing process. It should be seen under expected when the Turkey’s situation in international levels is considered. With realistic data and an accurate estimate of recycle rate in Turkey, it can be said that there are lots of things to be done further. For instance, the medical waste is not still recycled in any way. The Doğa recycle is the first example of the recycle of the electronic waste in Turkey, however it is not actually a big company to recycle all electronic waste of Turkey. This firm is a subpart of the Exitcom Group, which is originated in Germany and therefore, it is obvious that there are already electronic waste recycle firms in Germany.
In the vision of the local administration, there seems to be recycle by the firm named ITC (Invest Trading Consulting). However, the absence of the web and mail addresses of this firm, and also the recycle facility project’s failure, which was given to this firm by the municipality, show that it might be a fake firm dealing with municipality. In the case of the Çöpsan, which is also dealing with the municipality to collect some materials to recycle, it might be said that some individuals who are actually working as another firm’s officer, showed a firm in the name of Çöpsan to deal within a different name. This kind of corruptions can be prevented with some laws, which can be put quite easily, concerning the regularity and transparency of the municipality works and contracts.
In the university of Bilkent, it has been already started a recycle circle with the organization of Meteksan. This is a fact that the low consciousness of the students in university about recycling caused to collect less waste. In this case, there is a need of education to the Bilkent students about why recycling or showing that what is being recovered or what is going to be gained if recycled. To do this, conferences concerning recycle and seminars can be organized by the council. This will also bring remarkable profit to university from Meteksan if it is achieved efficiently. Recycling with honesty and conscious, there will not be any obstacles in front to make the world more sustainable.
Recycling in USA
Why USA
The U.S is a well-developed country and is the leader of the world in many fields. Because a comparison of Turkey with one of the best examples would help to see Turkey’s leakages and shortcomings better, USA’s process is evaluated. More resources are available about USA on the Internet and in the library, which makes research easier. The big size of USA is also important, because of consuming more goods than other countries, recycling of these goods is also more important. As the statistics showed below, a high percentage of recycling means big savings from world’s resources.
1 ton of virgin paper uses 24 trees.
1 ton of recycled paper saves 17 trees. (means 71% less trees used in producing 1 ton of paper)
That means,
382,500,000 trees
42 billion liters of oil
717 billion liters of water
92 billion kW of energy
Is saved per year by using recycled papers just in USA. These stats show the importance of recycling in USA for the world’s future.
The History Of Paper Recycling In U.S.A
Paper was invented in China in the 1st century. Before Chinese invention of modern paper, people were using papyrus (in Egypt), parchment and vellum (made from animal skins), strips of bamboo and scrolls of woven silk cloth (in China). Paper was more economic and easy to use than those. The history of paper in America was started with English colonists in the late 1500’s, about 1600 years later than its invention.
At first, rags were used to produce papers in Europe and America. However, as the need of papers increased all over Europe and America, a shortage of rags appeared. It was a very big one, even there was not enough rags to bury people; governments denied using cloths while burying people in order to use them for paper mills. After that shortage, a French thought about using woods in producing paper. The first paper mill, which produced paper by using materials other than rags, such as wood, old paper, hay and hemp, was built in England in 1801. Surprisingly, it was not successful; it went ruin in several years. However with the upcoming shortages, producing paper from wood instead of rags became the primary method of production. That method was started using efficiently in America at the end of 19th century, so paper prices dropped from $0.25 to $0.02 in 40 years. (Thompson, 1992. p:28)
First recycling movements started in the early 20th century, at the age of 1st World War. There was a shortage in in-puts for paper, so idea of using old papers came out again. Used papers became valuable and salable commodity, for the first time in America, thousands of tons of old books, newspapers and business papers were recycled by the paper mills. (Thompson, 1992. p:33)
The use of wastepaper progressed slowly. The importance of wastepaper rediscovered again in the 2nd World War. By the 1950’s, the utilization of wastepaper increased sharply –it was 6% more than today also-, but again as the prices of resources became cheaper after the effect of 2nd World War left the market, the importance of using wastepaper again waned.
However in the 1970’s recycling became important and about 3,000 volunteered recycling centers were opened. It was the age of “hippies”, who worked for peace, community and freedom. Most of these centers were owned by hippies. The recycling was reborn by 70’s in USA by this way.
Current Situation In USA
By 1990 in U.S.A 26-30% of all available waste papers are collecting. (Thompson, 1992. p: 42) Today U.S is the largest exporter of wastepaper, in 1990 U.S exported 22% of the 28,9 million tons of paper and paperboard wastes from Korea, Japan, Mexico, Canada, Italy and Spain. The rest (78%) of waste papers were collected from local markets. There are more than 50 companies in U.S, which are producing some grades of printing and writing paper that they classify as recycled. Recycled fiber percentage by total paperweight is about 50%; the others are 25% virgin fiber and 25% non-fiberial material. So 67% of fiber is recycled fiber, which means a really big number and a big saving. (Thompson, 1992. p: 47)
Today in U.S there are many companies, which use modern methods while they are producing new paper and saving the limited resources of the world. Turkey should see USA as an example for itself in the recycling field and should join the rally of recycling in order to provide a greener future for the next generations.
Possible Solutions For Increasing the Recycling Process in Turkey
As mentioned before, recycling is the easiest and cheapest way to solve the waste problem of the world. All countries of the world face this problem, however the ways of them to cope with this problem differs in the concept of the type of the method or the effectiveness of the applications of the method. It can be clarified with the situations of USA and Turkey about recycling. USA is one of the leader countries of the world for this topic, although Turkey is not so effective in both local applications and global role. In this case, some possible solutions is needed for Turkey to be more effective and efficient in using the process of recycling, such as improving the regulations about recycling, increasing the awareness of people to the problem and conducting them to recycle more, and finally applying some personal recycling methods.
First, the government should pass laws in order to increase recycling. For example; in some countries; the governments made and passed recycling laws in order to increase the recycling action of the residents. After that, residents in these countries separate much more of their newspaper, aluminum, and glass and other recyclable goods from their trash. Residents who do not apply local recycling laws are fined, or their trashes are not collected. In contrast to this situation, other residents may only separate their newspaper for recycling. In addition to these, the business world is affected by recycling laws. For example, in some countries, the bars and restaurant is forced to glass recycling or the office buildings is forced to paper recycling by government. As a result, recycling laws and the efficient control of the government in this process can increase recycling rate.
Secondly, voluntary recycling actions must be more encouraged. In developed countries, there are lots of organizations that support the recycling process. However; in Turkey; there is only one or two serious organization, which work on the recycling programs. For instance, Cevko is only non-governmental organization, which aims to increasing recycling in Istanbul. As compare with the population and the amount of waste in Istanbul, one non-governmental organization is not sufficient.
Addition to these solutions, there are some personal actions, which helps to increasing recycling process in Turkey. First, trying to make more recycling at home. For example; many people do not have a special container for their recycling material, therefore; making a cardboard box for recycling material helps us to participate the recycling process. Second, shopping more careful. For instance; when choosing between similar products; select the one, which is more environment friendly. Third, involving voluntary actions. As mentioned before; there are not many organizations about recycling in Turkey; however, there are some actions, which people can do. For instance, participating local organizations about recycling or supporting these organizations financially.
To sum up, both our government and society must give more importance in order to provide an increase in recycling to reach the rate of the other countries such as USA. Government should pay more attention to the attractiveness of the current laws and society must be more conscious about recycling. Because of the large amount of the recyclable everyday consumed products, people have to gain the habit of recycling to be more conscious and by this way Turkey will be more effective in the process of recycling.
Conclusion
In this project, firstly, the information about recycling is given with a general view and some of the most consumed products are discussed in their recycling processes; secondly, paper recycling is chosen to be analyzed in detail to make an effective comparision between the processes used in USA and Turkey, to show the reasons of Turkey for being less sufficient in recycling and lastly, some possible solutions are suggested to solve the problem. These are achieved in the light of the aim, which requires to increase the awareness about the problem and the importance of recycling. Therefore, as a result of the project, Turkey is not efficient in the concept of recycling because of the unconsciousness of both government and society, although recyling is a beneficial and generally applied activity all over the world, moreover, recycling can be achieved without large budget by households. To sum up, recycling is a necessity for the today’s world, to save the current energy sources for future and to protect the environment for both healty todays and tomorrows and must be obtained more.
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