The sudden new strength of recycling.

• Author: Young, John E.

IT STARTED OUT AS A "DO-GOOD" ACTIVITY, THEN EVOLVED INTO A NECESSARY BURDEN FOR MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENTS. NOW, QUITE SUDDENLY, IT HAS BECOME A REAL REVENUE-PRODUCER.

Recycling, one of the key strategies for alleviating the pressures of the human presence on natural systems, has finally - and dramatically - arrived as a mainstream industrial activity in North America.

It's ironic that the breakthrough took so long. North America - or at least the U.S. and Canadian part of it - is where materials consumption is most profligate, and where the impacts of that consumption (in pollution from landfills and incinerators, energy production for manufacturing, and the spreading damage left by extractive industries) are therefore most troublesome. Yet, for a quarter-century after the first Earth Day, recycling advocates were forced to spend much of their energy trying to make their case to skeptical decisionmakers.

In the 1980s, recycling was still seen largely as a "do-good" activity. It was of little interest to fast-track business investors, who in those days were too busy pursuing "high-tech" ventures. The idea of founding a profitable business on old newspapers and empty bottles did not fit well with the ascendant lifestyles of the era. Local governments, many of which had to cope with rising landfill costs, were a bit more responsive, but still tended to regard their new recycling programs as burdens.

But now, suddenly, what was seen as a burden has become a major asset, and those communities that had the foresight to set up solid recycling programs a few years ago are beginning to reap real rewards. Since early 1994, prices for nearly all commonly collected recyclables have skyrocketed. In San Francisco, for example, recycling director Sharon Maves reports that the used paper, plastic, and metals the city picks up from curbs is bringing in "unprecedented revenue" - allowing the city to actually reduce household assessments for waste collection and recycling.

The story is the same across the continent. New York City, which two years ago was paying $6 million per year to get rid of its newsprint, now expects to earn $20-25 million from selling the same material over the next year, says recycling chief Bob Lange. Early in 1994, Madison, Wisconsin was paying $13 per ton to the processors who took its recyclables; by the end of the year it was receiving nearly $23 per ton. Madison recycling coordinator George Dreckman calls his city's program a "cash cow" that yielded the city $240,000 in net revenue (after processing costs, but not including collection costs) in the first four months of 1994.

Such numbers are making recycling increasingly attractive to many city waste administrators. While every city's economics are different - and some still have cheap municipal landfills with years of remaining capacity - many well-run programs are collecting and marketing materials at costs well below those of landfilling or burning waste. Madison now saves $40 for every ton of material it keeps out of its landfill by recycling. In Seattle, the city's total cost of collecting and processing recyclables fell from an average of $89 per ton in 1993 to $28 per ton by April 1995 - about $77 per ton less than what the city pays for disposal of what it can't recycle. In Canada, a number of communities in the province of Ontario are now earning profits of Cdn $50 per ton or more on recycling, including collection, processing, and capital costs, according to Atul Nanda, a senior official in Metro Toronto's recycling program.

Where recycling is not succeeding, a close look often reveals poor management. In Washington, D.C., for example, where city officials moved in late April to halt residential collection of recyclables, municipal administrators did not take into account the costs of landfilling and incineration that the city avoided by recycling. They tied funding for the recycling program to revenue from dumping by commercial waste haulers at the city landfill, which meant that the more trash was recycled, the less funding it received. And finally, they failed to renegotiate materials marketing contracts to take advantage of rising prices.

Even some communities with a history of successful recycling, such as Metro Toronto, have not been in a position to benefit from improved markets, because they locked themselves into long-term, fixed-rate contracts before materials prices soared. William Ferretti, director...