recycling - Climate Break

Rerun: Sustainable Wood from Mass Timber, with Dr. Paul Mayencourt

As cities and communities around the world grapple with the need for affordable housing while also addressing climate change, sustainable wood provides a promising solution. Able to replace carbon-intensive traditional building materials, sequester carbon, and lower emissions, sustainable wood has the potential to redefine the future of low-carbon building. On this week’s Climate Break, UC Berkeley Professor Dr. Paul Mayencourt, explains how sustainable wood from mass timber could help mitigate the impact of climate change and transform the construction industry.

Buildings, Climate & Society, Sequestration, Technology, Transportation, Waste

Rerun: Bringing Local Textile Recycling to the US with Material Return’s Bobby Carswell

The textile industry produces up to 10% of global emissions and 20% of global wastewater, according to EU estimates. Mechanical recycling can reduce that impact by keeping textiles out of landfills — and in the circular economy — for longer. In this episode, Climate Break spoke to Bobby Carswell about Material Return about how locally based mechanical recycling can help make the US textile industry more circular and less polluting.

Climate & Society, Waste

Zero Waste with Jenny Chiu

The U.S. produces so much waste that this waste can be quantified using Olympic-sized swimming pools as negligible units of measurement.

Land, Waste

Recycling with Deborah Raphael

Many “recyclable” materials are not recycled or even recyclable. While papers and metals are recycled at relatively high rates, recycling rates for plastic are below 10 percent. Most plastics display numerical codes, purporting to denote a standardized and elaborate recycling system. But the system is convoluted, sometimes confusing even recycling facilities and identifying recycling processes that are not used.

Land, Waste