One thing that’s struck me about New Hampshire is it’s apparent lack of any recycling. There may be towns that do, but everywhere I’ve gone, nope. Here’s a photo I snapped (is that still a thing?) from the Target in Concord that we went to this morning:
It’s such a change from Oregon, and probably any place on the West Coast. Danica and I got into a good conversation in the car about this. It’s hard to find trustworthy information about recycling, but my feeling is that in some cases (plastics), it’s pretty damn worthless, and just ends up in landfills anyway, and probably overseas. In other cases (metals and glass), it probably does still make sense. But this begs the question: if it’s profitable, why don’t they do it everywhere? Does it require taxpayer subsidies to pencil out? I’m not a big fan of recycling as a moral imperative. The cost-benefit analysis needs to be done, both from a financial perspective and an environmental perspective, and then decisions based on that, and not just because it’s prima facie a good thing.
Columbia Gorge Dispatch 