Biodegradable products may just not be so Green afterall
We have all heard environmentalists harping on the good of biodegradable products for years now. New research is beginning to show that these products just might not live up to their green billing. Once thrown out, biodegradable products are designed to break down relatively quickly and disappear into the natural environment.
"The implication is, it's biodegradable, therefore, it's better for the environment — and our point is: Well, not necessarily and not so fast," said study researcher Morton Barlaz, who heads North Carolina State University’s Department of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering.
These biodegradable products release a potent greenhouse gas, methane, as they break down in landfills, a problem aggravated by the relatively rapid rate at which they decompose. Barlaz and his colleagues looked at what happened when food waste, paper, newsprint and a biodegradable polymer called PHBO were buried in the average landfill. Their modeling experiment showed that materials with higher rates of decomposition ultimately emitted more methane.
"The more slowly the gas is produced, the more of it gets collected" at the landfill, Barlaz said. "That is a function of how landfills operate. The collecting systems are generally installed after the waste is buried."
During the intervening time, usually about two years, the more rapid the decomposition, the more methane is released. To improve the environmental benefit of biodegradable products, they should be designed to decompose more slowly, and more methane should be collected from landfills, he said.
With the right technology, landfill methane can actually help the environment. The US EPA reports that roughly a third of garbage produced in the United States goes to landfills that capture the methane and use it to generate heat and electricity. Another third goes to landfills where it is simply burned off (and ends up in the atmosphere), and the rest goes to landfills that allow methane to escape into the atmosphere, according to Barlaz.
Methane stays in the atmosphere for a much shorter period of time than another greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide, but in the meantime it traps heat more effectively.
The research, led by James Levis, a doctoral student at North Carolina State University, appeared online May 27 in the journal Environmental Science & Technology.
Most of us believe that recycling is ethically the right thing to do. But sadly, we all seem to have friends, family, and acquaintances that do not recycle.
Everyone should recycle when possible, but not everyone makes the effort. Here are five great reasons we should all recycle!
Everyone should recycle when possible, but not everyone does. Here are the five best reasons we should all recycle!
We all know there is a major problem with all those plastic water bottles that go unrecycled in the world. They just end up in landfills needlessly. Did you know how much energy it takes now to produce that bottled water though?
Here are some interesting facts on the benefits of recycling.