Reduce, Reuse, Reimagine: Sorting Out the Recycling System [Hardcover]

Reduce, Reuse, Reimagine offers the reader a concrete social and scientific framework for exploring the recycling system for materials that are integral to solutions to the larger issues of environmental sustainability and economic development in our consumer-based society. Failing to recognize the importance of mitigating consumption leaves us awash in oceans of garbage of our own making. Porter, a first-time author and nonprofit climate program director, offers a responsible point of view in nine easy pieces ranging from recyclings patriotic beginnings in WW II to the psychology of consumption and its economic drivers emerging today from the remnants of the throw-away society that was its legacy. Between the covers of this important and timely book, readers will find useful and often interesting tips, as well as chapter notes, citations, and a working index. It may be about trash, but trash it is not: it is rather a vitally useful work that reminds readers of the need for effective waste management and recycling practices in this age of global climate change. Recommended.Porter, climate and recycling director for the nonprofit Green America, offers a succinct treatise on the history, efficacy, and future of recycling and waste disposal in her informative debut. She begins with the history of recycling as a patriotic act during WWII and includes delightful details about the ubiquity of victory gardens and the social pressure exerted by scrap drives. Revelations about the aggressive marketing done by manufacturers to convince Americans that waste is their personal failing (and not one that industry holds responsibility for) sit alongside direct, actionable advice on lessening ones environmental impact. Porter also discusses what she terms environmental racism; for example, the seizure of indigenous lands for production and harvesting, and the overwhelming placement of landfills and incinerators in black or Hispanic communities. Porter also delves into the individulãÙ