The Washington Post has an interesting article on recycling in the U.S. The prices of most recyclables are down, and although people are putting more recycling on the curb than ever before, there is more non-recyclable material in it than ever before. The technology has improved, but packaging design has also changed a lot towards extremely lightweight, plastic packaging that is cheap to make and ship.

This reminds me of the classic book Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way we Make Things, which talks about truly sustainable product design. Clearly, the companies that design this packaging have no incentive to consider how it is disposed of. They don’t pay any of that cost and it is not their problem. Their incentive is to produce cheap, lightweight materials. If on the other hand, they considered the recycling process alongside the manufacturing and transportation process, and designed products with all three in mind, they could produce truly reusable and recyclable materials.