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A little over a year and a half ago, my roommates and I decided to set up a compost bin outside our apartment for food scraps.
一年半前，我和我的室友决定在我们的公寓外面放一个堆肥箱，用来存放食物残渣。
We were trying to divert as much waste as we could from the landfill.
我们当时正试图尽可能多地减少垃圾进入垃圾填埋场。
And when we nestled that black compost roller in the corner of our yard, we thought we were well on our way to eco-conscious bliss.
当我们把那台黑色的滚筒式堆肥箱放在院子的角落里时，我们以为我们已经踏上了环保的幸福之路。
Our system was pretty simple.
我们的系统非常简单。
All of our food waste went into the compost; all of our plastics and glass got thrown into the recycling bin and everything else got sent to the trash.
我们把所有的食物垃圾都扔进了堆肥箱，把所有的塑料和玻璃都扔进了回收箱，把其他的都扔进了垃圾桶。
It was great except for one big problem.
除了一个大问题外，一切都很好。
We quickly discovered that the building's recycling dumpster also happened to be our trash bin.
我们很快发现，公寓的可回收垃圾箱也恰好是我们的垃圾桶。
Our landlord and even the waste management company claimed that we could commingle our trash and recycling in the same dumpster and everything would get somehow sorted out at the factory.
我们的房东和垃圾管理公司都声称，我们可以把垃圾和可回收物放在同一个垃圾箱里，所有的东西都会在工厂里以某种方式被分类。
This seemed very fishy.
这似乎很可疑。
So it got me thinking about how much of recycling actually gets recycled.
所以这让我开始思考到底有多少可回收物被回收了。
And really when it comes down to it, does recycling even lower a person's environmental impact?
归根结底，回收再利用真的能降低一个人对环境的影响吗？
After some online investigation, I discovered that the recycling journey of something like a plastic bottle is actually pretty long.
经过网上调查，我发现像塑料瓶这样的东西的回收之旅其实是很长的。
It begins with your last sip of water and might end halfway across the world in a recycling plant in China.
它开始于你最后一口水，可能在地球另一端的中国的一个回收工厂结束。
And there are numerous steps in that process where the plastic bottle can easily go from recycling to trash.
在这个过程中有很多步骤。塑料瓶在此过程中可以很容易地从可回收物变成垃圾。
So let's start at the beginning.
那么让我们从头开始吧。
In the city of Chicago, which is where I live, recycling collectors come around every other week to pick up blue recycling bins, and they'll often lift the lid and take a peek inside.
在我居住的芝加哥市，回收人员每隔一周就会过来收集蓝色的回收箱，他们经常会掀开盖子看一下里面。
There is anything out of the ordinary like a soccer ball or even a bunch of plastic shopping bags, both of which can't be recycled in Chicago.
回收箱里会有一些不寻常的东西，比如足球，甚至是一堆塑料购物袋，这两样东西在芝加哥都是不能回收的。
They send the whole bin to the landfill.
他们把整个回收箱送到垃圾填埋场。
That means just one big contaminant convert a whole lot of recyclables including our brave little plastic bottle to the landfill.
这意味着仅仅一个大的污染物就能将包括小塑料瓶在内的一大堆可回收物品运送到垃圾填埋场。
If, however, the bottle makes it past that first hurdle, it gets sent on its way to a sorting center, which is used heavily in single-stream recycling program, like Chicago's.
然而，如果瓶子通过了第一道障碍，它就会被送往分拣中心，分拣中心在单向回收计划中被大量使用，比如芝加哥的分拣中心。
While single-stream programs often make it easier and more convenient to recycle at home, it means more contaminants and more work on the processing app as Susan Collins of the container recycling Institute confirms what single-stream wins in volume, its sacrifices and quality.
虽然单向回收计划通常会使在家回收变得更容易、更方便，但这意味着会有更多的污染物和更多的处理应用程序上的操作步骤，容器循环再造研究所的苏珊·柯林斯证实了单向回收在数量、牺牲和质量方面的优势。
And in the Chicago area, a private company called Waste Management does the majority of this processing.
在芝加哥地区，一家名为Waste Management的私人公司负责大部分的处理工作。
They saw at 24,000 tons of recycled materials every single month.
他们每个月会看到2.4万吨可回收材料。
So at the facility, a combination of high-tech machines and human eyes sort through every piece of recycling, point out what doesn't belong, like plastics caked in food waste or even more plastic bags, all of which gets sent to you guessed it the landfill.
因此，在这家公司里，对每一件可回收物品进行分类需要联合利用高科技机器和人眼，它们会指出哪些物品不可回收，比如粘在食物垃圾中的塑料，或者更多的塑料袋，所有这些都会被送到垃圾填埋场。
According to the area director of recycling for Waste Management, 18 to 20 percent and sometimes as high as 30 percent of recycled materials are contaminated and get sent to the trash, which means that even in the processing phase, every year approximately 31,000 tons of materials put in recycling bins around Chicago end up getting thrown out.
根据Waste Management公司可回收部门区域主任的说法，18%到20%，有时高达30%的可回收材料受到污染，之后被送往垃圾桶，这意味着即使在处理阶段，芝加哥每年也有大约3.1万吨放在回收箱里的材料最终被丢弃。
But if that plastic bottle were following makes its way through this gauntlet of machines, it'll eventually get bundled, compressed and shipped to the highest bidder.
但是，如果塑料瓶通过了机器的考验，它最终会被捆扎、压缩并运往出价最高的买家手中。
In many cases, the highest bidder is a facility overseas.
在许多情况下，出价最高的是一家海外工厂。
The U.S. exports one-third of its recycling and almost half of that goes to China.
美国将三分之一的可回收物进行出口，其中近一半销往中国。
But in 2018, Chinese recycling facilities started to refuse 24 kinds of our waste.
但在2018年，中国的回收工厂开始拒绝美国的24种垃圾。
This now means that the fate of our recycling is unclear.
这意味着美国可回收物的命运还不明朗。
In some cases like in Portland, Oregon, the bids for recyclable materials have become so low that recycling facilities have turned away avid recyclers with some customers reporting that companies are telling them to throw all their recyclables in the trash.
在俄勒冈州波特兰市等地，可回收材料的出价已经变得如此之低，以至于回收工厂拒绝了狂热的回收商，一些客户报告说，公司告诉他们把所有可回收材料都扔进垃圾桶。
Understanding this relatively complex process is important, because when we recycle a plastic bottle, its environmental impact isn't neutralized.
理解这个相对复杂的过程很重要，因为当我们回收塑料瓶时，它对环境的影响并没有被中和。
Recycling still has fossil fuel emissions tied to it. Yes.
回收再利用仍然与化石燃料排放有关。是的。
The environmental costs associated with recycling are less than with extracting new materials.
与回收相关的环境成本比提取新材料的成本低。
That doesn't mean that our current waste management system is the best, it can be.
这并不意味着我们目前的垃圾管理系统是最好的，它可以是最好的。
Plastic bottles can only be recycled a maximum of seven to nine times, but materials will still last for 450 years.
塑料瓶最多只能被回收7到9次，但材料仍然可以继续存在450年。
Eventually that plastic bottle you use will end up in a landfill.
最终，你使用的塑料瓶会被扔进垃圾填埋场。
Ultimately recycling is a beneficial patch for a problem we've already created.
归根结底，回收再利用是解决我们已经造成的问题的一个有益的补丁。
But it allows for our true unsustainable problem of overconsumption to continue on.
但它却允许我们真正不可持续的过度消费问题继续存在。
While it is important for companies and governments to create less environmentally intensive packaging systems and waste systems, it would be foolish to wait around for that kind of systematic change.
虽然公司和政府创建较为环保的包装系统和垃圾系统很重要，但坐等这种系统性的改变是愚蠢的。
So recycling has to go hand in hand with a more serious interrogation of our consumption habits.
因此，回收可利用必须同改善我们的消费习惯齐头并进。
While movements like Zero Waste might be a little extreme for some, they do good work at getting to the root of the problem.
虽然像“零垃圾”这样的活动对一些人来说可能有点极端，但它们在解决问题的根源方面发挥着很好的作用。
For the average consumer, Heidi Bischoff's concept of conscious waste might provide better guidance.
对于普通消费者来说，海蒂·比肖夫的“有垃圾意识”的概念可能会提供更好的指导。
She focuses in on plastics, but her five R's mantra can be applicable in many situations.
她专注于塑料，但她的“五个R”的准则适用于许多情况。
First reflect on your current habits, then refuse what you don't need, reduce what you do need, reuse what you can't refuse or reduce and lastly rethink recycling.
首先反思你目前的习惯，然后拒绝你不需要的东西，减少你确实需要的东西，重复使用你不能拒绝或减少的东西，最后重新考虑回收利用。
In a sense that recycling bin we so often turn to should be approached as a last resort.
从某种意义上说，我们经常求助的回收箱应该作为最后的手段。
