gopalakrishna

The most common metals we need to consider when discussing recycling are aluminum and steel. Some other metals–like gold, silver, brass, and copper–are so valuable that they are rarely thrown away. They do not create a waste disposal problem.

Aluminum and steel do. Americans use 100 million steel cans and 200 million aluminum beverage cans every day. What should we do with this metal waste? Should we burn it in waste-to-energy plants? Should we landfill it? Or should we recycle it?

After source reduction (using less aluminum to make a can, for example), recycling is the most efficient way to reduce aluminum and steel waste.

Unlike paper and plastics,burning metal trash in waste-to-energy plants creates no energy. Instead, aluminum melts and steel just gets very hot. Magnets can be used to collect steel scrap at waste-to-energy plants, though, and then the scrap can be shipped to steel plants for recycling.

Landfilling is usually not a good alternative either. Aluminum, in particular, is so valuable as a scrap material that it simply does not make sense to bury it.