Climate Change and Our Stuff

By Larry Danos
and
Assisted by
Timonie Hood and Eileen Sheehan
(**See Disclaimer below)

Next time you recycle a soda can, did you realize you are taking a small step
toward reducing climate change? Recycling just a single aluminum can saves enough
energy to power a TV set for three hours. Making cans from recycled aluminum, uses
95% less energy than making them from scratch. So if you recycle a can, the
aluminum for a future can does not need to be mined and manufactured. This simple
example illustrates the connection between climate change and conserving materials
or resources The climate-materials connection is a focus for the office where I work
at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region IX.

This article provides an overview of how EPA Region IX is integrating Climate Change
into the environmental programs within its Waste Management Division (WMD). The
EPA’s Office of Resource Conservation and Recovery has developed a long-term
strategy made public on their web page with a vision of what the future should look
like as far as waste and handling of materials to prevent waste is concerned:
http://www.epa.gov/wastes/inforesources/pubs/vision.pdf.

The EPA emphasizes a more responsible approach based on conserving raw materials
and conserving resources in manufacturing, packaging, transport and the distribution
of products. It’s a more “upstream” approach to products that will also emphasize the
use of lower toxicity materials in all aspects of production and retail marketing. It
assumes a greater public awareness of sustainability and even an “industrial ecology
mantra” from the corporate world to look at the lifecycle of products. This may all
seem like a fantasy at this time but this report generated in 2002 is meant to help
formulate strategies that will take this country to the year 2020 and beyond.

Building on this work is the new field of “Climaterials” – connecting use of materials to
climate change. EPA research on the climate/materials connection has found that
44% of greenhouse gas emissions come from products and packaging. (Use this pie
chart if you can have images/weblink
http://www.productpolicy.org/ppi/attachments/PPI_Climate_Change_and_Products_Whit
e_Paper_September_2009.pdf). Here are a few facts to show the impact of our stuff
on climate change:

• Our national 33% recycling rate results in the avoidance of about 250
million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (MMTCO2E) in GHG
emissions each year. That’s the same as:
  Conserving 13,014,771 Households’ Annual Energy Consumption
 Conserving 11,231,804,983 Gallons of Gasoline
• Reducing packaging use by 50% would reduce up to 105 Million Metric
Tons of CO2 Equivalent each year

The new mindset after the “3Rs”, “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle”, will be “Environmental
Responsibility” and “Sustainable Materials Management” with a new look at the
lifecycle of products and how they are produced and handled, along with the reduction
or elimination of waste and, especially, toxic materials that might otherwise be
dumped into our environment. The EPA’s San Francisco Regional Office works with
State, City and Tribal Governments, as well as, industry, Non-Governmental
Organizations (NGOs), and other organizations in the prevention of waste, proper
production and handling of materials to prevent greenhouse gases and the recovery of
materials from our waste products.

When we think of the act of managing waste, what comes to mind are landfills,
recycling and compost facilities, and possibly, recycle/buy back stores of various
types. Landfilling, recycling, composting, have all evolved to new levels of
sustainability. For example, landfills and anaerobic digesters (a type of sewage and
food waste composting) can capture gases to produce power in new trash-to-energy
sites. Recycling markets have expanded globally. In fact the largest U.S. exports by
volume are waste paper and scrap metal! Composting has become a bigger business
than it previously was.

Materials management is really the subject of this paper and nowhere is it more
important than in the construction world. The U.S. generates over 100 million tons of
building-related materials each year so the Regional office is focusing on “green”
construction practices. Partnering with the construction industry, there are many
changes taking place. EPA’s “Green Building” web site is:
http://www.epa.gov/greenbuilding/. Partnering and stewardship is what is what the
WMD does best.

Americans spend about 90% of our time indoors, so in many ways our buildings have
become our environment. Green Building includes siting, design, construction, and
deconstruction, and also includes energy, water, and environmental efficiency, indoor
air quality, environmentally preferable material use, sustainable development
practices, and waste reduction efforts. It’s considered “green” to construct buildings
using reusable materials gathered from sources that have become available and
employ the latest energy and water saving devices.

Deconstruction is basically the art of taking buildings apart while salvaging the
materials for reuse. It could be lumber, bricks, tiles, shingles, windows, doors,
plumbing & electrical fixtures, rebar, broken concrete, and more. So part of the new
design is to make buildings easily de-constructible for reuse. The mind set assumes
the net result of looking at construction and un-construction to be more compatible
with less use of energy, thereby, reducing green house gases. The types of buildings
included in these are homes, of course, but also includes schools, commercial
buildings, laboratories, health care facilities, etc. The authors of this article worked on
a project to develop a map of companies that can help you deconstruct buildings and
find reused and green building materials.
http://epa.gov/region9/buildingreuse/index.html.

Resource Conservation and Pollution Prevention are not limited to construction

practices. EPA has a Resource Conservation web site:
http://www.epa.gov/osw/conserve/index.htm and a Pollution Prevention web site:
http://www.epa.gov/p2/. While Resource Conservation has to do with green building,
handling waste of all kinds from agricultural to commercial, Pollution Prevention
involves partnering with businesses, NGOs, governments, and others to find ways to
redesign products and business processes to prevent the generation of by-products
and especially waste substances that may be toxic in nature. These partnerships try
to find out how to better deal with such practices to prevent the generation of toxics
early on – at the design or manufacturing stage.

Electronics have been a major challenge for resource conservation and for pollution
prevention in the last twenty years. EPEAT (Electronic Product Environmental
Assessment Test) is a public IEEE standard for the greening of electronic equipment
manufacturing. You can find a list of green-certified EPEAT computers at
http://epeat.net/.

There’s also the EPA’s Energy Star program http://www.energystar.gov, which

identifies greener appliances and industry-specific practices. EPA is also promoting
green meeting procedures, green salons, green cleaners, and many more partnerships
focused on reducing energy and toxics in our environment.

**In writing this article the authors do not represent the official view or policy of the
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.