> Sweden has had incredible success with recycling in recent years
That line is more false than true. For the most part they are not recycling their trash, they are incinerating it.
Additionally Sweden is tiny. Trash there is brought to local recycling centers with 6 to 8 or more different bins, and people are expected to sort their trash.
How would you do that in the US? Trucks with 8 compartments? Where would you even keep that many different trash cans? The US is very large, you can't expect people to transport their recycling.
> The US is very large, you can't expect people to transport their recycling.
It is common in rural settings in the US for people to transport, themselves, both their trash and their recycling to a central drop off point. So there are lots of US residents that do exactly this periodically.
Curbside pickup is typically a system found in more urban portions of the US, but it is far from ubiquitous across the entirety of the US.
> you can't expect people to transport their recycling
Why on earth not? The majority used to haul their own garbage to the town dump a just few decades ago (and some still do in smaller towns). Ubiquity of curbside pickup is relatively new -- doubly so for recycling. And recyclables are a heck of a lot more pleasant to carry in the car than rotting kitchen scraps.
We have curbside trash but no recycling and are about 15 miles (+3000 ft elevation change) to the recycling drop off center. I’ve wondered if cranking the engine on the pickup is worth it in fuel consumption.
Those bins looks pretty nice, although the balance between the comportments seems odd. (The paper compartment (2 of them?) is too large, as is the white one the right - is that for "other"?)
Not sure I'd be able to get that down my stairs though.
> I never transport my trash more than 5 meters.
How is it picked up? Curbside? Curious what kind of truck they use.
Also, do you keep that in your house? Do you go outside in the winter for each item? Or do you stage the trash in the house, and sort it later?
I live in a house and each bin is emptied bi-weekly by a regular garbage truck. The two front-most compartments are actually not fixed to the bin, so the bin is lifted up, the front-most part is lifted and emptied (in a vertically split compartment), then the rest in another. (I used to watch this with the kids a lot...)
Apartments often have a similar setup but with one large bin per category in the basement. There is also another system where you are supplied with color coded garbage bags for each type of waste that you then throw in the same bin.
> For the most part they are not recycling their trash, they are incinerating it.
Actually, they are doing both. They have an incredibly high recycling rate, what is left they largely burn. Over time they have increased their recycling to the point that they have large spare capacity. Which is why they now import a comparable amount to what they burn.
How far are you traveling? It's very very very unlikely that what you are doing is actually good for the environment, unless you are making a trash run only every few months.
That line is more false than true. For the most part they are not recycling their trash, they are incinerating it.
Additionally Sweden is tiny. Trash there is brought to local recycling centers with 6 to 8 or more different bins, and people are expected to sort their trash.
How would you do that in the US? Trucks with 8 compartments? Where would you even keep that many different trash cans? The US is very large, you can't expect people to transport their recycling.