yes. we'll take your trash... we need it!

I heard about Sweden's trash dilemma earlier this year. A very successful recycling program has resulted in only 4% of Sweden's waste going to landfill (compared to over 50% of waste in the US).

The resultant dilemma of this success is a lack of a fuel source for waste-to-energy production facilities. To overcome the shortage, Sweden sources waste from other nations such as Norway... and they pay Sweden to take it!

The notion of recycling is catching on here... albeit exceptionally slowly. Our neighborhood recycling service now includes a dedicated recycling bin in the standard service. When we first moved in four years ago, we had to pay extra to have our waste for recycling removed! Guess how popular that service was :-/

I wrote about my frustration with America's apparent poor environmental awareness when we first arrived in Chicago here.