Apple refutes EU USB-C claims, could increase e-waste instead

Although criticised by some, energy from waste is seen as a vital component of the UK’s waste management system. Chris Elliott looks at where it fits as we transition to a circular economy.
It’s one of the burning issues in the quest for a circular economy: is incinerating waste a good thing or not?
On one side of the argument, there are those who believe it can be a useful way of making energy, and that it’s preferable to landfilling. It’s also a way of destroying waste that cannot be managed in any other way, because the material involved is dangerous, such as infectious bio-wastes from hospitals, or hazardous wastes from industry.

Whether delivery or takeout, as a weekday reprieve from cooking or festive food for a weekend celebration, people love their pizza. Over the course of a year in the U.S., people consume an estimated 3 billion pizzas. And during February’s Super Bowl game, Domino’s pizza in the U.S. typically sells around 2 million pizzas. The love for pizza has longevity, too. According to a Reader’s Digest poll, the single food that most Americans would want to eat for the rest of their lives is pizza. While we can debate Hawaiian versus pepperoni and turn our noses up at anchovies, there’s no agreeing to disagree on this: Pizza boxes can be recycled. There’s proof. The Cheese and Grease Study – Mired in myth, and confused by cheese and grease, people have been burying the pizza box in their trash bins, assuming it cannot be recycled. Allow me to set the record straight – it can! In 2020, my company, WestRock, conducted a Grease and Cheese study that concluded normal amounts of grease and residual cheese do not negatively affect the manufacturing of new products from this recycled fiber. These findings were endorsed by industry partners including the American Forest and Paper Association (AF&PA). Why does this matter? Pizza boxes are made of high-quality corrugated paper, which can be recycled at least seven times, according to the AF&PA. That means we could potentially recover and reuse upwards of 600,000 tons of corrugated board a year! In 2019, to help dispel the myth that…