Recycling old diapers

[bonniesayers]

Yes this is starting to happen here in Los Angeles County. Interesting that the city (Santa Clarita) is known for having a large population of police officers and fire fighters as residents...

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California City Turns Old Diapers to New Uses
Fri Nov 8, 8:54 PM ET

SANTA CLARITA, Calif. (Reuters) - Tossing dirty diapers in a garbage dump may soon be nearly as unthinkable as throwing the baby out with the bath water.



Soiled disposable diapers have a future that few ever dreamed of -- an afterlife as oil filters, roof shingles and vinyl siding, according to officials in Santa Clarita, California.


The Los Angeles suburb on Friday became the first U.S. city to institute a diaper recycling program.


The alternative is to continue shipping disposable diapers -- which take nearly 500 years to decompose -- to landfills, officials said.


"It's to reduce the amount of waste that goes to landfill," said Cameron Smyth, Santa Clarita's mayor pro tem. "We have a limited amount of space."


Already 20 billion soiled diapers are buried in U.S. landfills every year, representing about 7 billion pounds (3.175 billion kg) of garbage, according to Santa Clarita officials.


"We're having untreated human waste going into landfills," said Nazareth Chobanian, vice president with recycling technology company Knowaste LLC, manager of Santa Clarita's $500,000 program.


With a population of just over 151,000, Santa Clarita is Los Angeles County's fourth-largest city, and about 100 babies are born there each month.


Other cities may follow Santa Clarita's example. California cities were required by a state law to reduce the amount of garbage sent to landfills by 50 percent by 2000 even though many cities have not met that target.


Conventional recycling programs for glass, metals and paper have helped Santa Clarita reduce the garbage it sends to landfills by 40 percent and city hopes the diaper program will help it exceed the state's target.


"This will definitely help us get there," said city spokeswoman Gail Ortiz.

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What a thought!

Does this mean that when the garbage gets picked up someone then goes through the bags and places the dirty and disposed of diapers elsewhere?

My goodness my son who is six is still in diapers and he must have his own landfill by now!!!

Bonnie

[magenta321]

I doubt anyone will do the garbage picking for you.

I imagine it would be like recycling programs already in effect. Recycling some objects is the law here. However, no one actually checks to make sure you really do. For instance, if I threw away a soda can and it wound up on my curb in a garbage bag, I technically broke a law. However, no one will be sifting through my garbage bag to find that soda can.

I'm sure the diaper thing would be the same.

[sylvanb]

Oh. I thought you meant cloth diapers...as dishtowels. Nothing comes close.