Posts Tagged ‘green’

Why is it so tough to recycle in rural communities?

November 25th, 2009

Congratulations Salem!  You are one of the newest communities in South Dakota to participate in and benefit from the RecycleBank recycling program. 

Like most Americans, I understand the importance of recycling, but I’ve not always been as consistent in my recycling efforts as I should be.  After all, it’s usually inconvenient and there’s very little reward for recycling (outside of it is the right thing to do). 

According to this article in the Mitchell Daily Republic, some of these reasons have disappeared in Salem and in fourteen other rural SD communities through the RecycleBank program being offered by Novak Sanitary Services. 

Through the RecycleBank program, residents are (1) able to receive coupons based on the volume of waste they recycle, and (2) don’t have to sort their recyclable material.

When I lived in South Carolina during the early 1990s, my wife and I were regular recyclers, but fell out of the practice after moving back to rural South Dakota.  The reasons for this backslide were simple: there was no organized recycling in the town where I lived; and no one else collected any waste other than aluminum cans.

The Daily Republic article has me thinking:  How many rural communities in South Dakota offer recycling?  The article identifies fourteen additional small towns using the RecycleBank program, but I wonder how many others are recycling through other programs? 

And if rural communities are not offering recycling services, why not?  Why is it so difficult to offer recycling in a small town? 

 

Photo credit:  sparkle lavalamp - Flickr

 

 

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Posted in In the News, Rural | Comments (2)

The Climate and Energy Project

December 9th, 2008

I recently ran across a promising new project of The Land Institute in Salina, Kansas. The Climate and Energy Project (CEP) was launched in Februrary of 2007, and has since grown to a full-time staff of six. Randy Parry (Rural Learning Center President) saw a video from CEP at the W. K. Kellogg Foundation’s Rural People Rural Policy Network gathering in Kalamazoo, MI this Fall.

The CEP is about creating climate and energy conversations across the Great Plains, and staff hope to inspire stewardship, resilience, innovation and balance in rural places in the Midwest. Here’s a super video from the CEP team, focusing in on their home state, called “Where Does Kansas Stand?”

 

I’d encourage you to poke around a bit on the Climate and Energy Project website, including a great section called “Take Steps,” with tips (from free to expensive) for farms, businesses, and congregations. What does climate change and energy consumption mean for rural communities? Please share your thoughts in the Comments.

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Posted in Economic Development, Leadership, Rural, Rural Life | Comments (0)