The cost to recycle metal has grown with the industry, yet tons (literally) of scrap metal is generated from homes, industries and the use of consumer equipment such as vehicles and airplanes. Electronic waste from such items as phones, laptops, office equipment, and home appliances has also been churning at millions of tons of scrap metal, but what is the cost to recycle metal?
The cost of recycling metal
Over the years, governments and other private scrap dealers have stepped up their efforts to recycle several types of waste that include metal. The cost of recycling metal includes the cost of collecting metal from homesteads and the industries, sorting them out, smelting hem or fabricating the metal to something else.
It costs about lots of dollars to collect a ton of scrap metal from homesteads and scrap yards. This includes the cost of transporting the scrap metal to the recycling facility. Different metals require different processes to make them usable again. Non-ferrous metals such as bronze, copper, and aluminum are easier to recycle than the ferrous metals. It costs the recycling companies around $50 to process a ton of scrap metal. In total, an average of $200 is spent in recycling a ton of scrap metal. These costs may go down especially where the owners of the waste sort it themselves by placing the recyclable materials in the blue bins and then transporting them to the scrap dealers. However the cost is negligible considering the significant benefits that leap from recycling these metal. Besides one cannot talk of the cost if he/she thinks of the environmental and health hazards that might arise from unmanaged hills of scrap metal.
Here is a list of some of environmental benefits of recycling scrap metal:
Checks and Balances on the depletion of natural resources
If we continued mining every single piece of metal we need from the virgin ores, the natural supplies would be depleted in a few years. Recycling ensures that we mine less of the natural resources and lead to less damage to the ecosystems where the ores are found. The cost of recycling the metallic object cannot be compared to the depletion and environmental destruction that arise from mining sites.
Lowers the amount of energy used in making metal parts
Recycling metals such as aluminum take less the 10% of the energy and less workforce used to mine the ores, extract, and purify the metals for use. Recycling electronic waste gives large quantities of precious metals such as gold, platinum, and copper at relatively low cost that mining the same.
Recycling metal is a good environment mitigation procedure
Metal parts can remain in dumpsites for thousands of years without any change in their physical qualities. The littering also affects the living organisms and sea animals and leads to the poisoning the water and soil (through paints and components of the alloys). When we recycle, we ensure that the environment is clean and safe. There are also fewer landfills and less poisoning of the soil. Therefore, taking the used and less needed metallic item to scrap either for sale or discard save lots of money that could be used to try to save aquatic live and the money spent to save terrestrial plants. Recycling metallic object minimizes possible soil poisoning hence a supportive way of managing health plantation. Keep in mind that less toxic soil yields more than toxic soil.