In an update to municipal recycling, “The Kojo Nnamdi Show” broadcast from WAMU out of Washington D.C. reached out to Neil Seldman, the co-founder of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, to detail what has changed in the metro area and the challenges to this vital infrastructure. Seldman details the economic development benefits of local recycling and advocates for greater infrastructure investment.… Read More
Dan Knapp and Mary Lou Van Deventer sit down with long-time friend and ILSR co-founder Neil Seldman and Communications Manager Nick Stumo-Langer to discuss their successful reuse business and how they fit into the wider Berkeley community.… Read More
On November 8th, the Institute for Local Self-Reliance’s co-founder and researcher for the Waste to Wealth initiative Neil Seldman presented to the Green America audience for their webinar, Recycling in the U.S. here.You can stream the presentation from Green America’s website The … Read More
In The Washington Post, Written by Neil Seldman.
The decision to cut twice-a-week garbage collection to once a week is a reasonable response to budget overruns. In today’s world of tight budgets, many cities have made this transition, particularly with the introduction of recycling, which reduces the amount of garbage to be collected.… Read More
Strewn in streets and alleys. Dumped in a landfill. Burned in an incinerator and, ultimately, inhaled by residents.
About 20% of Baltimore’s residential trash is recycled. That’s extremely low compared to the 35% national average for cities. Some jurisdictions have achieved 50% and 60%. West Coast cities including Portland, San Francisco and Los Angeles have reached even higher levels.
In Charm City, what doesn’t get recycled ends up in some not-too-charming places, including the aging Wheelabrator Baltimore waste-to-energy incinerator, locally known as BRESCO.
But a decision point is looming: the city’s contract to send trash to BRESCO is set to expire in four years. Continuing to use the incinerator means expanding the Quarantine Road Landfill, which is approaching capacity and accepts the incinerator’s ash, as well as residents’ solid waste.… Read More
In this article for Baltimore Brew chief editor Fern Shen interviewed ILSR co-founder and Waste to Wealth researcher Neil Seldman on the change in the city of Baltimore’s solid waste plan to incorporate more recycling into the community’s economy.… Read More
In response to an article in The Washington Times on the “efficiencies” and “benefits” of burning trash, our co-founder Neil Seldman responded with an editorial piece about how helping communities with recycling-based economic development makes them more vibrant and dynamic.… Read More
In a great article for Waste Dive, reporter Cole Rosengren features our recently released report on the possibilities that the city of Baltimore has in increasing its proportions of recycling and increasing economic development from the policy change.… Read More
In this episode, Chris Mitchell, the director of our Community Broadband Networks initiative, interviews Neil Seldman, ILSR co-founder and senior staff member of the Waste to Wealth initiative about the hidden value in our waste stream and, specifically, some recent comments made by the CEO of Waste Management, Inc. disparaging the value of recycling.… Read More
