Cradle to Cradle by Michael Braungart

Author:Michael Braungart [Michael Braungart and William McDonough]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781407021324
Publisher: Random House

In preindustrial culture, people did consume things. Most products would safely biodegrade once they were thrown away, buried, or burned. Metals were the exception: these were seen as highly valuable and were melted down and reused. (They were actually what we call early technical nutrients.) But as industrialization advanced, the consumption mode persisted, even though most manufactured items could no longer actually be consumed. In times of scarcity, a recognition of the value of technical materials would flare up; people who grew up during the Great Depression, for example, were careful about reusing jars, jugs, and aluminum foil, and during World War II, people saved rubber bands, aluminum foil, steel, and other materials to feed industrial needs. But as cheaper materials and new synthetics flooded the postwar market, it became less expensive for industries to make a new aluminum, plastic, or glass bottle or package at a central plant and ship it out than to build up local infrastructures for collecting, transporting, cleaning, and processing things for reuse. Similarly, in the early decades of industrialization, people might pass down, repair, or sell old service products like ovens, refrigerators, and phones to junk dealers. Today most so-called durables are tossed. (Who on Earth would repair a cheap toaster today? It is much easier to buy a new one than it is to send the parts back to the manufacturer or track down someone to repair it locally.) Throwaway products have become the norm.

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