Norma Torres: “I am pleased to see the House addressing the issue of recycling. The bill under consideration today would encourage…”

“I am pleased to see the House addressing the issue of recycling. The bill under consideration today would encourage voluntary battery recycling, curtail the use of mercury-containing batteries and improve the procedures for recycling such batteries. The bill is a step in the right direction, but it's only a very small, half-step. We can and we should be doing much more to fix our country's critical solid waste disposal problems. Common items such as lead acid batteries, newsprint, motor oil and tires continue to clog neighborhood landfills, incinerators and sewers. Communities all over America continue to grapple with the serious health and safety hazards that result. There is a way, however, to turn these items usually treated as trash into valuable resources. And there is a way to meet this environmental challenge, which does not rely on command and control regulation. Mr. Speaker, 7 years ago, along with the late Senator John Heinz and former Senator Wirth, I introduced a innovative concept in environmental protection. The idea was simple--use market forces to achieve environmental protection. Very simply, our legislation offered a solution to the demand side of the supply-and-demand equation. Recycling is not just the process of having a product collected, recycling means turning the old product into a new product and using it again. Garbage is still garbage unless it has value throughout its lifecycle.”