We're working on a project in Montreal that's trying to do zero waste by 2020. There's a twofold process. One process is to look at a technology, a pneumatic, centralized waste system, which actually takes the responsibility, to a certain extent, away from the resident. The second one is to actually change our living habits and go about it from a low-technology perspective. We're in the midst of discussing this with the City of Montreal. We don't know which way they're going to go.
One of the examples I have, which is very frustrating, is happening in London, England. Everybody knows about the amazing requirement to have 5% renewables, and yet at the same time they're taking waste wood chips from outside of the city and trucking them in every day. The amount of carbon that's related to the transport to actually truck in the wood chips is actually worse than the actual burning and saving of the waste, and it's turning “waste” into a verb and not a noun.
I agree with Mr. Murray's attitude that we cannot look at one item in isolation. We have to understand the entire life cycle analysis of any of the systems we're talking about.
I know this lack of cyclical, holistic thinking is very exhausting--and I appreciate Andrew Pride's comment on how exhausting this exercise is--but as we simplify in order to pass subsidy strategies, we actually shoot ourselves in the foot. There's a built-in complexity that's healthy and that's related to a certain duplicity that's important.