Wasting the Nation.indd - Groundwork
Wasting the Nation.indd - Groundwork
Wasting the Nation.indd - Groundwork
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Chapter 1: Dust and Ashesunless <strong>the</strong>re is an infrastructure to ga<strong>the</strong>r it. That infrastructure will only be builtif <strong>the</strong>re is a profitable gas market and if building <strong>the</strong> infrastructure does not delay<strong>the</strong> production of oil. This is because oil is <strong>the</strong> more profitable product and rapidproduction represents <strong>the</strong> most efficient return on capital invested. The definitionof gas as waste thus turns on shareholder ‘value’. On South Africa’s gold belt, <strong>the</strong>old toxic mine dumps are being reworked with <strong>the</strong> latest technologies to extractgold that earlier miners had missed – while a fine dust laced with uranium blowsover Johannesburg’s poorer sou<strong>the</strong>rn suburbs. Lately, mine managers have arguedthat <strong>the</strong>ir waste is not waste, but ‘mining residues’ which may one day becomeresources as future technologies allow for improved extraction. A similar argumentmay now be made for landfills <strong>the</strong>mselves. In Britain, landfill managers startedmapping what was dumped where in <strong>the</strong> 1980s. At <strong>the</strong> height of <strong>the</strong> commoditiesboom in early 2008, several firms proposed using <strong>the</strong>se maps to mine <strong>the</strong> landfillsfor materials. With <strong>the</strong> subsequent drop in commodities, this resource will havereverted to waste.In terms of materials conservation, recycling waste before it gets to landfill isobviously a far better option. Mixing waste toge<strong>the</strong>r, even before dumping, alreadycontaminates it, sucks value from it and creates hazards. Waste pickers working at<strong>the</strong> margins where markets require <strong>the</strong> waste of value, including human value, arealso working <strong>the</strong> wrong side of <strong>the</strong> border of <strong>the</strong> unclean and dangerous. They are<strong>the</strong>mselves represented as dangerous, not least to <strong>the</strong> procedures of orderly wastemanagement, and <strong>the</strong>y work in danger and at <strong>the</strong> mercy of a volatile recyclablesmarket.Dumping on <strong>the</strong> poorFor industry and <strong>the</strong> middle classes, ‘away’ is mostly where poor people live. Observingand fighting against this gave rise to <strong>the</strong> idea of environmental injustice and racismin <strong>the</strong> US. As activist Dana Alston put it, “We have learned … that communities ofcolour are targets for <strong>the</strong> siting of toxic waste dumps and most hazardous industries”not wanted in white, middle class communities [1993: 188]. This targeting wasaccompanied by <strong>the</strong> promise of jobs in areas with high unemployment. But “<strong>the</strong> fewjobs that we did get were lower paying and more hazardous jobs” [189]. The US- 14 - groundWork - <strong>Wasting</strong> <strong>the</strong> <strong>Nation</strong>