Recycling Reform is More Important Than Ever for Our Community’s Future

This piece is a follow-up to “The Second Newburyport Renaissance is About to Begin. A Retrospective from the Year 2051,” published January 7, 2025. In that piece, John Giordano argues for four major reforms that would improve Newburyport over the coming decades. This article details one of those reforms: sustainability

The challenge of establishing a sustainable Newburyport is certainly daunting, but it is very encouraging that the Newburyport community has been on task for at least the past three decades. Newburyporters have long seen their corner of the world as a precious place to live and protect, and really got into gear in the 2000s when the threat of climate change to coastal communities became clearer.

The city government’s Energy Advisory Committee has been looking at energy policy since 2006, just before the emergence of the citizen’s group, SEED (Seacoast Energy and Environmental Design). SEED was a lively and remarkable grassroots effort that used a hub-and-spokes model for idea development and implementation.

My participation in SEED in the late 2000s led to the development of what was called the SLC (Sustainable Living Community). Our SLC was comprised of eight families, all with young children, who shared tools and resources, and used a currency system for bartered services such as childcare and prepared meals. We saved resources and time, and produced less waste – all while supporting each other. It embodied the spirit of co-living, even though we all had separate homes. 

While SEED eventually disbanded (as many utopian volunteer projects do), the work done by its members resulted in numerous local environmental efforts in the 2010s, including The Greater Newburyport Eco-Collaborative and Storm Surge. Other groups have also risen since SEED, such as Zero Waste Newburyport. More recently, in 2018, ACES (Alliance of Climate and Environmental Stewards) was formed as an advocacy and education organization promoting a sustainable future for Newburyport, while encouraging other communities to do the same. They are currently developing a local youth leadership initiative that will bring generational leadership in sustainability close to home, and in the future communities where the young leaders will eventually live.

There are also serious waste reduction efforts coming out of the Recycling, Energy, and Sustainability Office, headed by Molly Ettenborough. 

But there are still several ways we could improve. For example, many efforts around recycling and upcycling focus on residential waste produced at home, but recycling only accounts for about 5% of the recyclables actually collected in the U.S. Much of what we recycle is no longer made into new plastic goods, because countries like China no longer buy our recycling. Grounded in a “linear” out-of-sight-out-of-mind mentality, recycling is often shipped to developing countries where it enters the waste stream. Many make the effort to recycle, and municipalities pay for separate recycling pick up, only to have recyclables become trash. We need to be honest with ourselves about what exactly happens to Newburyport’s recycling (not to mention its residential and commercial waste). We also need to press the Industrial Park businesses to rethink the linear economic system they participate in, resulting in enormous waste. 

It doesn’t have to be this way. Did you know that Henry Ford had shippers specifically design the wooden boxes they shipped parts to Ford factory so the wood could be directly used in the manufacture of Ford cars? This is called pre-cycling. What if our Industrial Park businesses routinely pre-cycled, recycled, and upcycled the materials it uses?

An important step is getting residents, local food establishments, and manufacturers to take greater responsibility for the waste they produce in the city. I envision a future where much of the waste generated in the city remains in Newburyport to create opportunity, but also because it would force us to take real responsibility for what we consume. 

There’s an obvious need to ask how a coastal community can exist in a world with rising sea levels, and the potential for more extreme weather. But that’s really only one provocation prompting the Newburyport community to get to work on sustainability. Another motivation is perhaps less obvious. 

There are people here who recognize the connectedness of all things in both natural and human-designed ecosystems. Communities like Newburyport can band together with other communities in fostering environmental action, which may ultimately lead to state-level funding and lawmaking. The side effect of local action, however hard fought, is not only the betterment of our community, but the the deepening of our connections with one another.

John Giordano
Newburyport resident

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