Designers and builders have long recognized and lauded
steel for its strength, durability, and functionality. But one thing that
hasn’t been noticed enough is its high recycled content and high reclamation
rate. The steel industry's
annual recycling saves the equivalent energy to electrically power about 18
million households for a year.
I have applied the
concept of “technical metabolism” to the recycling of steel. Technical
metabolism is designed to mirror the earth’s cradle-to-cradle cycles, is a closed-loop
system in which valuable materials circulate in a perpetual cycle of
production, recovery, and remanufacture. For many years, there has been a strong economic
motive to incorporate recycling into the process for making steel and other
building materials, but today’s environmental concerns make recycling even more
important. Recycling saves money while conserving energy and resources, as well
as reducing solid, liquid, and gaseous wastes. Recycling steel diverts these products from landfill, and
enables the material to be reprocessed, thereby conserving raw materials.
Steel is one of the
most easily-recycled materials on Earth. Unlike other materials, it does not
need to be sorted by color or size. Rather, it is simply picked up by a magnet
and melted down. Steel
is 100% recyclable and can be recycled an infinite amount of times, designers
and builders have to take advantage of the upcyling of this material.
Good pointing out that steel is highly recyclable, but I am not sure where you are going with this post? An extremely high percentage of steel is already made of recycled steel, something like 97%. Maybe you could use steel as an example of how a textile product could be highly recyclable. Have a good week!
ReplyDeleteYes Josh, you are right but not all people take advantage of this. Because steel is so highly recyclable I would like to see more designers make use of this material in both exterior/interior designs.
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