R² Strategies and the role of Sustainable Marketing.

While both pollution prevention and resource recovery both can be considered proactive marketing strategies, they differ greatly in approach. In keeping with a reduction and elimination of inefficiencies that also promote a benefit in service and/or profit, resource recovery is used where pollution prevention could not. This reuse of waste, known as resource recovery is “the collecting and separating of certain waste materials for processing into new forms, which will ultimately be marketed as raw materials for new products.”[1] Resource recovery is not only environmentally important, but it is also cost effective and therefore more efficient. It reduces the amount of waste for disposal, saves space in landfills, is more energy-efficient than burning materials, and conserves natural resources. Fuller describes resource recovery as “the process through which products, materials and energy values are routinely recaptured from waste (residual) streams and returned to economic use (redeployed) in future production-consumption cycles.”[2] Furthermore resource recovery is a function that moderates the negative impacts of waste streams that have been first downsized through pollution prevention efforts. Perhaps the most common example of resource recovery is the recycling of aluminum can. Not only does not recycling represent a foregone opportunity from an economical standpoint but there are environmental and social considerations. The production of aluminum from raw material is a dirty process. There are environmental impacts associated with each stage of aluminum production, from extraction to processing. The major environmental impact of refining and smelting is greenhouse gas emissions. These gases result from both the electrical consumption of smelters and the byproducts of processing. The greenhouse gases resulting from primary production include perfluorocarbons (PFC), polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH), fluoride, sulfur dioxide (S02), and carbon dioxide (CO2). Of these gases, PFC's resulting from the smelting process are the most potent. Primary aluminum production is the leading source of perfluorocarbon emissions in the United States.[3] Beyond the simple example of the aluminum can there are large corporations and state initiatives that deal exclusively with resource recovery across the country.[4]

Photo by Daniel Suchenski

[1] http://www.co.grand-traverse.mi.us/departments/resource_recovery/What_is_Resource_Recovery_.htm[2] Sustainable Marketing: Managerial-Ecological Issues p. 95[3] http://www.enviroliteracy.org/article.php/1013.html[4] www.rirrc.org www.crra.com www.nrra.net