With Chinese demand -- and prices -- plunging, reclaimed cardboard that is normally exported by the ton stacks up in Southland warehouses.By David PiersonDecember 9, 2008Bales of shredded cardboard, paper and packaging are arranged into towers several stories high inside Steve Young's 130,000-square-foot warehouse in Commerce.Trucks have been unloading 600 tons of the wastepaper each day for more than a week, leaving the cavernous building filled nearly to capacity.Ordinarily, much of the scrap would have been shipped to China, where it would be mashed into pulp and recycled into new cardboard boxes to package many of the goods destined for American store shelves.But American consumers aren't buying so many nicely packaged televisions, computers and toys these days. And China's economy is slowing too.What are we going to do with all this paper?

Since we are trying to conserve our forests these days, everything is made from recycled paper, i.e. toilet paper, napkins, paper towels, tissues, kitty litter. Anything that is made from paper is recycled into a new paper product. It will not go to waste. It is a hot commodity and definitely will find its way into a new product that will end up on the shelf in some store. Actually everything is recycled today into something new. You name it and it is recycled.

Well I guess we could recycle it ,but wait there's no jobs who will buy it oh well hey I know lets use it to make unemployment checks that will spark the economy and the recession well end and everyone will go back to work ,,,,Hmm...it looks like you have a lot of punctuation.

It's not just paper recycling market. The whole recycling industry is taking a big hit due to the global economy downturn. While the demand of raw materials is shrinking, the price eruption to the recycled materials is getting even a bigger hit. I think this is something many haven't talked about when the economy was blooming. As economy going through up and down, environmentalist and recycling industry need to establish a strategy to ride with the cyclical nature of our economy. I wouldn't be surprised that some community will even stop their recycling program or at least stop collecting certain recycled materials. I think during this difficult times, people who are environmental conscious should put more emphasis on "reduce" and "reuse".

Let's use it for Mt Rushmore sized paper mache' images of famous people. Imagine a giant image of the faces of the Beatles or Martin Luther King Jr.We could also use it to soak up oil slicks and other hazardous spills.We could use it for a new type of attic insulation. We could soak it with water or fire retardant and drop it on California forest fires. Ever try to burn wet paper?

There is a good summation in a front page article in the NYT this week (Monday I think). In the end a great deal of scrap material is going to the landfill. This is very similar to the scrap markets in the early 90s.

I guess it will all go into the landfills, but i hate to do that

I think we may have problems with where to put it