Are You Up or Down With Recycling? Let Thor Explain…
March 2024
March 18th is Global Recycling Day. It's a good day to take some time to think a bit deeper about the value of recycling. Our founder and director, Thor Diesendorf has put pen to paper to explain the concepts of downcycling versus upcycling, and why joining the ‘up’ crowd is the best way to keep precious resources like Australian hardwood timbers out in the world to be used and enjoyed for generations.
I’m a timber recycler, and I’ve been doing it as my main focus for more than 30 years, but I’m not down with recycling, I’m definitely up. To explain what I mean, I’d like to take the example of the asbestos containing mulch that has been in the news lately.
About 10 to 15 years ago I noticed that there was a significant reduction of interest from the average demolition company in Sydney in separating timber. They weren’t so interested anymore in selling it to companies like my own where it is upcycled into high quality building products like flooring, decking, benchtops and furniture. Big hammer mills and chipping machines were being set up at facilities to take construction waste. On the demolition site, timber was being roughly separated with the excavator and sent to the chippers to be made into mulch, saving tip fees and the labour time for handling. This suits an industry that is heavily driven by speed.
Being handled by machine, and with the avoidance of tip fees naturally being an incentive to include other material, it is no surprise that the mulch ends up containing asbestos. I’d bet it also contains treated and painted timbers, gyprock, chipboard and plastics. Even if it didn’t contain these contaminants, I would still see this as a massive case of downcycling.
Up until the 1980’s, the timber that was used in our building industry was predominantly old growth hardwoods. Beautiful and durable timbers like blackbutt, ironbarks, spotted gum, tallowwood, bluegum and ash species. Perfect for recycling and turning into high quality products where they can be used and enjoyed again for another 50 to 100 years or more. It’s one of the pleasures of recycling timber to plane back our old hardwoods and see the grain and colour revealed.
If you turn this valuable timber into mulch you not only miss out on saving these historic high quality timbers, you also release the carbon that is stored in the timber within 3-4 years. Chipping them into small pieces makes them break down even quicker than sending them to landfill whole! And timber stores 1.6 to 1.8 times its weight in CO2 (this is because the carbon in the timber combines with two molecules of oxygen to create CO2 when it breaks down).
What’s the difference between ‘downcycling’ and ‘upcycling’?
So when we recycle let's think more about whether we are downcycling or upcycling.
Downcycling means that the resource may be saved for a few more years, but because it has gone into a low quality product it will quickly end up as waste. Glass and plastics are generally downcycled. Most glass is crushed and turned into low grade products like road base and aggregate for drainage. It will never be able to be reused again. Plastics are mostly recycled into products needing less strength and durability than the original product, like the black plastic used in agricultural pipes. Most plastics will only be recycled once.
Upcycling means turning the waste resource into a high quality product and therefore saving it from becoming waste again for as long as possible - helping to create a circular economy where resources stay in use, rather than a system where more resources are continually mined or produced from forestry, turned into low quality products to quickly end up in landfill - wasting the resources, energy and creativity that went into their manufacture.
This timber framed factory is being knocked over with an excavator instead of dismantling. Some timber was saved, but much was split and broken and ended up in landfill.
Every piece of timber was saved in this wharf demolition. Bolts were removed by hand or cut with oxy-fuel and then timbers were craned out and stacked carefully.
I’m proud to be an upcycler. When I look at the timber carefully sorted and stored in my yard, I see the beautiful, well designed products that we will make from it. I also see the carbon we are locking up - every year that we operate we save thousands of tons of CO2 emissions. I’m also proud that like other upcyclers, we are a labour intensive industry - employing 35 people in satisfying, valuable work with a range of skill levels from labourers to highly skilled cabinet makers and designers. And when I consider the high quality building products, joinery and furniture that we make, sent out backed with a lifetime warranty, I know that it will be a long time before we see them again. If we do, it will most likely just be for a small repair, or a light sand and fresh coat of oil. As upcyclers, we are saving the use of new timber from our precious forest resource, and keeping our recycled timbers out in the world to be used and enjoyed for generations.
So when we think about recycling, and when we talk about it with our friends and communities, and even when we consider the quality of our future purchases, and maybe even hopefully when our governments regulate to encourage recycling, let’s not be down with recycling, let’s be up!
Words: Thor Diesendorf