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The Secret Life of Trash
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Trash Triage
Jairo Plascencia starts recyclables on a journey that takes them...
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...to a 200-ton pile at the L.A. Express recovery facility...
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...then onto the conveyor moving at 12 feet per minute, where workers sort them.
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Moises Salgado discards a container contaminated with food. Farther on, a magnet separates articles made of iron.
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Bound Beauty
Colored plastics are separated because they can't be processed into transparent products; then the plastics are compacted and tied...
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...Roberto Emiliano uses a crowbar to remove loose waste from newly minted bales.
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All Aboard
Roberto Emiliano uses a crowbar to remove loose waste from newly minted bales.
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Bon Voyage
Cardboard bales are loaded into a container truck that will haul them to the docks. Several 18-wheelers are loaded a day, and dozens of them leave L.A. Express each week, taking L.A.-area recyclables to ships in the harbor. Next stop: processors in China.
Photographs by Mathieu Young
The cardboard, plastic, glass, and aluminum went to the Los Angeles Express Materials Recovery Facility, operated in South L.A. by Waste Management Recycle America. Workers—some wearing cut-resistant gloves—look for bodies (occasionally the homeless die in rubbish bins, where they seek food and refuge), weapons, and other hazards as the trash is placed on conveyor belts and sorted. Turns out the soda can doesn't end up in a dump after all: It goes to processing plants that turn it into raw material for, most likely, a new can—a dull but worthy rebirth.
Also watch Recycling Revolution