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I believe this topic is fairly simple and straightforward. A lot of focus has been placed on renewable energy, but not as much has been placed on renewable resources. Metal, plastic, and paper products all fall under different types of renewable resources and what they mean to us. All three are important to our society, but each is peculiar in their circumstances.

Metals are fairly expensive to mine, and mining hurts the local environment by stripping it of vegetation, hurts the miners with health risks, and hurts the global environment by introducing pollutants into the atmosphere. Metals are only truly renewable in the sense that we can recycle many of them, and recycling vastly cuts down on the environmental impact and ensures that society will have those metals forever.

Likewise, plastics are not so much mined as they are a byproduct of petroleum products such as the gasoline vehicles use. Different types of materials have been discovered which can make plastics besides petroleum, but petroleum is the largest supplier of plastics. Needless to say, the world's supply of petroleum is finite, so recycling will also ensure the world's supply of plastics.

Lastly, paper is infinitely renewable because whole forests can be planted and grown in mere decades. However, the environmental effects of cutting down forests is the largest (even though it is controlled in places such as the United States, the rain forests and other regions of the world are largely abused by lumber companies). Recycling would lower the demand for deforestation.

My larger question is what would you propose we as a society do to increase our recycling habits?

I have a few suggestions myself (which is why I made this thread). Firstly, make the process of transporting recyclable materials to the recycling center much easier. Most colleges and schools recycle, so set up a deposit center at the public colleges and schools that would be open to the public. Most people do not even know where their recycling center is, and many townships do not have a recycling pickup day (as opposed to a trash pickup day). Private schools and colleges could receive tax benefits if they also participated in the program. Also, make a national website to promote recycling and locate the nearest deposit center.

The second part of my plan would be to provide tax benefits (or some other incentive, such as lower utility rates or something) to anybody that participates in the recycling program per pound of material. If a person donates a pound of recyclable material, they would get a $5 coupon for that month's utility bills (or something to that effect), etc.

Lastly, begin to provide a monthly or even weekly recycling pickup day. Perhaps a small ID chip could be implanted in a recycling bin, and when the bin is hoisted into the recycling truck (to transport the material to the center), the ID would be tagged in a computer, the weight of the materials calculated, and the information saved so that the appropriate amount of money would be deducted from the bills/taxes for that month. Of course, the material would be quickly checked by dumping it in a small bin that a worker could visually check in the truck before being dumped into the main compartment. Also, perhaps different materials could be picked up every week. For example, week one would be plastics, week two would be metals, etc. etc.

What do you think about all of this?

Metal Cans, Plastic bottles, Glass bottles. I don't think that our state does anything with it, as far as recycling because it is all comingled...

We recycle glass, plastic, paper and metal.

I have no idea what you are doing in the US since I am Swedish, but here we have stations where we recycle thingies, there is a lot of commercial going on television that encourage us to recycle the things that we have no use for anymore.
But one thing which is bad in Sweden is that we have to go to certain stations who recycle glass, all of those stations aren't really local to the places that people usually go to in their regular lives (such as supermarkets, gas stations and shopping centres).

We recycle everything recyclable For Washington, you don't get much for recycling... $45 for one TON of cardboard. We have a weekly recycling pickup though, so we have no reason not to put the resources back into the factories, if you know what I mean. If there were to be a cash incentive, we would have to use a better system than weighing the recycled materials and having some guy sift through it for a few seconds to make sure it's all actual recyclable stuff. I can think of quite a few ways to mess with that process (for example, putting a layer of recyclables around something really heavy that I want to get rid of). I guarantee you that the recyling guy won't go through every individual item to make sure it can be reused. Maybe some new trucks could be made where there is a long, retractable plate of metal on the truck where the contents of said recycling bin could be quickly spread out and checked at a higher speed than that of putting them in a second bin and looking through it. Also, there could be bigger trucks that hold a team of recycling people. A certain type of barcode could be put on each recyclable item that, when scanned, would tell a computer that the item could be recycled. Some barcode scanners could be put on the trucks and the people could scan each piece of material that will be recycled. It sounds a little weird, but it could work...

My family recycles anything recyclable.

We rarely recycle. The few times we tried, our recycling bin just sat out by the curb for a week. And we're not even sure if the stuff ends up getting recycled anyway.

I recycle most paper as well as some glass, metal and plastic.

As for what we can do to recycle more? Personally, I'd look for more alternative ways of recycling. Paper and plastic are all very well, but what I'd really like to see is fermenting organic waste to get methane. A huge amount of energy is thrown out with organic waste, and the conversion processes are really quite simple and easy with modern technology.

After witnessing the janitors at my school simply dumping the recycle bins into the trash after school got out, I have lost faith in many recycling programs. Similarly with salvation army, making immense profits off of free items. If you want to do something to help out, do it yourself.

As such I collect cans, and will melt them down to build sculptures.

or model armors.

We try to recycle as much as we can but sometimes it is hard to recycle for example when your riding a bike...it is dumb to hold it the whole time for 10 cents and easier just to throw it

Plastics, cardboard, glass, paper, the works. Anything that can be recycled and whatever we find

I can't find it the fact, but my Chem teacher (amazing guy) told me that, I think, 80% of the U.S.'s energy goes into making aluminum. Imagine how much we save by recycling every can of soda.

The reason aluminum costs so much is that it has such a high melting point. Even recycling won't bring the cost down to dramatically.

I personally recycle all.

And also I'm like a deep down but not to deep enviromentalist. I don't toss a soda can or juice box on the floor. I always put it in my backpack to recycle or throw it into the nearest garbage can.

In england they still have those machine were if you bring in 1 bottle in exchange you get 1.50 pound.

And for those who listion to the news theres a new paper that when you right with a pen on it then after 24 hours it fades away and you could use it again.

I think like some parts of the world, Cans and bottles with drinks should be returned to the store or you can't buy another one or you'd have to pay a fine. I think basically there should be fines for everything you dont recycle. Or maybe people should buy those filter waters that comes to your door and you refill your water bottle and after the filter is done, people would have to return the empty filter to get another one.

I've heard about that, I wonder how it well it works.

"Recovery of the metal via recycling has become an important facet of the aluminium industry. Recycling involves melting the scrap, a process that uses only five percent of the energy needed to produce aluminium from ore." - Wikipedia
Also, it is in an oxidized state in the earth, we don't use that, we use electrolysis to make it useful, that is the huge energy cost.

That's why I believe the top of some monument (washington monument?) is made of aluminum (instead of gold), because it was so expensive and valuable before efficient refining techniques. Or was that some other metal?