Episode Details

New York city's eight million residents are known for staying busy, but with the abundance of people comes plenty of waste and the need to recycle.

纽约市八百万居民以忙碌著称，但人口众多也带来了大量垃圾和回收需求。

Compliance is a big challenge, and in a city as diverse as New York, it's always been a challenge.

合规是个很大的挑战，在纽约这样多元化的城市里，这一直都是个难题。

New York city produces a 12,000 tons of waste each day, but manages to recycle just 17% of it.

纽约市每天产生12000吨废物，但却只能回收其中的17%。

There's no city in the United States that is winning with recycling right now.

目前，美国没有一座城市在回收利用方面做得很成功。

It turns out that it's become a money loser for municipalities around the country, and in the past they'd actually been shipping it abroad to be dumped.

结果全国各地的市政当局都在往里砸钱，而过去他们实际上一直将其运往国外倾倒。

In the past companies that recycle plastic, paper, glass and metal would pay municipalities for their trash.

以前，回收塑料、纸张、玻璃和金属的公司会向市政当局支付垃圾处理费用。

More recently the cities started paying the companies to pick up their material,

最近，城市开始向这些公司付费，让他们回收材料，

sometimes hauling the trash far away before dumping it, worsening its environmental footprint.

有时这些公司会把垃圾运到很远的地方再倾倒，这进一步加重了对环境的影响。

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