Recycle?

Techworld has an article on the carbon economics of recycling:

Looked at this way recycling is no way to reduce global warming. In fact, by increasing energy use, it worsens it.

GreenPeace and Friends of the Earth would want us to increase recycling rates, as does the EEC, because .... well why? Okay, waste is a shame and Chinese tearing computer components apart by hand and smelting them for precious metals releases hazardous substances in the air but ....

I'm still not buying that CO2 causes poor tender Gaia to get warmer. But I agree: sending your keyboards to China and your newspapers to the same landfill on a different truck only puts more CO2 into the air. Aluminum cans may be the sole exception, only because it takes huge energy to make new aluminum.

Also, how much energy goes into producing all those celebrity Priuses (Priie?) that only get driven once a month to inflate the owner's smug-factor?

h/t: Tom Pechinski