Environmentalists are skilled at identifying the disastrous impact of industrialization on the environment. Industrialists, on the other hand, find conservation advocates to be blind to the social and economic justifications for industrialization. They assert that if every environmental protection advice is observed thoroughly, it will lower living standards everywhere, technologically and economically. Both groups see industrial waste and the products that we create, as destructive to the environment. The choice is between rampant industrialization and narrow environmentalism.
Is there another way out of the box? As a matter of fact, there is a third alternative. Cradle to cradle recycling.
Recycling, as it is being done today, is in fact "downcycling" or "cradle to grave" recycling. This concept is explained clearly by architect William McDonough and chemist Michael Braungart in their 2002 seminal work,