“HAVE YOU HEARD THE NEWS? Recycling is dead—or close to it. China no longer wants our trash and its neighbors are following suit, shedding the region’s undesirable role as a dumping ground for the Global North. This reversal was several years in the making, but after decades of offshoring our low-quality recyclables and generally neglecting our domestic waste infrastructure, American towns and cities have proved woefully ill-equipped to handle the logjam of unwanted material. As municipal waste commissioners and their private industry counterparts scramble to find alternatives, many of the items collected in blue and green bins are being discreetly rerouted into landfills and incinerators, extinguishing any last pretense that recycling can alleviate our ballooning waste footprint.”