By Ben Pangelinan
For Variety

IT was a short e-mail, no self promotion, just a direct invitation to attend their monthly meeting. They had scheduled a guest speaker to talk about his business and how it contributes to the collective efforts that is not only good for Guam, but for the planet as well.
They are the most unlikely looking group of warriors, an eclectic mix of individuals who share a passion for being green, not because it is fashionable, especially now that former Vice President Al Gore has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his work on the environment, but because they truly value this planet. Their motivation is singular and is unattached to any political agenda. Purely and simply, they want to save Guam and planet earth.
I am, of course, talking about the Recycling Association of Guam. RAG, as it is often called, was founded in 1981 as a non-profit organization to promote recycling and other environmentally friendly practices on Guam. For years they have labored in our community, reaching out to individuals and groups to advocate for “reuse, reduce and recycle” as a policy in dealing with our waste stream. They have participated in debates, from an environmental perspective, as well as preaching against burying valuable economic resources at Ordot every day. When others say it is not possible to recycle in island economies, they prove to us that it is. When others say it costs too much to recycle, they prove to us how much others have saved. When others say their waste disposal process is the only way, they show us alternatives that work, more economical and is less harmful to the environment.
They lead by example in their everyday lives and live what they preach. You will find them at the Ordot dump taking their one bag of trash for the month because they had already visited the recycling centers.
Our government marches on to build landfills and resurrect the disastrous incinerator contract, all the while failing to see these are not solutions to our problems, but just more questions masquerading as answers. DPW alarms everyone with the proclamation that we have only 200 days left in the life of the Ordot dump and then goes about doing the same things, in the same way, day in and day out. Their solution is to hurry up and build a new landfill, just so we can hurry up and fill it up. Why can’t they see that recycling one ton of cardboard saves 9 cubic yards of landfill space? The guest speaker at the meeting, Mr. James Honda of Guam Transport and Warehouse’s document security division, on their own and without any help from the government, has recycled over 2 million pounds of paper in the last two years. This is equivalent to almost 40 forty-foot containers or 126,400 cubic feet saved at Ordot dump.
They propose burning the trash in an incinerator and have no regard to the dangers that dioxins and greenhouse gases to our lives and our planet.
If Al Gore received the Nobel Peace for peace, then where is the war? The war confronts us everyday in our battle to deal with the assault on our planet with our wasteful and harmful environmental practices.
The Recycling Association of Guam members are soldiers in this environmental war. For their sustained efforts in battle after battle, year after year, I think they are deserving of a medal of honor.

Ben Pangelinan is a senator in the 29th Guam Legislature and a former speaker now serving his seventh term in the Guam Legislature.
E-mail comments or suggestions to senbenp@guam.net or ctzenben@ite.net.