Solid waste disposal presents one of the most pressing, though least glamorous, environmental issues today. Environmentalists have long urged that comprehensive recycling programs can achieve three important goals: reducing the mountains of refuse which must be disposed of by incineration, ocean dumping, or landfills; preserving the natural resources that must be used to make the discarded steel, glass, paper, etc.; and conserving the energy required to process raw materials. But rather than give preferential treatment to recyclables, they charge, the nation's railroads have imposed higher rate schedules for such materials, with the approval of the Interstate Commerce Commission. Now, a three-judge federal district court, in its third opinion in SCRAP v. United States, has ruled that the ICC prepared an inadequate environmental impact statement on applications for rail freight rate increases.¹ The decision requires the ICC to prepare a new impact statement, evaluating the entire existing rail freight rate structure, to determine if that structure discriminates against the shipping of recyclable scrap materials.

The court's opinion, written by Judge Skelly Wright, author of the D.C. Circuit's landmark decision in Calvert Cliffs' Coordinating Committee v. Atomic Energy Commission,² points out that if present rate structures discriminate against recyclables as compared with virgin materials, an across the board percentage rise in all freight rates would increase the disparity. The importance of the case is highlighted by the significant reduction in pollution and energy use that results when scrap materials are used in production instead of raw materials. The court cited an EPA study that found that when scrap iron is used in place of virgin ore in the production of steel, 74 percent less energy and 51 percent less water are expended, while 86 percent less air pollution and 97 percent less mining wastes are created.