Thanks, Diane for tackling this one. Some good improvements have been made on the lead. See here:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_recovery

Is anyone out there who cares about teaching people on this topic? If so, then here are some gaps that I have noticed:
- It doesn't come out clearly what the difference is between resource recovery, recycling and reuse.
- If we can spell out those differences then we can also mention something about "resource recovery" in the related articles on recycling and on reuse (which have much higher click rates).
- Should we create an article on source separation? So for we only have a disambiguation page: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Source_separation_(disambiguation)

Can you help tackle those gaps?

Regards,
Elisabeth

I'm not making much headway improving the "readability" of the lead paragraphs of the "Resource recovery" article. It's still scoring 31 (out of 100). Worse: only 16% of Wikipedia articles are harder to read than this one. It needs shorter sentences and shorter words, with no sacrifice of accuracy. Can you help?

If you can but don't want to learn how to edit on Wikipedia, open up the doc I've attached here -- it's an MSWord doc using the text from the lead (also pasted below into this post). Edit away, making sure you keep "track changes" on. You can re-post your revisions here, (or email the doc directly to me) and I'll input your changes.

The process is the same if you want to work any topic. Make an MSWord doc and edit using "track changes." Send it to me or Elisabeth and we'll input your improvements. We worked this way with several people for the World Toilet Day effort, and some eventually got the hang of editing right on Wikipedia.

Thanks,
Diane

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Resource recovery is the process of selectively removing materials from waste that can be recycled for other uses. Other uses can include making new products for resale using, for example, plastic, paper, aluminum, glass or metal. Some waste products can be used for composting (organic household waste, for example) or for generating energy. The point of resource recovery is to extract the maximum benefit from products and reduce the amount of waste generated. Resource recovery delays the need to resort to the use of virgin resources.

Resource recovery differs from the management of waste in that it uses life-cycle analysis (LCA) to come up with alternative uses that will reduce the volume of waste going to landfills. A number of studies on municipal solid waste (MSW) have indicated that reuse should be favoured over landfill disposal. Improvements to administration, source separation and collection should be followed by reuse and recycling of non-organic materials. Organic materials that undergo anaerobic digestion can be turned into energy, compost or fertilizer.

In the context of sanitation, the term "resource recovery" is used to denote sanitation systems that aim to recover and reuse the resources that are contained in wastewater and excreta (urine and feces). These include: nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus), organic matter, energy and water. This concept is also referred to as ecological sanitation or productive sanitation.