Criminal recycling

Have you ever thought that recycling will be called a crime?
well... neither have I ;-)

...What do beer kegs, boat propellers, utility wires and a 200-ton metal bridge have in common? They all have been stolen by a brand of thieves called criminal recyclers. No, they're not recyclers who neglect to flatten their cardboard boxes or to separate their glass from their plastic. They belong to a growing group of lawbreakers who steal recyclable items (primarily metals) that they exchange for cash at a recycling facility....

...As much as we would like to believe that recycling is a selfless act fueled by the desire to care for Mother Nature, much of it is driven by cold, hard cash. When this article was written, copper was selling at about $3.94 per pound, three times as much as it was a few years ago [source: MetalPrices.com]. Other metals like aluminum are following a similar trend, thanks to demand from industrializing nations like China. In the United States, the scrap recycling industry generated $65 billion and processed roughly 145 million tons of materials in 2006 [source: ISRI]. It was only a matter of time before enterprising criminals cashed in on the moneymaking machine...

...­Thousands of miles away, thieves set their sites on an even ­heftier goal. In Russia, employees of a heating plant had to find an alternate route to work after the bridge that provided them their only direct access was stolen by scrap thieves during a nighttime heist. The heating company estimated that the 200-ton steel bridge would cost almost $40,000 to replace -- this time with concrete [source: Daily Mail]. ...

you can read the article on http://people.howstuffworks.com/criminal-recycling.htm/printable