NEW ORLEANS — In the rush to rebuild, this hurricane-smashed city is dumping its debris into the swamps by the truckload -- and throwing away an opportunity to turn America's costliest natural disaster into the nation's greatest recycling effort, environmentalists say.

Every day, trucks rumble down the streets on their way to the Old Gentilly Landfill, a municipal dump in the swampiest part of the city, to unload the debris that homeowners and contractors have piled up on the curbs throughout New Orleans.

With large-scale home demolitions now beginning, there are no comprehensive, citywide plans to salvage and recycle building materials -- things such as cypress and cedar boards, bricks, cinderblocks and roof tiles.