4 ms·

Physical waste is not a real issue. A landfill 10 miles square and 250 ft deep could hold all of the US's waste for the next hundred years. Twenty of these (Whi

by cm2012 8y ago

Physical waste is not a real issue. A landfill 10 miles square and 250 ft deep could hold all of the US's waste for the next hundred years. Twenty of these (Which could fit without people taking notice in any rural area) can hold the whole world's garbage for next 100 years.

deadmik3 8y ago
but when you say "all the discarded k-cups could wrap around the earth 10 times" it sounds like that takes up a lot more space because people can't possibly visualize the size difference between a k-cup and the equator it's like wrapping dental floss around a skyscraper the size of a slightly smaller earth
j-c-hewitt 8y ago
No, but it's a spiritual concern that people like to signal their virtue over. Don't try to bring reason into this: it's about the soul!
derefr 8y ago
I assume the reason this doesn’t happen is that the land value in first-world countries is too high (i.e. everywhere you’d want to put the landfill, someone wants to do something else with it and is willing to pay more than the landfill is worth to the municipality/state/country that wants to put it there.) And putting the landfill in developing countries (or rather, formalizing the landfill, since we already informally do that) wouldn’t change much, since we would still need a system of trash barges and so forth to get it there. Also, presumably, we expect these developing countries to, well, develop, at which point their land values will also become high. Eventually, there will be no piece of land on earth with low-enough “rent” for us to just stick trash on. We’ll have globally gentrified the landfill into homelessness.
- cm2012 8y ago
  This does happen now. Very few countries have a shortage of landfill space now so there's no pressure to build even bigger ones that would fit everything. Litter is a separate issue but kpods are not a type of waste that typically gets littered (unlike soda cans, etc.)
- gbear605 8y ago
  There are plenty of places in America, but they are all far away from the source of the trash.
mbrameld 8y ago
If physical waste is not a real issue, why do I see garbage on the ground? Why is there tons of plastic in our oceans? I think there's more to the issue of physical waste than whether or not we can dig a hole big enough for it all.
- cm2012 8y ago
  Litter is a whole other issue, which kpods also do not really contribute to.
  - peterwwillis 8y ago
    "We totally have the space to bury this plastic in the ground. Killing wildlife and destroying habitats is a whole other issue. The carbon and ecological cost of producing massive amounts of single-use petrochemical products is a whole other issue. Chemicals leaking into the water supply is a whole other issue. Microplastics found in humans, animals and processed foods is a whole other issue." We're not concerned about whether we can bury it in the ground.
    - marcosdumay 8y ago
      > The carbon and ecological cost of producing massive amounts of single-use petrochemical products is a whole other issue. You should take a calm look into the carbon and ecological cost of producing and reusing the reusable equivalents of those single-use products. Besides... If you have any idea on how to make it possible that people not dig every gram of fossil fuels available and use it for something (that something being a piece of plastic buried somewhere being way better than carbon dioxide at the atmosphere), please say so, because natural gas based plastics aren't a world-ending problem, but the coal mining endgame is.
  - darkmighty 8y ago
    It will be a whole other issue only once we can make waste disposal 100% effective (if we can even expect that to happen). Until then waste is not a trivial problem.
- 8y ago
hunter23 8y ago
How do you propose getting all the trash to this one spot in America in a cost efficient manner? The logistical cost (and environmental cost) of shipping all our trash to one area would be a nightmare. Also how exactly are you planning on preventing the trash from having an environmental impact ? Physical trash can result in harmful chemicals leeching into the groundwater and affecting way more than 10 miles of area. This comment seems to be severely underestimating the cost of physical waste.
- cm2012 8y ago
  We don't need to build one this big because we already have no shortage of landfill space. The big hole is just to help visualize that.
qntty 8y ago
I'm curious to read a source to support this. Seems wrong to me.
- cm2012 8y ago
  Here's one from a quick google: https://mises.org/library/three-myths-about-trash https://mises.org/library/three-myths-about-trash
  - qntty 8y ago
    No sources cited in that article either and I'm not inclined to trust the Mises Institute on this one :/
jazzyjackson 8y ago
Cool, how about the 100 years after that? How about its effect on our water table?
- cm2012 8y ago
  Human population is going to stablize in the next 100 years. Just build another. And modern built landfills don't affect the local environment or water table.
- dopamean 8y ago
  Yeah I get the feeling that that math only works if trash production stays constant.
pzone 8y ago
Thanks for bringing this point up and calmly repeating it to people. It's hard to overcome the "garbage is gross, therefore it must be a moral evil" kneejerk reaction which you see in so many people.
dragontamer 8y ago
> Physical waste is not a real issue. A landfill 10 miles square and 250 ft deep could hold all of the US's waste for the next hundred years. Twenty of these (Which could fit without people taking notice in any rural area) can hold the whole world's garbage for next 100 years. Physical waste isn't an issue. But the high-nitrogen of coffee grounds makes it a shame to throw it away. Generally speaking, carbon-based compost material is easy to find (sticks, paper, etc. etc.). Good sources of nitrogen however is more difficult. Its kind of a shame to throw away coffee grounds, because of how good they are for compost. Its like Aluminum: we have so much Aluminum it isn't really a big deal to put it into landfills. However, Aluminum recycles very easily, so its just a shame to throw it away.
drb91 8y ago
This presumes that the issue with waste is space, which appears to be a strawman argument. The issues are idiotic resource usage and lack of proper waste processing techniques because rational resource usage doesn’t turn profits in the short term.
darkmighty 8y ago
My calculations are larger by a factor of 2.5 (you've probably used density of water but I think that's a bit optimistic, don't know much about garbage compaction). I mostly agree it's not as bad as it seems; however that doesn't account for the <100% disposal effectiveness (a certain % will realistically always make it to streets, rivers, oceans), or as others mentioned some chance of environmental leakage of landfills (an associated issue is energy efficiency and energetic cost of packaging and disposal) -- i.e. I wouldn't dismiss waste in total as an absolute non-issue.

by cm2012 8y ago

deadmik3 8y ago

but when you say "all the discarded k-cups could wrap around the earth 10 times" it sounds like that takes up a lot more space because people can't possibly visualize the size difference between a k-cup and the equator it's like wrapping dental floss around a skyscraper the size of a slightly smaller earth

j-c-hewitt 8y ago

No, but it's a spiritual concern that people like to signal their virtue over. Don't try to bring reason into this: it's about the soul!

derefr 8y ago

I assume the reason this doesn’t happen is that the land value in first-world countries is too high (i.e. everywhere you’d want to put the landfill, someone wants to do something else with it and is willing to pay more than the landfill is worth to the municipality/state/country that wants to put it there.) And putting the landfill in developing countries (or rather, formalizing the landfill, since we already informally do that) wouldn’t change much, since we would still need a system of trash barges and so forth to get it there. Also, presumably, we expect these developing countries to, well, develop, at which point their land values will also become high. Eventually, there will be no piece of land on earth with low-enough “rent” for us to just stick trash on. We’ll have globally gentrified the landfill into homelessness.

cm2012 8y ago
This does happen now. Very few countries have a shortage of landfill space now so there's no pressure to build even bigger ones that would fit everything. Litter is a separate issue but kpods are not a type of waste that typically gets littered (unlike soda cans, etc.)
gbear605 8y ago
There are plenty of places in America, but they are all far away from the source of the trash.

mbrameld 8y ago

If physical waste is not a real issue, why do I see garbage on the ground? Why is there tons of plastic in our oceans? I think there's more to the issue of physical waste than whether or not we can dig a hole big enough for it all.

cm2012 8y ago
Litter is a whole other issue, which kpods also do not really contribute to.
- peterwwillis 8y ago
  "We totally have the space to bury this plastic in the ground. Killing wildlife and destroying habitats is a whole other issue. The carbon and ecological cost of producing massive amounts of single-use petrochemical products is a whole other issue. Chemicals leaking into the water supply is a whole other issue. Microplastics found in humans, animals and processed foods is a whole other issue." We're not concerned about whether we can bury it in the ground.
  - marcosdumay 8y ago
    > The carbon and ecological cost of producing massive amounts of single-use petrochemical products is a whole other issue. You should take a calm look into the carbon and ecological cost of producing and reusing the reusable equivalents of those single-use products. Besides... If you have any idea on how to make it possible that people not dig every gram of fossil fuels available and use it for something (that something being a piece of plastic buried somewhere being way better than carbon dioxide at the atmosphere), please say so, because natural gas based plastics aren't a world-ending problem, but the coal mining endgame is.
- darkmighty 8y ago
  It will be a whole other issue only once we can make waste disposal 100% effective (if we can even expect that to happen). Until then waste is not a trivial problem.
8y ago

hunter23 8y ago

How do you propose getting all the trash to this one spot in America in a cost efficient manner? The logistical cost (and environmental cost) of shipping all our trash to one area would be a nightmare. Also how exactly are you planning on preventing the trash from having an environmental impact ? Physical trash can result in harmful chemicals leeching into the groundwater and affecting way more than 10 miles of area. This comment seems to be severely underestimating the cost of physical waste.

cm2012 8y ago
We don't need to build one this big because we already have no shortage of landfill space. The big hole is just to help visualize that.

qntty 8y ago

I'm curious to read a source to support this. Seems wrong to me.

cm2012 8y ago
Here's one from a quick google: https://mises.org/library/three-myths-about-trash https://mises.org/library/three-myths-about-trash
- qntty 8y ago
  No sources cited in that article either and I'm not inclined to trust the Mises Institute on this one :/

jazzyjackson 8y ago

Cool, how about the 100 years after that? How about its effect on our water table?

cm2012 8y ago
Human population is going to stablize in the next 100 years. Just build another. And modern built landfills don't affect the local environment or water table.
dopamean 8y ago
Yeah I get the feeling that that math only works if trash production stays constant.

pzone 8y ago

Thanks for bringing this point up and calmly repeating it to people. It's hard to overcome the "garbage is gross, therefore it must be a moral evil" kneejerk reaction which you see in so many people.

dragontamer 8y ago

> Physical waste is not a real issue. A landfill 10 miles square and 250 ft deep could hold all of the US's waste for the next hundred years. Twenty of these (Which could fit without people taking notice in any rural area) can hold the whole world's garbage for next 100 years. Physical waste isn't an issue. But the high-nitrogen of coffee grounds makes it a shame to throw it away. Generally speaking, carbon-based compost material is easy to find (sticks, paper, etc. etc.). Good sources of nitrogen however is more difficult. Its kind of a shame to throw away coffee grounds, because of how good they are for compost. Its like Aluminum: we have so much Aluminum it isn't really a big deal to put it into landfills. However, Aluminum recycles very easily, so its just a shame to throw it away.

drb91 8y ago

This presumes that the issue with waste is space, which appears to be a strawman argument. The issues are idiotic resource usage and lack of proper waste processing techniques because rational resource usage doesn’t turn profits in the short term.

darkmighty 8y ago

My calculations are larger by a factor of 2.5 (you've probably used density of water but I think that's a bit optimistic, don't know much about garbage compaction). I mostly agree it's not as bad as it seems; however that doesn't account for the <100% disposal effectiveness (a certain % will realistically always make it to streets, rivers, oceans), or as others mentioned some chance of environmental leakage of landfills (an associated issue is energy efficiency and energetic cost of packaging and disposal) -- i.e. I wouldn't dismiss waste in total as an absolute non-issue.