3 ms·
Person from Germany here where we have 4 different bins per household - paper, recyclables (metal, plastic), compostables and dump (+ glass by color, batteries
by skriticos2 8y ago
Person from Germany here where we have 4 different bins per household - paper, recyclables (metal, plastic), compostables and dump (+ glass by color, batteries and electronics at dedicated sites). We get to a recycling rate of about 20-30% (effective at plant) with really wanting to and having it ingrained into our culture.
Recycling is hard at the best of times. Unless packaging gets much better at identifying as recyclable it will be a long road ahead (it's the small things, black plastic is hard to identify and get's burned, composite plastics are problematic, like different plastic foil over plastic canister). At least people think about it around here, but it is a very hard problem.
- mirimir 8y agoDamn, I had no clue that it was just 20-30%. That's depressing.
- u04011 8y agoGerman 66.1 percent recycling rate in 2015. https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/tgm/table.do?tab=table&plugin=1&language=en&pcode=t2020_rt120 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/tgm/table.do?tab=table&plugin=...
- sct202 8y agoGermany used to export 69% of collected plastic to China too, so they will likely face a similar crisis as America. https://qz.com/1310240/chinas-ban-on-plastic-recycling-imports-means-the-world-will-have-111-million-metric-tons-of-extra-plastic-to-deal-with-by-2030/ https://qz.com/1310240/chinas-ban-on-plastic-recycling-impor...
- BrandonMarc 8y agoConsider also: recycled black plastic is often made from electronic waste, which isn't done very carefully, and so black plastic often has heavy metals from computer components. Problem is, this recycled black plastic is often used for food containers. What could possibly go wrong?