20 ms·

91% of plastic isn't recycled (2018)

433 points by adrian_mrd 6y ago

pstrateman 6y ago
The vast majority of things people think of as recyclable are actually not. The result is an endless stream of trash in the recycling stream which makes the actual recyclables worthless.
ProAm 6y ago
There is an excellent Planet Money podcast about this from NPR [1] [1] https://www.npr.org/2020/09/11/912150085/waste-land https://www.npr.org/2020/09/11/912150085/waste-land
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aNoob7000 6y ago
Listen to the latest episode of Planet Money. https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510289/planet-money https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510289/planet-money
- scottndecker 6y ago
  This. Most plastics can't be recycled; it was a PR play by the plastic industry decades ago. Using plastics for such things as medical devices and such makes complete sense to me. Using plastics for items which inherently are only used for a few minutes or an hour (see the F&B industry) makes no sense at all to me.
  - chmod600 6y ago
    "Using plastics for items which inherently are only used for a few minutes or an hour" Of course it makes sense. Plastic is cheap, light, watertight, strong, and mallable. It's kind of a miracle material, except that it's too stable. If we had a version that decomposed in a year, it would be awesome.
    - hadlock 6y ago
      Compostable "plastics", e.g. PLA, which sometimes is corn-based, exist; in California I've seen compostable disposable silverware, as well as compostable decorative planters (I own two, holding up good after three years, which makes me wonder how compostable they really are). But compostable "plastics" do exist, at least in some markets.
      - joelhoffman 6y ago
        Surely the companies that print the symbol and "Please recycle!" on non-recyclable plastic wouldn't label non-compostable silverware as compostable... I've successfully run "compostable" plastic through the dishwasher several times and haven't seen any sign of decay. The county I live in offers composting service and begs people to please not put "compostable" plastic in it.
    - _Microft 6y ago
      A quickly decomposing plastic wouldn't be awesome either as it would add all the carbon extracted from fossil sources into the short term carbon cycle more quickly.
  - olejorgenb 6y ago
    There are a few companies claiming progress in chemical recycling. eg.: https://quantafuel.com/ https://quantafuel.com/ | https://newsweb.oslobors.no/message/513575 https://newsweb.oslobors.no/message/513575 80% (by weight) recovery into high quality liquids (eg.: nafta). They claim the majority of the energy used by the process comes from the remaining 20%. The acceptable input is mostly PP and PE, the two most commonly used plastics (at least for packaging). A special catalysator is used to remove additives like chlorine.
diggan 6y ago
Fitting, I just started looking into reusing plastic myself by collecting plastic from my own, family and friends trash and remoulding it into something useful. In my quest for this, I found Precious Plastic, an amazing community around recycling plastics yourself and for your community. https://preciousplastic.com/ https://preciousplastic.com/ While individuals plastic pollution is not the biggest emitter of plastic here in the world, we can always take small steps towards making sure we don't throw as much plastic as we currently do.
- marmshallow 6y ago
  What kinds of things do you mold it into?
  - diggan 6y ago
    I've only run smaller experiments so far, mostly focusing around storage containers as I have a lot of electronic stuff that is currently just laying around. You can get some more inspiration here of what you could mould: https://bazar.preciousplastic.com/moulds/ https://bazar.preciousplastic.com/moulds/ But in general, anything you've seen in the real world would be possible to recreate with your own moulds, the limit is your imagination!
- cheshireoctopus 6y ago
  This is REALLY cool. How can I meet people around me who have already setup a collection point, a community point, or a machine shop? Do you have an onboarding guide for beginners who are looking for low-effort ways to explore what you are doing?
  - diggan 6y ago
    I don't want to give the impression I'm part of the Precious Plastic Community (yet at least) as I'm only playing around. However, here are some resources for getting started locally: - Map of all the workshops registered on PP - https://community.preciousplastic.com/map https://community.preciousplastic.com/map - Events that are being organized all around the world - https://community.preciousplastic.com/events https://community.preciousplastic.com/events - Onboarding guide, read from top to bottom, includes some videos as well, great for getting started - https://community.preciousplastic.com/academy/intro https://community.preciousplastic.com/academy/intro - And the most helpful, PPs Discord community, tons of channels and even more people, usually very responsive and very diverse - https://discordapp.com/invite/cGZ5hKP https://discordapp.com/invite/cGZ5hKP
ccktlmazeltov 6y ago
People are so into recycling, but I fail to see how I can make a difference by recycling. It just seems like the problem is too massive at this point.
- Loic 6y ago
  This is the drop in the oceans. If people start to buy low single use plastic intensity products, the producers will start to reduce and it starts the pump for changes. Usually just buying less helps a lot.
  - ARandumGuy 6y ago
    I feel like you have it backwards here. Consumers aren't the ones deciding how much plastic is in what. For example, I didn't decide that my new pair of scissors should come in large, impossible to open blister packaging. I didn't decide that my grocery store should only sell milk in large plastic jugs. And that's just going by the packaging I can see. Who knows how much disposable packaging is used throughout the production process. I'm not saying that you shouldn't try to reduce the amount of plastic you use. But the end consumer wasn't responsible for the huge rise of plastic products, and there's only so much they can do to fix it.
- dahart 6y ago
  Not buying plastic is a better solution. But is that realistic for you right now? If everyone thinks the same thing you do, and gives up without trying, then we never start solving the massive problem. Instead if everyone recycles, then we begin the process of keeping the problem from growing even larger than it already is. I do think you raise a great point that it's a little silly to put this on the shoulders of individual consumers, and let the corporations off the hook. This is a problem that does need to be addressed with policy, and companies shouldn't be allowed to continue polluting this planet with no consequences. I don't know how what the solution should look like, but this is a specific example of where free markets can fail us - the costs of producing all this unnecessary packaging was externalized starting 60 years ago, and is now starting to catch up with us. Because the delay between market forces and outcomes can be a century, we need to be more careful about just letting things run wild.
hinkley 6y ago
Method started out as a stealthily eco-friendly company, and when they first introduced refills for their products they did not make the container recyclable but did a big defense of that. They claimed recycling of plastic loses a large fraction of the input as waste, and recyclables/recycled materials have to be bulkier. They could make a very thin nonrecyclable package that had less plastic than the unrecoverable fraction of a recyclable alternative, and reduce shipping costs/footprint in the process. So sometimes less of a bad thing is better than more of a mediocre thing. They have since marked that packaging as recyclable, so I don’t know whether they found a workaround or are participating in the recycling mythos now.
vinhboy 6y ago
I don't really understand why recycling plastic is not viable. I feel like this is more of a problem with ideology than actual process. For example, I buy these "Green Toys" products that are supposedly made from recycled plastic and I love it. I have no idea why this recycled plastic is not used in other kid's toys, kitchenware, or random things like garden tools. This recycled plastic is tough, it doesn't decay in the sun like regular plastic. I would pay more for it! I have actually tried looking for more items made from recycled plastic and it just doesn't exist. My conclusion is that people don't like the way it looks, because it's very rough and the color is different, so there is no market for it. Most people probably prefer to buy the cheaper, "nicer" looking plastic.
- gruez 6y ago
  >I don't really understand why recycling plastic is not viable. I feel like this is more of a problem with ideology than actual process. [...] Anyways, if someone smarter than me tells me the economics doesn't work, I will believe them, but until then I am skeptical of the idea that we can't properly recycle plastic. This comment is baffling. In the beginning you think it's an ideological issue. Later on you acknowledge that cost might be an issue, but then you move to goal posts from "plastic is not viable" to "we can't properly recycle plastic". Cost is absolutely the main issue here, not that it's "not possible". Even if recycled plastic is substandard compared to virgin plastic, most consumers can be convinced of otherwise if it's sufficiently cheap enough.
  - deleted 6y ago
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  - vinhboy 6y ago
    You're probably right. My comment was confusing so I edited it to make it more coherent. I struggle with writing, so I appreciate the feedback to improve it. However, regarding your comment > In the beginning you think it's an ideological issue. Later on you acknowledge that cost might be an issue I don't see these as contradictory. Ideology affects what people are willing to spend. As someone who cares about the environment I don't mind spending more on recycled plastic to reduce waste. Most of my peers would not spend a cent more if they don't have to.
narwally 6y ago
This is for glass recycling not plastic, but I recently found out that my county ships all of their glass recyclables to be dumped in a landfill of a neighboring state. In my state, waste disposal companies are legally obligated to recycle everything they can that ends up in a recycling bin. But with glass it's actually vastly cheaper to produce new glass bottles than it is to make them out of recycled material. So there isn't a market for the waste management companies to even sell the product they legally have to produce. To get around this regulation they just ship their recycled glass to a state without this regulation, and dump it all in a landfill there. It seems like the only way to make recycling truly effective at a large scale is to make it economically viable, either through the creating of new recycling techniques that make using recycled materials the cheapest option, or through subsidies to artificially produce the same effect.
- leafmeal 6y ago
  If the cost of recycling was added in as a tax on the material, that could be effective as well. Then the market could decide which materials are truly cost effective.
- lotsofpulp 6y ago
  >It seems like the only way to make recycling truly effective at a large scale is to make it economically viable I think it's easier and less corruptible to have the goal be to reduce the consumption causing the waste and attack the problem at the root. I.e. a tax increasing the cost of everything to reflect the cost of properly disposing it. Recycling doesn't undo the environmental damage, and in many cases it takes huge amounts of energy to recycle causing even more damage.
  - wolco 6y ago
    Doesn't this hurt the poor while enabling the rich to continue being wasteful.
    - Goronmon 6y ago
      Doesn't this hurt the poor while enabling the rich to continue being wasteful. Absolutely
DoingIsLearning 6y ago
The Plastic recycling process as a whole is an incredibly succesful cost externalization for the petro-chemical and packaging industries. Governments and consumers need to get serious with these lobbies: - Ban ALL single-use plastic (except for medical supplies). - Heavily tax plastic packaging - Tax breaks for glass and paper packaging - Force plastic return deposit schemes at supermarkets _payed for by manufacturers_ - Define industry quotas for how much 'new' plastic is allowed to be made from crude and make companies bid for it in a "new plastic" market, this would enable buy in from petro-chemical businesses whose profit currently depends on volume. Yes, product prices will increase but the reality is that the price is already there but is just currently hidden behind the recycling PR machine. None of this requires ocean micro plastic cleaning tech, or plastic separating computer vision, it is purely political it is purely stopping this protectionism. It can change right now if people are outraged enough.
- makecheck 6y ago
  I’m not against these ideas but you do have to zoom out a bit to fully realize the impact of each alternative. It’s not as simple as replacing a “bad” one with a “good” one, because there are side effects. (I haven’t added up the total impacts of every option either; this is just something to consider.) For example, glass is much heavier than the plastic used for bottles. If you have trucks/etc. hauling millions of bottles around the world, it will take more energy to move glass bottles. Glass is also fragile so it’s possible there is more shipping material or more random losses affecting cost. So then the problem is not just how to replace plastic bottles with glass but how to offset the added environmental cost of transporting glass.
  - jlmorton 6y ago
    > hauling millions of bottles around the world If it's a 1:1 transition from plastic bottle to glass bottle, it would be 35 billion bottles annually, in the US alone.
    - davinic 6y ago
      It wouldn't be. Forcing the producers to pay for their externalities will also make some products like bottled water cost-prohibitive to sell in glass bottles and reduce demand or increase packaging sizes to more is bought in reusable plastic carboys, etc. "Reduce" is more important than reuse or recycle and while there is an obvious need for cheap bottled water, probably at least 80% of plastic disposable water bottles do not need to be sold in that way.
dang 6y ago
Threads about recycling have started to pile up just like the recycling has. A list of the major ones is below (but only with "recycl" in the title—if you find more, let me know!) Given the current picture, perhaps most interesting in retrospect is this 1996 article (which apparently set a record for hate mail) and its sequel from 2015: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9757853 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9757853 Recycling is Garbage (1996) (55 comments) - https://archive.is/JKG7y https://archive.is/JKG7y https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10327585 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10327585 The Reign of Recycling (34 comments) - https://archive.is/o8LBm https://archive.is/o8LBm --- 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24454067 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24454067 Oil Companies Touted Recycling to Sell More Plastic (232 comments) 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24441979 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24441979 How Big Oil Misled the Public into Believing Plastic Would Be Recycled (310 comments) 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24440516 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24440516 Pringles tube tries to wake from 'recycling nightmare' (394 comments) 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23040674 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23040674 Plastics pile up as coronavirus hits Asia recyclers (19 comments) 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22927072 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22927072 'Horrible hybrids': the plastic products that give recyclers nightmares (40 comments) 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22741635 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22741635 Industry spent millions selling recycling, to sell more plastic (105 comments) 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22467015 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22467015 Coke and Pepsi are getting sued for lying about recycling (170 comments) 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22318165 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22318165 Is Recycling a Waste of Time? (94 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21837414 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21837414 Recycling Rethink: What to Do with Trash Now China Won’t Take It (152 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21742196 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21742196 The Great Recycling Con [video] (77 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21303618 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21303618 How Coca-Cola Undermines Plastic Recycling Efforts (132 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21297639 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21297639 All plastic waste could be recycled into new plastic: researchers (150 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21102560 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21102560 We asked three companies to recycle plastic and only one did (64 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21043986 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21043986 Exposing the Myth of Plastic Recycling (17 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20762789 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20762789 Plastics: What's Recyclable, What Becomes Trash and Why (215 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20728911 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20728911 Smart plastic incineration posited as solution to global recycling crisis (84 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20726689 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20726689 'Plastic recycling is a myth': what really happens to your rubbish (63 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20549804 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20549804 Americans' plastic recycling is dumped in landfills (282 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20433851 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20433851 Landfill is underrated and recycling overrated (336 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20134641 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20134641 I work in the environmental movement. I don’t care if you recycle (15 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19889365 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19889365 Why Recycling Doesn't Work (216 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19844551 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19844551 Reycling Plastic from the Inside Out (46 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19799348 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19799348 Bikes, bowling balls, and the balancing act that is modern recycling (2015) (35 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19728391 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19728391 Just 10% of U.S. plastic gets recycled. A new kind of plastic could change that (116 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19483074 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19483074 America Finally Admits Recycling Doesn’t Work (35 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19399543 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19399543 The World's Recycling Is in Chaos. Here's What Has to Happen (25 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19346342 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19346342 What Happens Now That China Won't Take U.S. Recycling (219 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18893252 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18893252 The Era of Easy Recycling May Be Coming to an End (84 comments) 2018 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17841584 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17841584 Recycling in the United States is in serious trouble. How does it work? (94 comments) 2018 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17677698 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17677698 Trash piles up in US as China closes door to recycling (272 comments) 2018 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17495872 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17495872 Californians love to recycle, but it's no longer doing any good (14 comments) 2018 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17409152 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17409152 Plastic recycling is a problem consumers can't solve (441 comments) 2018 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16856246 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16856246 An enzyme that digests plastic could boost recycling (122 comments) 2018 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16174719 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16174719 Plastics Pile Up as China Refuses to Take the West’s Recycling (71 comments) 2017 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15888827 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15888827 Recycling Chaos in U.S. As China Bans 'Foreign Waste' (233 comments) 2017 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15528740 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15528740 China Bans Foreign Waste – What Will Happen to the World's Recycling? (63 comments) 2016 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11083898 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11083898 Is it time to rethink recycling? (147 comments) 2015 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10327585 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10327585 The Reign of Recycling (34 comments) 2015 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9757853 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9757853 Recycling is Garbage (1996) (55 comments) 2014 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7778956 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7778956 Is Recycling Worth It? (13 comments) 2010 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1186666 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1186666 Recycling is Bullshit; Make Nov. 15 Zero Waste Day, not America Recycles Day (18 comments) 2009 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=937097 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=937097 The Recycling Myth (36 comments)
noxer 6y ago
PENN & TELLER: BULLSHIT S02EP05 Recycling https://www.bitchute.com/video/j0Hd6UfA4MKo/ https://www.bitchute.com/video/j0Hd6UfA4MKo/ Yes its old but not much has changed.
- ZeroGravitas 6y ago
  And here's their equally scientifically accurate take on climate change from the same time period. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fWt2Rir8OQk https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fWt2Rir8OQk Big fan of both Penn and Teller but libertarian bullshit is still bullshit and they proved that even smart people fall for it if they hang in the wrong circles too much.
  - mike00632 6y ago
    They've also done a 180 on veganism and animal activism.
  - noxer 6y ago
    Admitting that they where wrong on some parts isn't exactly bad. Also doesn't affect the countless other topics they covered from which almost all are still BS today. Could they have been wrong on recycling? Yes, they could but there is no evidence that they where wrong.
  - waterhouse 6y ago
    Did we watch the same video? "Every tingly spidey sense, every sniff, every whiff, smells like global warming—which they now call climate change, in case they want to go the other way and say it's colder—but it just reeks of fuckin' bullshit to me. And yet, in good conscience, we can't really come out and say it's bullshit, because there isn't enough information to really refute it completely. And there is some information that it might be real. So—the high-dea is not to go with your gut, the idea is to go with your head, and our heads can't say that global warming is complete and utter bullshit. So we're doing—again, this is like our third show that's kind of sort of on global warming—we're kind of picking out one area that we're sure is bullshit, and that is the carbon credits, the spending money so that your guilt goes away. Buying a forgiveness." I see proper intellectual restraint about the science, and criticism of one particular policy proposal.
chubot 6y ago
I still don't get how bottled water became a thing. It wasn't a thing when I was a kid, and somehow the industry convinced us to buy huge quantities of an inferior product for more money, and it pollutes the environment to boot. Insane. The least you can do is use a refillable container. 10+ years ago Google switched from bottle water to giving everyone a container. And that was a great move. Yet people complained, and a few years later we were back to bottled water. What a waste.
- RankingMember 6y ago
  It's literally convenience trumping everything. For example, for gatherings (back when we were able to have those), you could either bring a big jug of water and a bunch of solo cups, a case of bottled water, or, the eco-friendly option, a jug of water and just assume everyone else will have a reusable water bottle (e.g. Nalgene). The easiest option there is the bottled water option. This can only be solved by shifting from the "wish upon a star that all consumers will somehow solve the problem themselves" strategy to putting the responsibility squarely on the shoulders of the people profiting from putting municipal water in single-use plastic bottles.
- SQueeeeeL 6y ago
  People are bad decision agents. Selling bottled water to Americans is like selling snow to eskimos, but we buy it in droves because advertising fuckin works and works well. They make a few dollars off of every person in the country to contribute nothing, but that's just how capitalism works. The only way to win is to start making your own water bottles and market them harder!! (btw the planet is still screwed doing this, but you'll be rich!)
- outworlder 6y ago
  > I still don't get how bottled water became a thing Many reasons. Mostly distrust on how potable the water actually is (events like Flint didn't help). Some locations have water that tastes bad - even if it should be otherwise healthy. What I don't understand is how small bottles became a thing. Sure, if you are out and about it might be convenient to carry some, as they are sealed containers. But some people buy them for normal consumption. At least use the big bottles that are supposed to be used with watercoolers. Those are actually reused.
mattbeckman 6y ago
If someone was to Elon Musk the shi* out of this problem, what would they build or do differently? My gut is that it would focus on plastic identification automation, but not positive.
- f00zz 6y ago
  Maybe not the most environment-friendly solution, but plastic waste can be depolymerized into crude oil. No idea about the economics though.
- aforwardslash 6y ago
  They did. The plastics industry sinked millions in campaigns to convince the people plastics are reclyclable. The only thing missing from being a true Musk move is that they came up with it themselves, instead of buying off the idea from someone else.
  - mattbeckman 6y ago
    You know that's not what I meant. Let's chat again when you've executed and launched five unique revolutionary companies.
    - aforwardslash 6y ago
      Executed is not a synonym of "bought". And arguably, none of them is revolucionary. With a cool $1bn in the bank, you bet I could do better, such as investing in tech that solves real problems instead of 3rd cathegory sci-fi adaptations.
gl00pp 6y ago
Honest question for the great minds who hang out here but; why don't we 'harvest' the landfills? thanks good-day.
hristov 6y ago
As I have said before the solution is compostable plastic. It solves the problem with the smallest net change in behavior of the affected parties. As we have regrettably seen with the coronavirus changing the behavior of large populations is incredibly difficult even if there are dire repercussions for failure to change. The cost of compostable plastic is slightly higher than the usual plastic, so the governments will have to enforce its use, but it will be a small price to pay for removing the externalities of dealing with actual plastic waste.
- ars 6y ago
  I disagree. The solution is burning plastic for energy. You get to use the oil from the ground twice: Once as plastic, and again for energy. It's a win/win since you reduce oil you burn and get rid of plastic waste.
  - hristov 6y ago
    Have you ever burned ordinary plastic? The smell is horrific, there are some truly nasty poisons being released. Furthermore, compostable plastics will solve the biggest problem of plastic pollution -- the a-hole that just tosses plastic garbage in the ground because he/she doesn't give a damn. Compostable plastics compost much faster in proper municipal/industrial composting facilities, so it is still important to throw the stuff away in compost bins and to have regular pickup service, but they will compost in the environment too. Thus, there is some defense against the morons that just litter. In other words, compostable plastics fail better than all the other choices.
    - ars 6y ago
      > Have you ever burned ordinary plastic? The smell is horrific, there are some truly nasty poisons being released. Only if you don't use enough oxygen. Except for PVC plastic does not have any bad atoms in it, if fully burned the exhaust is completely safe (it's just water and CO2). A proper, hot, incinerator will burn plastic very safely.
    - kgabis 6y ago
vaccinator 6y ago
I pretty much stopped using my recycling bins... except for aluminum.
- kgabis 6y ago
  I don't get why this comment is downvoted. This is the only reasonable thing to do from the energy standpoint.
- thescriptkiddie 6y ago
  Steel, unbroken glass bottles, and clean paper/cardboard are actually recycled at most municipal recycling centers as well.
  - vaccinator 6y ago
    but is it worth it, energy wise (or for any other reason)?
idoubtit 6y ago
Since no one comments on the precise content of the article, I'll do it. First of all, it's mostly based on a paper "published Wednesday in the peer-reviewed journal Science Advances". Unfortunately, there is no link to the article. The exact title is not even given. The date is unclear since the magazine published this in 2017 and updated some (undetermined) content in 2018. Most links are dead (home page of the lead author, web site of an association about statistics). The basis is scientific, but this National Geographic article is not. For instance, the title is misleading: "91% of plastic isn't recycled" means "an estimated 91% of all the plastic ever produced has not been recycled as of today (2017)". Another dubious sentence is: "79 percent is accumulating in landfills or sloughing off in the natural environment as litter." Since 12% were incinerated and 9% recycled, it assumes that the rest (100-12-9) is just garbage. I suppose the reality is that a large proportion of the plastics produced is still used. They mention that 40% of plastics are for packaging. According to PlasticsEurope, 20% for construction, 10% for vehicles. People often focus on packaging and forget the variety of plastics and their usages. What surprised me was that the USA were so bad at recycling (9%) while Europe and Asia were far better (30% and 25%). I had read that some American soda producers were mostly using recycled PET, so I wondered if there was a contradiction. I've just read more about it, and these companies recycle in many countries but not much in the USA because there is no large-scale infrastructure to do so. The lack of national leadership means it can only exist locally, with varying quality and lack of long term committing. Even when the recycling exists, consumers in the USA do not behave as well as they do in Netherland, so the recycled PET is more costly with a lower quality.
- pixl97 6y ago
  >What surprised me was that the USA were so bad at recycling No, you can thank the coca cola corporation for that. They have lobbied millions, along with the groceries associations to prevent things like bottle deposits to make recycling more common. Google it, plenty of information out there on the topic.
dgellow 6y ago
Germany has some recycling plants with modern sorting machines, almost entirely automated, it’s quite impressive to see it working. https://youtu.be/I_fUpP-hq3A https://youtu.be/I_fUpP-hq3A I was checking for details a few days ago, they announce on their website 53% of their input recycled, and 47% used for “energy recovery” (which is newspeak to say they burn it for the cement and steel industry). I was surprised by the fact that they burn so much but 47% is apparently considered very good.
- thescriptkiddie 6y ago
  Burning plastic in a modern (read: clean) incinerator is probably the best thing to do with it at this point. It's certainly better than burying it in a landfill. Of course, it would be better to just not make it in the first place.
  - dgellow 6y ago
    Yes, that’s what I read. It still feels dirty and counter intuitive IMHO, but I get that by doing so they can avoid using even more fossil fuel. Regarding the German system, they could really improve the percentage of recycled plastic trash by using more explicit bins, you currently have one single yellow bin for anything recyclable instead of one for PET, one or aluminum, etc. Because of this it is always a bit difficult to know what is supposed to go or not in the bin, and people just put everything they think is plastic.
hosh 6y ago
I knew that plastic recycling were not as big but I did not know it was 91%. I started looking up stuff like this: https://leapsmag.com/plastic-eating-mushrooms-let-you-have-your-trash-and-eat-it-too/ https://leapsmag.com/plastic-eating-mushrooms-let-you-have-y... I mean, if the corporate community won't do what they say, then I'm going to look for a practical way to do this locally, onsite.
benjaminpkane 6y ago
They should start making yoga pants from recycled plastic, if they don't already. It is deeply ironic that many people who advocate for better plastic consumption, probably own yoga pants, which are made of plastic. Kind of off topic, but, my point is it is more than just Coca-Cola driving the plastics industry.
L-four 6y ago
My idea is that retailers should have to pay for the collection and recycling of any waste created by the products they sell. Thus creating an insensitive to retailers to stock products with cheap collection and easy recyclability.
pfdietz 6y ago
Plastic shouldn't be recycled. It should be burned. It's a compact store of energy, and that energy can be recovered and used, even if plastic cannot be easily reused as a material. Waste handling should focus on making plastics cleanly combustible and keeping problematic materials (like, toxic heavy metals) from being mixed with them in the waste stream.

433 points by adrian_mrd 6y ago

The vast majority of things people think of as recyclable are actually not. The result is an endless stream of trash in the recycling stream which makes the actual recyclables worthless.

ProAm 6y ago

There is an excellent Planet Money podcast about this from NPR [1] [1] https://www.npr.org/2020/09/11/912150085/waste-land https://www.npr.org/2020/09/11/912150085/waste-land

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aNoob7000 6y ago

Listen to the latest episode of Planet Money. https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510289/planet-money https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510289/planet-money

scottndecker 6y ago
This. Most plastics can't be recycled; it was a PR play by the plastic industry decades ago. Using plastics for such things as medical devices and such makes complete sense to me. Using plastics for items which inherently are only used for a few minutes or an hour (see the F&B industry) makes no sense at all to me.
- chmod600 6y ago
  "Using plastics for items which inherently are only used for a few minutes or an hour" Of course it makes sense. Plastic is cheap, light, watertight, strong, and mallable. It's kind of a miracle material, except that it's too stable. If we had a version that decomposed in a year, it would be awesome.
  - hadlock 6y ago
    Compostable "plastics", e.g. PLA, which sometimes is corn-based, exist; in California I've seen compostable disposable silverware, as well as compostable decorative planters (I own two, holding up good after three years, which makes me wonder how compostable they really are). But compostable "plastics" do exist, at least in some markets.
    - joelhoffman 6y ago
      Surely the companies that print the symbol and "Please recycle!" on non-recyclable plastic wouldn't label non-compostable silverware as compostable... I've successfully run "compostable" plastic through the dishwasher several times and haven't seen any sign of decay. The county I live in offers composting service and begs people to please not put "compostable" plastic in it.
  - _Microft 6y ago
    A quickly decomposing plastic wouldn't be awesome either as it would add all the carbon extracted from fossil sources into the short term carbon cycle more quickly.
- olejorgenb 6y ago
  There are a few companies claiming progress in chemical recycling. eg.: https://quantafuel.com/ https://quantafuel.com/ | https://newsweb.oslobors.no/message/513575 https://newsweb.oslobors.no/message/513575 80% (by weight) recovery into high quality liquids (eg.: nafta). They claim the majority of the energy used by the process comes from the remaining 20%. The acceptable input is mostly PP and PE, the two most commonly used plastics (at least for packaging). A special catalysator is used to remove additives like chlorine.

diggan 6y ago

Fitting, I just started looking into reusing plastic myself by collecting plastic from my own, family and friends trash and remoulding it into something useful. In my quest for this, I found Precious Plastic, an amazing community around recycling plastics yourself and for your community. https://preciousplastic.com/ https://preciousplastic.com/ While individuals plastic pollution is not the biggest emitter of plastic here in the world, we can always take small steps towards making sure we don't throw as much plastic as we currently do.

marmshallow 6y ago
What kinds of things do you mold it into?
- diggan 6y ago
  I've only run smaller experiments so far, mostly focusing around storage containers as I have a lot of electronic stuff that is currently just laying around. You can get some more inspiration here of what you could mould: https://bazar.preciousplastic.com/moulds/ https://bazar.preciousplastic.com/moulds/ But in general, anything you've seen in the real world would be possible to recreate with your own moulds, the limit is your imagination!
cheshireoctopus 6y ago
This is REALLY cool. How can I meet people around me who have already setup a collection point, a community point, or a machine shop? Do you have an onboarding guide for beginners who are looking for low-effort ways to explore what you are doing?
- diggan 6y ago
  I don't want to give the impression I'm part of the Precious Plastic Community (yet at least) as I'm only playing around. However, here are some resources for getting started locally: - Map of all the workshops registered on PP - https://community.preciousplastic.com/map https://community.preciousplastic.com/map - Events that are being organized all around the world - https://community.preciousplastic.com/events https://community.preciousplastic.com/events - Onboarding guide, read from top to bottom, includes some videos as well, great for getting started - https://community.preciousplastic.com/academy/intro https://community.preciousplastic.com/academy/intro - And the most helpful, PPs Discord community, tons of channels and even more people, usually very responsive and very diverse - https://discordapp.com/invite/cGZ5hKP https://discordapp.com/invite/cGZ5hKP

ccktlmazeltov 6y ago

People are so into recycling, but I fail to see how I can make a difference by recycling. It just seems like the problem is too massive at this point.

Loic 6y ago
This is the drop in the oceans. If people start to buy low single use plastic intensity products, the producers will start to reduce and it starts the pump for changes. Usually just buying less helps a lot.
- ARandumGuy 6y ago
  I feel like you have it backwards here. Consumers aren't the ones deciding how much plastic is in what. For example, I didn't decide that my new pair of scissors should come in large, impossible to open blister packaging. I didn't decide that my grocery store should only sell milk in large plastic jugs. And that's just going by the packaging I can see. Who knows how much disposable packaging is used throughout the production process. I'm not saying that you shouldn't try to reduce the amount of plastic you use. But the end consumer wasn't responsible for the huge rise of plastic products, and there's only so much they can do to fix it.
dahart 6y ago
Not buying plastic is a better solution. But is that realistic for you right now? If everyone thinks the same thing you do, and gives up without trying, then we never start solving the massive problem. Instead if everyone recycles, then we begin the process of keeping the problem from growing even larger than it already is. I do think you raise a great point that it's a little silly to put this on the shoulders of individual consumers, and let the corporations off the hook. This is a problem that does need to be addressed with policy, and companies shouldn't be allowed to continue polluting this planet with no consequences. I don't know how what the solution should look like, but this is a specific example of where free markets can fail us - the costs of producing all this unnecessary packaging was externalized starting 60 years ago, and is now starting to catch up with us. Because the delay between market forces and outcomes can be a century, we need to be more careful about just letting things run wild.

hinkley 6y ago

Method started out as a stealthily eco-friendly company, and when they first introduced refills for their products they did not make the container recyclable but did a big defense of that. They claimed recycling of plastic loses a large fraction of the input as waste, and recyclables/recycled materials have to be bulkier. They could make a very thin nonrecyclable package that had less plastic than the unrecoverable fraction of a recyclable alternative, and reduce shipping costs/footprint in the process. So sometimes less of a bad thing is better than more of a mediocre thing. They have since marked that packaging as recyclable, so I don’t know whether they found a workaround or are participating in the recycling mythos now.

vinhboy 6y ago

I don't really understand why recycling plastic is not viable. I feel like this is more of a problem with ideology than actual process. For example, I buy these "Green Toys" products that are supposedly made from recycled plastic and I love it. I have no idea why this recycled plastic is not used in other kid's toys, kitchenware, or random things like garden tools. This recycled plastic is tough, it doesn't decay in the sun like regular plastic. I would pay more for it! I have actually tried looking for more items made from recycled plastic and it just doesn't exist. My conclusion is that people don't like the way it looks, because it's very rough and the color is different, so there is no market for it. Most people probably prefer to buy the cheaper, "nicer" looking plastic.

gruez 6y ago
>I don't really understand why recycling plastic is not viable. I feel like this is more of a problem with ideology than actual process. [...] Anyways, if someone smarter than me tells me the economics doesn't work, I will believe them, but until then I am skeptical of the idea that we can't properly recycle plastic. This comment is baffling. In the beginning you think it's an ideological issue. Later on you acknowledge that cost might be an issue, but then you move to goal posts from "plastic is not viable" to "we can't properly recycle plastic". Cost is absolutely the main issue here, not that it's "not possible". Even if recycled plastic is substandard compared to virgin plastic, most consumers can be convinced of otherwise if it's sufficiently cheap enough.
- deleted 6y ago
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- vinhboy 6y ago
  You're probably right. My comment was confusing so I edited it to make it more coherent. I struggle with writing, so I appreciate the feedback to improve it. However, regarding your comment > In the beginning you think it's an ideological issue. Later on you acknowledge that cost might be an issue I don't see these as contradictory. Ideology affects what people are willing to spend. As someone who cares about the environment I don't mind spending more on recycled plastic to reduce waste. Most of my peers would not spend a cent more if they don't have to.

narwally 6y ago

This is for glass recycling not plastic, but I recently found out that my county ships all of their glass recyclables to be dumped in a landfill of a neighboring state. In my state, waste disposal companies are legally obligated to recycle everything they can that ends up in a recycling bin. But with glass it's actually vastly cheaper to produce new glass bottles than it is to make them out of recycled material. So there isn't a market for the waste management companies to even sell the product they legally have to produce. To get around this regulation they just ship their recycled glass to a state without this regulation, and dump it all in a landfill there. It seems like the only way to make recycling truly effective at a large scale is to make it economically viable, either through the creating of new recycling techniques that make using recycled materials the cheapest option, or through subsidies to artificially produce the same effect.

leafmeal 6y ago
If the cost of recycling was added in as a tax on the material, that could be effective as well. Then the market could decide which materials are truly cost effective.
lotsofpulp 6y ago
>It seems like the only way to make recycling truly effective at a large scale is to make it economically viable I think it's easier and less corruptible to have the goal be to reduce the consumption causing the waste and attack the problem at the root. I.e. a tax increasing the cost of everything to reflect the cost of properly disposing it. Recycling doesn't undo the environmental damage, and in many cases it takes huge amounts of energy to recycle causing even more damage.
- wolco 6y ago
  Doesn't this hurt the poor while enabling the rich to continue being wasteful.
  - Goronmon 6y ago
    Doesn't this hurt the poor while enabling the rich to continue being wasteful. Absolutely

DoingIsLearning 6y ago

The Plastic recycling process as a whole is an incredibly succesful cost externalization for the petro-chemical and packaging industries. Governments and consumers need to get serious with these lobbies: - Ban ALL single-use plastic (except for medical supplies). - Heavily tax plastic packaging - Tax breaks for glass and paper packaging - Force plastic return deposit schemes at supermarkets _payed for by manufacturers_ - Define industry quotas for how much 'new' plastic is allowed to be made from crude and make companies bid for it in a "new plastic" market, this would enable buy in from petro-chemical businesses whose profit currently depends on volume. Yes, product prices will increase but the reality is that the price is already there but is just currently hidden behind the recycling PR machine. None of this requires ocean micro plastic cleaning tech, or plastic separating computer vision, it is purely political it is purely stopping this protectionism. It can change right now if people are outraged enough.

makecheck 6y ago
I’m not against these ideas but you do have to zoom out a bit to fully realize the impact of each alternative. It’s not as simple as replacing a “bad” one with a “good” one, because there are side effects. (I haven’t added up the total impacts of every option either; this is just something to consider.) For example, glass is much heavier than the plastic used for bottles. If you have trucks/etc. hauling millions of bottles around the world, it will take more energy to move glass bottles. Glass is also fragile so it’s possible there is more shipping material or more random losses affecting cost. So then the problem is not just how to replace plastic bottles with glass but how to offset the added environmental cost of transporting glass.
- jlmorton 6y ago
  > hauling millions of bottles around the world If it's a 1:1 transition from plastic bottle to glass bottle, it would be 35 billion bottles annually, in the US alone.
  - davinic 6y ago
    It wouldn't be. Forcing the producers to pay for their externalities will also make some products like bottled water cost-prohibitive to sell in glass bottles and reduce demand or increase packaging sizes to more is bought in reusable plastic carboys, etc. "Reduce" is more important than reuse or recycle and while there is an obvious need for cheap bottled water, probably at least 80% of plastic disposable water bottles do not need to be sold in that way.

dang 6y ago

Threads about recycling have started to pile up just like the recycling has. A list of the major ones is below (but only with "recycl" in the title—if you find more, let me know!) Given the current picture, perhaps most interesting in retrospect is this 1996 article (which apparently set a record for hate mail) and its sequel from 2015: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9757853 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9757853 Recycling is Garbage (1996) (55 comments) - https://archive.is/JKG7y https://archive.is/JKG7y https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10327585 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10327585 The Reign of Recycling (34 comments) - https://archive.is/o8LBm https://archive.is/o8LBm --- 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24454067 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24454067 Oil Companies Touted Recycling to Sell More Plastic (232 comments) 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24441979 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24441979 How Big Oil Misled the Public into Believing Plastic Would Be Recycled (310 comments) 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24440516 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24440516 Pringles tube tries to wake from 'recycling nightmare' (394 comments) 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23040674 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23040674 Plastics pile up as coronavirus hits Asia recyclers (19 comments) 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22927072 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22927072 'Horrible hybrids': the plastic products that give recyclers nightmares (40 comments) 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22741635 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22741635 Industry spent millions selling recycling, to sell more plastic (105 comments) 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22467015 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22467015 Coke and Pepsi are getting sued for lying about recycling (170 comments) 2020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22318165 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22318165 Is Recycling a Waste of Time? (94 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21837414 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21837414 Recycling Rethink: What to Do with Trash Now China Won’t Take It (152 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21742196 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21742196 The Great Recycling Con [video] (77 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21303618 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21303618 How Coca-Cola Undermines Plastic Recycling Efforts (132 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21297639 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21297639 All plastic waste could be recycled into new plastic: researchers (150 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21102560 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21102560 We asked three companies to recycle plastic and only one did (64 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21043986 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21043986 Exposing the Myth of Plastic Recycling (17 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20762789 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20762789 Plastics: What's Recyclable, What Becomes Trash and Why (215 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20728911 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20728911 Smart plastic incineration posited as solution to global recycling crisis (84 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20726689 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20726689 'Plastic recycling is a myth': what really happens to your rubbish (63 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20549804 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20549804 Americans' plastic recycling is dumped in landfills (282 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20433851 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20433851 Landfill is underrated and recycling overrated (336 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20134641 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20134641 I work in the environmental movement. I don’t care if you recycle (15 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19889365 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19889365 Why Recycling Doesn't Work (216 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19844551 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19844551 Reycling Plastic from the Inside Out (46 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19799348 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19799348 Bikes, bowling balls, and the balancing act that is modern recycling (2015) (35 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19728391 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19728391 Just 10% of U.S. plastic gets recycled. A new kind of plastic could change that (116 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19483074 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19483074 America Finally Admits Recycling Doesn’t Work (35 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19399543 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19399543 The World's Recycling Is in Chaos. Here's What Has to Happen (25 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19346342 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19346342 What Happens Now That China Won't Take U.S. Recycling (219 comments) 2019 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18893252 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18893252 The Era of Easy Recycling May Be Coming to an End (84 comments) 2018 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17841584 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17841584 Recycling in the United States is in serious trouble. How does it work? (94 comments) 2018 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17677698 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17677698 Trash piles up in US as China closes door to recycling (272 comments) 2018 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17495872 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17495872 Californians love to recycle, but it's no longer doing any good (14 comments) 2018 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17409152 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17409152 Plastic recycling is a problem consumers can't solve (441 comments) 2018 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16856246 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16856246 An enzyme that digests plastic could boost recycling (122 comments) 2018 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16174719 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16174719 Plastics Pile Up as China Refuses to Take the West’s Recycling (71 comments) 2017 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15888827 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15888827 Recycling Chaos in U.S. As China Bans 'Foreign Waste' (233 comments) 2017 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15528740 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15528740 China Bans Foreign Waste – What Will Happen to the World's Recycling? (63 comments) 2016 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11083898 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11083898 Is it time to rethink recycling? (147 comments) 2015 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10327585 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10327585 The Reign of Recycling (34 comments) 2015 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9757853 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9757853 Recycling is Garbage (1996) (55 comments) 2014 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7778956 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7778956 Is Recycling Worth It? (13 comments) 2010 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1186666 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1186666 Recycling is Bullshit; Make Nov. 15 Zero Waste Day, not America Recycles Day (18 comments) 2009 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=937097 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=937097 The Recycling Myth (36 comments)

noxer 6y ago

PENN & TELLER: BULLSHIT S02EP05 Recycling https://www.bitchute.com/video/j0Hd6UfA4MKo/ https://www.bitchute.com/video/j0Hd6UfA4MKo/ Yes its old but not much has changed.

ZeroGravitas 6y ago
And here's their equally scientifically accurate take on climate change from the same time period. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fWt2Rir8OQk https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fWt2Rir8OQk Big fan of both Penn and Teller but libertarian bullshit is still bullshit and they proved that even smart people fall for it if they hang in the wrong circles too much.
- mike00632 6y ago
  They've also done a 180 on veganism and animal activism.
- noxer 6y ago
  Admitting that they where wrong on some parts isn't exactly bad. Also doesn't affect the countless other topics they covered from which almost all are still BS today. Could they have been wrong on recycling? Yes, they could but there is no evidence that they where wrong.
- waterhouse 6y ago
  Did we watch the same video? "Every tingly spidey sense, every sniff, every whiff, smells like global warming—which they now call climate change, in case they want to go the other way and say it's colder—but it just reeks of fuckin' bullshit to me. And yet, in good conscience, we can't really come out and say it's bullshit, because there isn't enough information to really refute it completely. And there is some information that it might be real. So—the high-dea is not to go with your gut, the idea is to go with your head, and our heads can't say that global warming is complete and utter bullshit. So we're doing—again, this is like our third show that's kind of sort of on global warming—we're kind of picking out one area that we're sure is bullshit, and that is the carbon credits, the spending money so that your guilt goes away. Buying a forgiveness." I see proper intellectual restraint about the science, and criticism of one particular policy proposal.

chubot 6y ago

I still don't get how bottled water became a thing. It wasn't a thing when I was a kid, and somehow the industry convinced us to buy huge quantities of an inferior product for more money, and it pollutes the environment to boot. Insane. The least you can do is use a refillable container. 10+ years ago Google switched from bottle water to giving everyone a container. And that was a great move. Yet people complained, and a few years later we were back to bottled water. What a waste.

RankingMember 6y ago
It's literally convenience trumping everything. For example, for gatherings (back when we were able to have those), you could either bring a big jug of water and a bunch of solo cups, a case of bottled water, or, the eco-friendly option, a jug of water and just assume everyone else will have a reusable water bottle (e.g. Nalgene). The easiest option there is the bottled water option. This can only be solved by shifting from the "wish upon a star that all consumers will somehow solve the problem themselves" strategy to putting the responsibility squarely on the shoulders of the people profiting from putting municipal water in single-use plastic bottles.
SQueeeeeL 6y ago
People are bad decision agents. Selling bottled water to Americans is like selling snow to eskimos, but we buy it in droves because advertising fuckin works and works well. They make a few dollars off of every person in the country to contribute nothing, but that's just how capitalism works. The only way to win is to start making your own water bottles and market them harder!! (btw the planet is still screwed doing this, but you'll be rich!)
outworlder 6y ago
> I still don't get how bottled water became a thing Many reasons. Mostly distrust on how potable the water actually is (events like Flint didn't help). Some locations have water that tastes bad - even if it should be otherwise healthy. What I don't understand is how small bottles became a thing. Sure, if you are out and about it might be convenient to carry some, as they are sealed containers. But some people buy them for normal consumption. At least use the big bottles that are supposed to be used with watercoolers. Those are actually reused.

mattbeckman 6y ago

If someone was to Elon Musk the shi* out of this problem, what would they build or do differently? My gut is that it would focus on plastic identification automation, but not positive.

f00zz 6y ago
Maybe not the most environment-friendly solution, but plastic waste can be depolymerized into crude oil. No idea about the economics though.
aforwardslash 6y ago
They did. The plastics industry sinked millions in campaigns to convince the people plastics are reclyclable. The only thing missing from being a true Musk move is that they came up with it themselves, instead of buying off the idea from someone else.
- mattbeckman 6y ago
  You know that's not what I meant. Let's chat again when you've executed and launched five unique revolutionary companies.
  - aforwardslash 6y ago
    Executed is not a synonym of "bought". And arguably, none of them is revolucionary. With a cool $1bn in the bank, you bet I could do better, such as investing in tech that solves real problems instead of 3rd cathegory sci-fi adaptations.

gl00pp 6y ago

Honest question for the great minds who hang out here but; why don't we 'harvest' the landfills? thanks good-day.

hristov 6y ago

As I have said before the solution is compostable plastic. It solves the problem with the smallest net change in behavior of the affected parties. As we have regrettably seen with the coronavirus changing the behavior of large populations is incredibly difficult even if there are dire repercussions for failure to change. The cost of compostable plastic is slightly higher than the usual plastic, so the governments will have to enforce its use, but it will be a small price to pay for removing the externalities of dealing with actual plastic waste.

ars 6y ago
I disagree. The solution is burning plastic for energy. You get to use the oil from the ground twice: Once as plastic, and again for energy. It's a win/win since you reduce oil you burn and get rid of plastic waste.
- hristov 6y ago
  Have you ever burned ordinary plastic? The smell is horrific, there are some truly nasty poisons being released. Furthermore, compostable plastics will solve the biggest problem of plastic pollution -- the a-hole that just tosses plastic garbage in the ground because he/she doesn't give a damn. Compostable plastics compost much faster in proper municipal/industrial composting facilities, so it is still important to throw the stuff away in compost bins and to have regular pickup service, but they will compost in the environment too. Thus, there is some defense against the morons that just litter. In other words, compostable plastics fail better than all the other choices.
  - ars 6y ago
    > Have you ever burned ordinary plastic? The smell is horrific, there are some truly nasty poisons being released. Only if you don't use enough oxygen. Except for PVC plastic does not have any bad atoms in it, if fully burned the exhaust is completely safe (it's just water and CO2). A proper, hot, incinerator will burn plastic very safely.
  - kgabis 6y ago

vaccinator 6y ago

I pretty much stopped using my recycling bins... except for aluminum.

kgabis 6y ago
I don't get why this comment is downvoted. This is the only reasonable thing to do from the energy standpoint.
thescriptkiddie 6y ago
Steel, unbroken glass bottles, and clean paper/cardboard are actually recycled at most municipal recycling centers as well.
- vaccinator 6y ago
  but is it worth it, energy wise (or for any other reason)?

idoubtit 6y ago

Since no one comments on the precise content of the article, I'll do it. First of all, it's mostly based on a paper "published Wednesday in the peer-reviewed journal Science Advances". Unfortunately, there is no link to the article. The exact title is not even given. The date is unclear since the magazine published this in 2017 and updated some (undetermined) content in 2018. Most links are dead (home page of the lead author, web site of an association about statistics). The basis is scientific, but this National Geographic article is not. For instance, the title is misleading: "91% of plastic isn't recycled" means "an estimated 91% of all the plastic ever produced has not been recycled as of today (2017)". Another dubious sentence is: "79 percent is accumulating in landfills or sloughing off in the natural environment as litter." Since 12% were incinerated and 9% recycled, it assumes that the rest (100-12-9) is just garbage. I suppose the reality is that a large proportion of the plastics produced is still used. They mention that 40% of plastics are for packaging. According to PlasticsEurope, 20% for construction, 10% for vehicles. People often focus on packaging and forget the variety of plastics and their usages. What surprised me was that the USA were so bad at recycling (9%) while Europe and Asia were far better (30% and 25%). I had read that some American soda producers were mostly using recycled PET, so I wondered if there was a contradiction. I've just read more about it, and these companies recycle in many countries but not much in the USA because there is no large-scale infrastructure to do so. The lack of national leadership means it can only exist locally, with varying quality and lack of long term committing. Even when the recycling exists, consumers in the USA do not behave as well as they do in Netherland, so the recycled PET is more costly with a lower quality.

pixl97 6y ago
>What surprised me was that the USA were so bad at recycling No, you can thank the coca cola corporation for that. They have lobbied millions, along with the groceries associations to prevent things like bottle deposits to make recycling more common. Google it, plenty of information out there on the topic.

dgellow 6y ago

Germany has some recycling plants with modern sorting machines, almost entirely automated, it’s quite impressive to see it working. https://youtu.be/I_fUpP-hq3A https://youtu.be/I_fUpP-hq3A I was checking for details a few days ago, they announce on their website 53% of their input recycled, and 47% used for “energy recovery” (which is newspeak to say they burn it for the cement and steel industry). I was surprised by the fact that they burn so much but 47% is apparently considered very good.

thescriptkiddie 6y ago
Burning plastic in a modern (read: clean) incinerator is probably the best thing to do with it at this point. It's certainly better than burying it in a landfill. Of course, it would be better to just not make it in the first place.
- dgellow 6y ago
  Yes, that’s what I read. It still feels dirty and counter intuitive IMHO, but I get that by doing so they can avoid using even more fossil fuel. Regarding the German system, they could really improve the percentage of recycled plastic trash by using more explicit bins, you currently have one single yellow bin for anything recyclable instead of one for PET, one or aluminum, etc. Because of this it is always a bit difficult to know what is supposed to go or not in the bin, and people just put everything they think is plastic.

hosh 6y ago

I knew that plastic recycling were not as big but I did not know it was 91%. I started looking up stuff like this: https://leapsmag.com/plastic-eating-mushrooms-let-you-have-your-trash-and-eat-it-too/ https://leapsmag.com/plastic-eating-mushrooms-let-you-have-y... I mean, if the corporate community won't do what they say, then I'm going to look for a practical way to do this locally, onsite.

benjaminpkane 6y ago

They should start making yoga pants from recycled plastic, if they don't already. It is deeply ironic that many people who advocate for better plastic consumption, probably own yoga pants, which are made of plastic. Kind of off topic, but, my point is it is more than just Coca-Cola driving the plastics industry.

L-four 6y ago

My idea is that retailers should have to pay for the collection and recycling of any waste created by the products they sell. Thus creating an insensitive to retailers to stock products with cheap collection and easy recyclability.

pfdietz 6y ago

Plastic shouldn't be recycled. It should be burned. It's a compact store of energy, and that energy can be recovered and used, even if plastic cannot be easily reused as a material. Waste handling should focus on making plastics cleanly combustible and keeping problematic materials (like, toxic heavy metals) from being mixed with them in the waste stream.