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I believe plastic recycling is not motivated by oil use primarily. I believe it is motivated by trash accumulation in oceans and the food chain (microplastics).
by jvanderbot 6y ago
I believe plastic recycling is not motivated by oil use primarily. I believe it is motivated by trash accumulation in oceans and the food chain (microplastics). There are a ton of areas of the world where plastic just piles up.
- joshspankit 6y agoOff-topic, but sometimes I feel like we could harvest the plastic from the ocean, make plastic bricks, and build millions of houses. Edit: Just to be clear, I’m not trying to say that this is a viable solution to anything, or that it’s a good use of resources based on our current methodologies. I’m more just trying to say that there’s so much raw material out there and that it’s better if it comes out of the ocean. Like, if suddenly we found a non-polluting method to perfectly separate out all the components, then a health-safe chemical mixture with those components that was solid and fireproof (and UV proof), there’s probably enough out there to do something significant with.
- tachyonbeam 6y agoYou certainly could, but you could also build houses out of stone and cement, like they used to do in the old days. Makes for very durable construction.
- toomuchtodo 6y agoBetter to harvest the plastic from the ocean, and power the collection system with the plastic in a plasma gasifier. The slag can be disposed of in the ocean, as its chemically inert.
- mnouquet 6y ago> [...] build millions of houses ... slowly leaching endocrine disruptors in the environment for generations to come.
- da_big_ghey 6y agoThis would also cut reproduction rates, which is not pleasant but is necessary to stop climate change.
- JulianMorrison 6y agoThere are more species than humans who need to reproduce.
- da_big_ghey 6y agoThat is a good point, maybe something like one-child policy better serve this need. Or possibly we must consider which is worse for animals, damage from climate change or damage from endocrine disruptor.
- JulianMorrison 6y agoThe answer is neither. Human energy use that causes climate harms can be replaced with renewables. Fuel can be replaced with batteries. In the longer term, the sun is absolutely pouring out energy, which largely goes to waste, and a Dyson swarm capturing a small fraction of that would satisfy the energy needs of a much larger population.
- da_big_ghey 6y agoThese are not solving land impact of human. We must have fewer human or live in smal space like in Tokyo and others city like it. Most human no have desire to do this. Batery take resources like lithium more than we have. Maybe Dyson swarm eating star energy output cause climate change of its own, fewer energy reaching earth surface. There is always impacts that human create. We only can for truly mitigate climate change with reducing human numbers. One action we take for to reduce impact create impact again in one other place. We swalow spider to catch fly and continue on each and again. One child policy is the forebest way for to accomplish.
- BariumBlue 6y agoThere is a Kenyan Entrepreneur that is trying making bricks from excess and non-recyclable plastic: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-environment-recycling/kenyan-recycles-plastic-waste-into-bricks-stronger-than-concrete-idUSKBN2A211N https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-environment-recycli...
- pkaye 6y agoYou also need to make it fireproof or use an outer layer of fireproof material.
- roywiggins 6y agoYeah, if you aren't careful plastic building materials have some grim failure modes, the cladding that burned Grenfell Tower was made of aluminum and polyethylene, which more or less acted like a candle.
- joshspankit 6y agoI’ve edited my comment to clarify the subtext, but yes you’d definitely need to make it fireproof. Fiery liquid plastic is exceptionally unpleasant.
- Covzire 6y agoThere have been attempts at harvesting plastic from the ocean. I remember one fairly recently that built a system using crowd funding but I don't think it was as successful as hoped. If they keep trying I have little doubt they'll make it work and possibly even turn a profit. https://www.sciencealert.com/that-ocean-garbage-collector-is-finally-hauling-in-bags-of-rubbish https://www.sciencealert.com/that-ocean-garbage-collector-is...
- TheGallopedHigh 6y agoThis company did a slight pivot to building autonomous collectors anchored in rivers which have the most plastic dumped into them leading to the ocean.
- beckman466 6y agoOr... we could not use so much plastic, and make actual bricks to build ‘millions of houses’. Since you sound so excited, are you going to live in the first plastic house with your family? I think suggestions like this are super demeaning. I often see them coming from privileged knowledge workers, who are eager to share ‘free ideas‘/psuedo-solutions as a sort of ‘charity’ for poor people (and people in the global south). They are also often strategies which somehow don’t seem to fit for their own life - and instead are for ‘others’ who are less well off. In other words: tech solutionism. As knowledge workers, let’s try to cut through our false consciousness and come up with some awesome systemic changes that kick butt.
- joshspankit 6y agoDemeaning or proposing ‘charity’ was not my intent at all. I’ve edited my comment to clarify the subtext, but to answer your question: if we could find a health-safe fire and UV-resistant plastic formula that made solid building materials out of the pollution in the ocean, I would definitely live in the first plastic house with my family. It could survive hundreds of years and have a lot of benefits.
- dEnigma 6y agoYou're reading a lot into that short parent comment. Maybe you should be a bit more generous in your interpretation of other people's words.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- labawi 6y agoMost of the plastic can not be practically recovered from the ocean. It's more of a publicity stunt and cleaning hotspots. We need to catch the plastics before they go into the environment, disintegrate, release their plasticizers and other toxins. As has been said, best way to deal with all the plastic garbage that contains who-knows-what would probably be fuel, feedstock in refineries or similar.
- bluGill 6y agoYour edit is where the problem is. Sure there is a lot of plastic in the ocean, but the ocean is big as well. As a whole the size of the ocean cancels out your attempts to do any recovery. You end up using more energy to power the filters (which are typically on ships) than you would by taking the oil powering the filters and directly turning it into plastic. Plastic in the ocean isn't an easy problem to solve with anything other than wait for it to degrade. Which isn't as bad as it sounds because plastic doesn't do well in the sun, and we can easily make plastics that do worse and thus degrade faster.
- JulianMorrison 6y agoYou're assuming smaller plastic is better. You should probably stop assuming that.
- bluGill 6y agoI assume no such thing. Degrade is more than just smaller, though that does come first
- JulianMorrison 6y agoBricks made of plastic weather into dust made of microplastic. If microplastic turns out to be as serious a problem as has been suggested, with bioaccumulation and various sorts of damage, then the only solution is that all plastic without exception has to be thoroughly destroyed chemically or by burning as soon as it it isn't in use. And not put into use in ways that emit microplastic (as fibers, dust, or otherwise).
- derefr 6y agoHow about asphalt with plastics mixed into the underwater, but not the top layer?
- JulianMorrison 6y agoDeferring the problem. Roads get dug up and relaid, roads get abandoned, maybe a few years down the line, we won't be using roads. Mentally insert "Back to the Future 2" clip here. And so a few decades later, we return to the problem.
- spookthesunset 6y agoI forget where I read this but asphalt is perhaps the most recycled plastic out there. Asphalt can be ripped up and then remelted right back into place or moved somewhere else.
- derefr 6y agoRight! They even have road-paving machines that rip up the asphalt; add a bit more tar to replace the tar that seeped away; heat up the mixture and tumble it; lay it back down; and steamroll over it; all in one pass, all in a closed system with no dust escaping. (Ref: https://youtu.be/XKFaC5RYbEM https://youtu.be/XKFaC5RYbEM) Plus, since asphalt’s petroleum-tar binder is liquified during the working process, it would actually act as a solvent perfect for dissolving (certain) microplastics into. The microplastics wouldn’t merely be in mechanical mixture with the asphalt; they wouldn’t exist as distinct entities any more! They’d revert to being a petroleum fraction, in complex with the heavier petroleum fractions of the tar.
- cortesoft 6y agoHow would recycling help that? Throwing your trash in a trash can and taking it to a landfill would protect the ocean and food chain just as much as recycling it would.
- tooltower 6y agoIt would reduce the demand for landfill space?
- DenisM 6y agoWe’re not running out of land tho.
- ehnto 6y agoThat's not correct, plenty of countries don't have space for landfill and instead burn off trash in incinerators.
- DenisM 6y agoLet’s talk about the US then. Do you agree we’re not running out of land? If so, what is the point of recycling?
- objektif 6y agoWhat is your point? If we are not running out of land should we start dumping plastic all over the place?
- stjohnswarts 6y agoModern landfill techniques are actually quite scientific and regulated. It's not as bad as the far left portrays. We do need to encourage more reusable things though. Plastic and aluminum can be almost 100% recycled. Plastic is much much lower. It will take more than one solution to fix the problem. I think composting is a pipe dream though unless someone figures out how to quickly do it on a very large scale. It's fine for home gardeners but the rest of us simply aren't going to do it.
- malloryerik 6y agoWhat about biodegradable plastics? If regular plastics were made illegal or heavily taxed, wouldn't industry quickly come up with biodegradable alternatives?
- barney54 6y agoIt’s not easy to find good biodegradable alternatives for many types of plastics. See the example of Legos trying to replace their plastic with a more environmentally friendly version. https://www.wsj.com/articles/lego-struggles-to-find-a-plant-based-plastic-that-clicks-11560331800 https://www.wsj.com/articles/lego-struggles-to-find-a-plant-...
- derefr 6y agoSeems weird to want biodegradable lego, when they’re highly reusable. I’ve never heard of a LEGO brick get so worn out that it had to be thrown away. Making them rot would just decrease their productive multi-generational lifespan.
- DenisM 6y agoBiodegrading plastic releases CO2, landfill-buried plastic does not. Apart from that, what problem are you trying to solve with this innovation?
- Thiez 6y ago
- DenisM 6y agoThe countries which are the most preoccupied with recycling plastics, such as the US, are also the least likely to throw they trash into the ocean. Plastic bags do no harm buried in the landfill, and we’re not running out of land.
- Alkhwarizmi 6y agoYou seem extremely confused if you genuinely think buried trash in landfill does no harm. Please go and educate your self on the consequences of PLASTIC landfills.
- jounker 6y agoI see plastic bags on the beach. I walk along the creeks nearby, and I see plastic bags and plastic garbage. I go for a hike in the sierras, and I find plastic garbage. I bike along the roads in town, and I see plastic bags in the gutter. I look down the incline beside the road and there are plastic bags in the trees. Is the USA as bad as Morocco? No. Is plastic waste a problem? Yes.
- shawnz 6y agoLittering/dumping is a much different issue than disposing of your waste through the wrong channel. The problem you are describing isn't because people use the garbage instead of the recycling.
- oblio 6y agoIf we only had paper bags and such, littering wouldn't be a problem. Single use plastics of any kind need to be banned universally. Pseudo multiple use plastic such as bags needs to be taxed like alcohol and tobacco, through the roof, until alternatives become economically viable.
- tuwtuwtuwtuw 6y agoHow much does a plastic bag cost where you are? Here in Sweden there's a tax on it and a single bag can cost 7 SEK (USD 0.85).
- AnthonyMouse 6y ago> I believe it is motivated by trash accumulation in oceans and the food chain (microplastics). There are a ton of areas of the world where plastic just piles up. But then how are we not at the same solution? Burn the plastic garbage (in place of coal or natural gas) to generate electricity. Even better if they were plant-based plastics to begin with, because then it's renewable energy.