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Does the US still operate landfills? Some or all EU countries have completely abandoned the practice. So that's just not a harm that matters, unlike some other

Does the US still operate landfills? Some or all EU countries have completely abandoned the practice. So that's just not a harm that matters, unlike some other ones. In any case, it'd be compounding the problem here, and rather bad economics at the same time. Plastics aren't that hard to collect/separate, especially if it's ok to be mixed with paper. They burn readily and, given high temperatures, cleanly, allowing the recuperation of a significant fraction of its energy content. Then, there's recycling, of course. Not always possible, but not entirely impossible, either.

Retric 5y ago
Yes, the US still has landfills as does Europe. “In 2018, 24% of all municipal waste generated in the EU was landfilled.” That said, incineration is a similar option that drastically lowers volume of waste, but still produced ash that ends up buried and vast amounts of CO2.
- IfOnlyYouKnew 5y ago
  Yeah, the news I remembered were about Germany, specifically. it, and a few others, are at <=1% landfill: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/headlines/society/20180328STO00751/eu-waste-management-infographic-with-facts-and-figures https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/headlines/society/201...
  - Retric 5y ago
    That’s extremely misleading Germany simply uses incinerators before dumping the ash in landfills. “One nation now grappling with the legacy of its long embrace of incineration is Denmark. The country, one of Europe’s biggest waste producers, built so many incinerators that by 2018 it was importing a million tons of trash.” https://e360.yale.edu/features/in-europe-a-backlash-is-growing-over-incinerating-garbage https://e360.yale.edu/features/in-europe-a-backlash-is-growi...
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- Hokusai 5y ago
  Source: https://ec.europa.eu/environment/topics/waste-and-recycling/landfill-waste_en https://ec.europa.eu/environment/topics/waste-and-recycling/... The goal in the EU is to reduce it to 10% in 15 years. The USA landfill was of 50% in 2018. Some more legislation is needed. https://www.epa.gov/facts-and-figures-about-materials-waste-and-recycling/national-overview-facts-and-figures-materials https://www.epa.gov/facts-and-figures-about-materials-waste-...
MattGaiser 5y ago
Is incineration of plastic really better for the environment than a landfill? And would the ash not go to a landfill of sorts?
- gambiting 5y ago
  It's "just" carbohydrates - in theory it's no worse than burning oil or gas for heating/electricity, if you make sure everything burns at high enough temperature to burn cleanly and have filters at the exhaust to catch anything that survived the processes. I'd say it's a positive, we use oil to produce plastics, if that oil is used to produce energy after its plastic form is no longer needed....that's a plus in my book. But maybe on the other hand it's better if it stays in the landfill instead of being burnt and releasing the bound carbon into the atmosphere.
- frosted-flakes 5y ago
  From a C02 perspective, if it's burned cleanly and the energy released is used to generate electricity or heat homes, it's really not much different than a natural gas plant. But I agree with your point.
- IfOnlyYouKnew 5y ago
  A modern plant turns plastic into CO_2, electricity, and, often, residential heat. So, yes, that's preferable. Among the sheer ugliness and wastefulness of landfills, burning at high temperature avoids the toxic intermediates plastics give off when degrading in nature, which landfills struggle to contain. Ash is, by definition, inert. It is the remaining mass that does not chemically react even under extreme heat. It therefore also does not interact with, for example, the human body. Plastics are all carbon/hydrogen/nitrogen/oxygen, and, to a first approximation, do not leave any ash. In reality they do, but it's extremely little and harmless. (Physical harms can survive an incinerator, such as material giving off radiation, but those should never be in the trash)
  - nate_meurer 5y ago
    Incinerator ash and fume often has a very high concentration of heavy metals, comparable to coal ash. Definitely not harmless. You're correct that sufficient incineration temperatures ensure the complete destruction of organic intermediaries, such as dioxins.
gambiting 5y ago
>>Some or all EU countries have completely abandoned the practice. Absolutely not true, glad you maybe live in a country where landfills are disappearing, but they will always exist in some form - even with burning where do you think the slag goes to? That's right, a normal landfill. Not everything can be burnt, and not everything can be recycled. And definitely not "all" EU countries - Poland has normal landfills that take everything still, very few operational waste incenerators, and recycling is still unknown to a lot of people.

Retric 5y ago

Yes, the US still has landfills as does Europe. “In 2018, 24% of all municipal waste generated in the EU was landfilled.” That said, incineration is a similar option that drastically lowers volume of waste, but still produced ash that ends up buried and vast amounts of CO2.

IfOnlyYouKnew 5y ago
Yeah, the news I remembered were about Germany, specifically. it, and a few others, are at <=1% landfill: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/headlines/society/20180328STO00751/eu-waste-management-infographic-with-facts-and-figures https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/headlines/society/201...
- Retric 5y ago
  That’s extremely misleading Germany simply uses incinerators before dumping the ash in landfills. “One nation now grappling with the legacy of its long embrace of incineration is Denmark. The country, one of Europe’s biggest waste producers, built so many incinerators that by 2018 it was importing a million tons of trash.” https://e360.yale.edu/features/in-europe-a-backlash-is-growing-over-incinerating-garbage https://e360.yale.edu/features/in-europe-a-backlash-is-growi...
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
Hokusai 5y ago
Source: https://ec.europa.eu/environment/topics/waste-and-recycling/landfill-waste_en https://ec.europa.eu/environment/topics/waste-and-recycling/... The goal in the EU is to reduce it to 10% in 15 years. The USA landfill was of 50% in 2018. Some more legislation is needed. https://www.epa.gov/facts-and-figures-about-materials-waste-and-recycling/national-overview-facts-and-figures-materials https://www.epa.gov/facts-and-figures-about-materials-waste-...

MattGaiser 5y ago

Is incineration of plastic really better for the environment than a landfill? And would the ash not go to a landfill of sorts?

gambiting 5y ago
It's "just" carbohydrates - in theory it's no worse than burning oil or gas for heating/electricity, if you make sure everything burns at high enough temperature to burn cleanly and have filters at the exhaust to catch anything that survived the processes. I'd say it's a positive, we use oil to produce plastics, if that oil is used to produce energy after its plastic form is no longer needed....that's a plus in my book. But maybe on the other hand it's better if it stays in the landfill instead of being burnt and releasing the bound carbon into the atmosphere.
frosted-flakes 5y ago
From a C02 perspective, if it's burned cleanly and the energy released is used to generate electricity or heat homes, it's really not much different than a natural gas plant. But I agree with your point.
IfOnlyYouKnew 5y ago
A modern plant turns plastic into CO_2, electricity, and, often, residential heat. So, yes, that's preferable. Among the sheer ugliness and wastefulness of landfills, burning at high temperature avoids the toxic intermediates plastics give off when degrading in nature, which landfills struggle to contain. Ash is, by definition, inert. It is the remaining mass that does not chemically react even under extreme heat. It therefore also does not interact with, for example, the human body. Plastics are all carbon/hydrogen/nitrogen/oxygen, and, to a first approximation, do not leave any ash. In reality they do, but it's extremely little and harmless. (Physical harms can survive an incinerator, such as material giving off radiation, but those should never be in the trash)
- nate_meurer 5y ago
  Incinerator ash and fume often has a very high concentration of heavy metals, comparable to coal ash. Definitely not harmless. You're correct that sufficient incineration temperatures ensure the complete destruction of organic intermediaries, such as dioxins.

gambiting 5y ago

>>Some or all EU countries have completely abandoned the practice. Absolutely not true, glad you maybe live in a country where landfills are disappearing, but they will always exist in some form - even with burning where do you think the slag goes to? That's right, a normal landfill. Not everything can be burnt, and not everything can be recycled. And definitely not "all" EU countries - Poland has normal landfills that take everything still, very few operational waste incenerators, and recycling is still unknown to a lot of people.