3 ms·

Intuitively I agree, from a different angle although I don't know about chemistry either, but from a supply chain perspective, for generations it's all been abo

by parksy 5y ago

Intuitively I agree, from a different angle although I don't know about chemistry either, but from a supply chain perspective, for generations it's all been about optimising delivery to a consumer. Supply lines point directly at households and beyond that point it's a bit of a dark web. Random piles of crap end up... somewhere? If the consumer became a supplier of raw recyclable materials, and those materials had value, they deserve to be compensated, and will probably be more engaged in the sorting and quality control processes. I drink a lot of beer - that makes me a great supplier of ready-made glass bottles to anyone that wants them. Rather than bulk collecting a random pile of potentially recyclable material, here's a bunch of sorted glass bottles each quarter. Anyone that can hook into that kind of idea and find some kind of economy of scale might make a killing.

kfprt 5y ago
I call this entropy. Once the products are dispersed it takes a lot of energy to bring them back together like they were in the supply chain. I'm not sure it will ever be solved purely because of the physics.
checker 5y ago
This concept exists in the American auto repair sector as core charges. I believe they work pretty well, but once the "core charge" becomes too insignificant then people will ignore it for the convenience. I suspect an organization as large as Apple could subsidize core charges for iPhone and laptop batteries.
- earleybird 5y ago
  It worked for the last starter I bought :-)
lrem 5y ago
I remember selling bulk quantities of beer bottles back to the shop as recently as 2005. A state-mandated, industry-wide reuse scheme would lead to them being examined for damage, sterilised and supplied back to breweries. Theoretically the scheme still works, but somehow the beers I buy when visiting the home country all come in bottles not partaking in it.

by parksy 5y ago

kfprt 5y ago

I call this entropy. Once the products are dispersed it takes a lot of energy to bring them back together like they were in the supply chain. I'm not sure it will ever be solved purely because of the physics.

checker 5y ago

This concept exists in the American auto repair sector as core charges. I believe they work pretty well, but once the "core charge" becomes too insignificant then people will ignore it for the convenience. I suspect an organization as large as Apple could subsidize core charges for iPhone and laptop batteries.

earleybird 5y ago
It worked for the last starter I bought :-)

lrem 5y ago

I remember selling bulk quantities of beer bottles back to the shop as recently as 2005. A state-mandated, industry-wide reuse scheme would lead to them being examined for damage, sterilised and supplied back to breweries. Theoretically the scheme still works, but somehow the beers I buy when visiting the home country all come in bottles not partaking in it.