10 ms·
We really owe it to future generations to figure out effective, energy efficient plastic recycling. This seems to be a big step. The economic barriers are huge
by bglazer 4y ago
We really owe it to future generations to figure out effective, energy efficient plastic recycling. This seems to be a big step. The economic barriers are huge here, oil is going to be cheap for a while yet.
That said, it is a bit concerning that this could escape into the wild. Plastics are harmful long term but it’s crucial to society that they don’t just start degrading.
- meltyness 4y agoIt's always been confusing why this isn't as simple as running the dishwasher.
- eru 4y agoWhy would you expect it to be?
- feet 4y agoSimple things are expected due to a lack of understanding of the complexity of the problem
- eru 4y agoFunny enough, even supposedly simple dishwashers are already marvels of engineering.
- meltyness 4y agoI mean there's food-grade paraffin and beeswax wax can act as a polymer that addition of heat will reform. I can remember thinking as a kid, "why can't we just melt all this crap down?" I guess call it indoctrination since reuse, conservation, recycling is something taught to kindergarteners, but even at face value the lifecycle obviously a cost -- trash management, elegance (due to litter, and bad packaging), the risks of petroleum mining/hydraulic fracturing, presumably greenhouse gas emissions, microplastic contamination, risks of sloppy chemical engineering/benzene contamination... all costs centered on crap that mostly sucks as a product to begin with... an idiotic matryoska doll of nested garbage. The requirements get tough at those scales, for the full life cycle I suppose, iterating on any component effectively is a lifetime of work. Oh you can melt it, what about nonremovable contaminants? how much energy input did that cost? I don't see any clear-cut solution except to eliminate subsidies at a solution-dependent rate.
- kingkawn 4y agoIt is crucial to society that we transition away from them almost completely
- peteradio 4y agoEnjoy your laptop made of bamboo.
- empyrrhicist 4y agoThat actually sounds dope.
- eru 4y agoApple laptops are largely made of aluminum, I think. There's some plastic in there, eg for the keyboard. But removing 90% of plastics would solve 90% of the problem they pose. No need for purity. (I'm just playing devil's advocate here. I don't actually think plastics are necessarily all that harmful.)
- midoridensha 4y agoThere are countless applications where anything other than plastic really makes no sense, or is quite impractical or even impossible. The idea of eliminating plastics is pure fantasy. Even reducing them doesn't make that much sense. The amount of energy needed to recycle metals is generally much higher.
- bglazer 4y agoTo what?
- happyopossum 4y agoThat seems highly unlikely, and with efficient recycling, completely unnecessary. There are a number of uses where plastic is the best solution - economically and environmentally.
- eru 4y agoWhy? What bad things do you expect to happen?
- maria2 4y agoWhy? Plastic is made from oil. Oil exists deep in the earth, more or less permanently. If we extract oil, convert it to plastic, and then sequester the plastic permanently, e.g. via a landfill, then that seems net neutral. Yes plastic ends up in the ocean. But most plastic waste in the ocean comes from recyclables shipped from first world to third world countries with poor refuse control.
- tedivm 4y agoExtracting oil is an expensive process that has environmental consequences, and storing plastic after the fact requires land and can result in plastic leaching into the environment. There are also other petroleum byproducts between extraction and having usable plastics. With that in mind being able to recycle plastic cheaper than creating it from oil would be an economic and environmental win. As a small factual change I can not find any evidence for the statement that most plastic waste comes from shipped recyclables. I'd love a source for that.
- maria2 4y ago90% of river-borne ocean plastic comes from 10 rivers in Asia and Africa: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/06/90-of-plastic-polluting-our-oceans-comes-from-just-10-rivers/ https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/06/90-of-plastic-polluti... Almost all plastic recyclables in the US is shipped to Asia and Africa. It’s simply not profitable to process here. From the article: > Recently, however, China has made efforts to curb waste. > For years the country had imported millions of tons of recyclable waste from overseas, but a growing recycling burden at home prompted the government to shift its policy.
- feet 4y ago>Almost all plastic recyclables in the US is shipped to Asia and Africa. It’s simply not profitable to process here. >90% of river-borne ocean plastic comes from 10 rivers in Asia and Africa Sounds like it isn't profitable there either, so why are we shipping it
- eru 4y ago> We really owe it to future generations to figure out effective, energy efficient plastic recycling. Why do we owe it to the future? We can just stick the plastics in a land fill and deal with them later. They don't degrade (much) after all. Perhaps oil will become expensive enough, and recycling good enough, that it will makes sense to mine landfills in the future. (I agree that putting plastics in the ocean or so is probably not a good idea. But that doesn't mean recycling is the only alternative, especially when it doesn't make economic sense. Btw, most plastics also burn well. So waste-to-energy plants might also make sense.)
- gilbetron 4y agoGrow plants, use plants to make plastic, use plastic for all kinds of great things, bury used plastic deep underground forever as a form of carbon sequestration. Repeat. Recycling plastic is pointless.