4 ms·

Stop driving? Most microplastic in water come from tires. I've been trying to make small moves away from car infrastructure in my town and the response is, wel

Stop driving? Most microplastic in water come from tires. I've been trying to make small moves away from car infrastructure in my town and the response is, well, less than positive. We already tacitly accept that cars are one of the biggest causes of death. Reducing car infrastructure to reduce microplastics, where we don't even really know the harm, seems far far more challenging.

anonymous_pro_ 3y ago
What town is that? It seems like the success of diversifying away from cars depends on the place and how it grew. LA, for example, grew at the time of peak automobile infrastructure investment and it's basically unrecoverable at this point. There are probably other reasons why places like LA are so locked in to cars now, but that's the one that seems obvious to me.
- epistasis 3y ago
  It's a town with one of the highest percentages of bike commuters in the state, actually. However there's also a regressive aspect that refuses to make any accommodations for anything except cars, and these people have veto power over non-car infrastructure. There is no built-in veto power for new car infrastructure, and in fact existing law requires car infrastructure as a base for any sort of building, for example parking minimums. Most of the city was built 1960-1980, so based on car designs. But it's small enough that small amounts of change would eliminate car dependence.
Solvency 3y ago
Not just tires. Your clothes being washed.
tppiotrowski 3y ago
I think of tires as being made of rubber. Where does the plastic come from?
- haltist 3y ago
  A car tire is not purely rubber, it is combined with synthetic polymers derived from petroleum and petroleum derivatives (same as plastics).
- emptybits 3y ago
  Car and light truck tires are apparently only about 19% rubber.[1] More than half of a tire's composition is synthetic polymers, fillers, and textiles (e.g. polyester, rayon, nylon). [1] https://www.ustires.org/whats-tire-0 https://www.ustires.org/whats-tire-0 Tires generate more particles of pollution than exhaust.[2] EVs are good. But eliminating car exhaust apparently isn't the big car pollution problem. [2] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jun/03/car-tyres-produce-more-particle-pollution-than-exhausts-tests-show https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jun/03/car-tyre...
- I_Am_Nous 3y ago
  >Tire factories start with bulk raw materials such as synthetic rubber (60% -70% of total rubber in the tire industry[2][3]), carbon black, and chemicals and produce numerous specialized components that are assembled and cured. Looks like most of the rubber used these days is synthetic[1], usually made of styrene and butadiene which could easily degrade into base monomers or at least shorter chains. 1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tire_manufacturing https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tire_manufacturing
olalonde 3y ago
> Stop driving? Not a realistic solution. The vast majority of people will take the microplastics over not driving.
- glial 3y ago
  Until the concentration is high enough it affects birth rates.
  - malka 3y ago
    It might already do.
  - QuarterReptile 3y ago
    I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but birth rates are already pretty low, and, worse than failing to deal with the problem, some people think that is a good thing.
    - jay_kyburz 3y ago
      Falling birth rates _is_ a good thing and in my view its the only viable solution to global warming. Less people is less energy use and pollution.
      - haltist 3y ago
        [flagged]
        dang 3y ago
        That's not any sort of moderation factor on HN.
      - orthecreedence 3y ago
        [flagged]
ahazred8ta 3y ago
No. Most microplastic in water comes from washing machines. Synthetic fibers from clothes.
- cma 3y ago
  Each time you clean your dryer lint trap I think you inhale more microplastics than a lifetime of food.
  - city_guy_1 3y ago
    source?
    - cma 3y ago
      "I think." Just from eyeballing the amount of dust in the air when the sun shines on it while scraping it off.
  - fnordpiglet 3y ago
    https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-43023-x https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-43023-x
- gwbas1c 3y ago
  > No. Water pollution from brake and tire dust, (and oil drippings,) is well proven. If you build infrastructure to handle runoff from roads, you need to mitigate pollution in that runoff too. > Most microplastic in water comes from washing machines. Synthetic fibers from clothes. I know less about that but from what I've skimmed it appears to be true too.
- epistasis 3y ago
  No. > Seventy-eight percent of ocean microplastics are synthetic tire rubber, according to one estimate. https://e360.yale.edu/features/tire-pollution-toxic-chemicals https://e360.yale.edu/features/tire-pollution-toxic-chemical... > About 34% of the emitted coarse TWPs (tire wear particles) and 30% of the emitted coarse BWPs (brake wear particles) (100 kt yr−1 and 40 kt yr−1 respectively) were deposited in the World Ocean. These amounts are of similar magnitude as the total estimated direct and riverine transport of TWPs and fibres to the ocean (64 kt yr−1). https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-17201-9 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-17201-9
ironmagma 3y ago
Stopping driving is only the beginning. Much more impactful would be to reduce the overall population's driving through legislation/taxation.
- psunavy03 3y ago
  Ah, yes. Where adopting a fringe belief isn't enough, we need to force it on other people, too.
  - ironmagma 3y ago
    Whether it's fringe has no impact on whether it's true.
Reason077 3y ago
> ”Most microplastic in water come from tires.” And also synthetic clothes. According to the study they found more plastic fibres than plastic particles in many samples. These get released when you launder your clothes, ending up in the drain water and ultimately the ocean. Solution? Buy clothes with natural fibres (cotton, wool, etc) instead of plastics. And wash your clothes in a modern washing machine with a microfibre filter on its drain outlet.
- bordercases 3y ago
  > And wash your clothes in a modern washing machine with a microfibre filter on its drain outlet. That doesn't solve the whole problem because the microfibres eventually need disposal.
  - Reason077 3y ago
    Assuming you dump the sludge in the bin when you clean the filter then it’s much better than going into the ocean. Depending on your location, they’ll either get destroyed by incineration or put in landfill where they’ll do less harm and hopefully break down after a few centuries. Of course, if you clean the filter by flushing the sludge down the sink then you didn’t solve anything.
    - bordercases 3y ago
      The risk is runoff into the ocean or insertion into the water table through seepage within the dump into the soil. Furthermore incineration doesn't atomize these plastics; the smoke plumage may become a part of rain clouds which either recirculates the contaminants into the water cycle, and thus either in the local environment or into the ocean, again. Obviously these are geography-relative concerns. But they aren't rare.

anonymous_pro_ 3y ago

What town is that? It seems like the success of diversifying away from cars depends on the place and how it grew. LA, for example, grew at the time of peak automobile infrastructure investment and it's basically unrecoverable at this point. There are probably other reasons why places like LA are so locked in to cars now, but that's the one that seems obvious to me.

epistasis 3y ago
It's a town with one of the highest percentages of bike commuters in the state, actually. However there's also a regressive aspect that refuses to make any accommodations for anything except cars, and these people have veto power over non-car infrastructure. There is no built-in veto power for new car infrastructure, and in fact existing law requires car infrastructure as a base for any sort of building, for example parking minimums. Most of the city was built 1960-1980, so based on car designs. But it's small enough that small amounts of change would eliminate car dependence.

Solvency 3y ago

Not just tires. Your clothes being washed.

tppiotrowski 3y ago

I think of tires as being made of rubber. Where does the plastic come from?

haltist 3y ago
A car tire is not purely rubber, it is combined with synthetic polymers derived from petroleum and petroleum derivatives (same as plastics).
emptybits 3y ago
Car and light truck tires are apparently only about 19% rubber.[1] More than half of a tire's composition is synthetic polymers, fillers, and textiles (e.g. polyester, rayon, nylon). [1] https://www.ustires.org/whats-tire-0 https://www.ustires.org/whats-tire-0 Tires generate more particles of pollution than exhaust.[2] EVs are good. But eliminating car exhaust apparently isn't the big car pollution problem. [2] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jun/03/car-tyres-produce-more-particle-pollution-than-exhausts-tests-show https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jun/03/car-tyre...
I_Am_Nous 3y ago
>Tire factories start with bulk raw materials such as synthetic rubber (60% -70% of total rubber in the tire industry[2][3]), carbon black, and chemicals and produce numerous specialized components that are assembled and cured. Looks like most of the rubber used these days is synthetic[1], usually made of styrene and butadiene which could easily degrade into base monomers or at least shorter chains. 1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tire_manufacturing https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tire_manufacturing

olalonde 3y ago

> Stop driving? Not a realistic solution. The vast majority of people will take the microplastics over not driving.

glial 3y ago
Until the concentration is high enough it affects birth rates.
- malka 3y ago
  It might already do.
- QuarterReptile 3y ago
  I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but birth rates are already pretty low, and, worse than failing to deal with the problem, some people think that is a good thing.
  - jay_kyburz 3y ago
    Falling birth rates _is_ a good thing and in my view its the only viable solution to global warming. Less people is less energy use and pollution.
    - haltist 3y ago
      [flagged]
      - dang 3y ago
        That's not any sort of moderation factor on HN.
    - orthecreedence 3y ago
      [flagged]

ahazred8ta 3y ago

No. Most microplastic in water comes from washing machines. Synthetic fibers from clothes.

cma 3y ago
Each time you clean your dryer lint trap I think you inhale more microplastics than a lifetime of food.
- city_guy_1 3y ago
  source?
  - cma 3y ago
    "I think." Just from eyeballing the amount of dust in the air when the sun shines on it while scraping it off.
- fnordpiglet 3y ago
  https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-43023-x https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-43023-x
gwbas1c 3y ago
> No. Water pollution from brake and tire dust, (and oil drippings,) is well proven. If you build infrastructure to handle runoff from roads, you need to mitigate pollution in that runoff too. > Most microplastic in water comes from washing machines. Synthetic fibers from clothes. I know less about that but from what I've skimmed it appears to be true too.
epistasis 3y ago
No. > Seventy-eight percent of ocean microplastics are synthetic tire rubber, according to one estimate. https://e360.yale.edu/features/tire-pollution-toxic-chemicals https://e360.yale.edu/features/tire-pollution-toxic-chemical... > About 34% of the emitted coarse TWPs (tire wear particles) and 30% of the emitted coarse BWPs (brake wear particles) (100 kt yr−1 and 40 kt yr−1 respectively) were deposited in the World Ocean. These amounts are of similar magnitude as the total estimated direct and riverine transport of TWPs and fibres to the ocean (64 kt yr−1). https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-17201-9 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-17201-9

ironmagma 3y ago

Stopping driving is only the beginning. Much more impactful would be to reduce the overall population's driving through legislation/taxation.

psunavy03 3y ago
Ah, yes. Where adopting a fringe belief isn't enough, we need to force it on other people, too.
- ironmagma 3y ago
  Whether it's fringe has no impact on whether it's true.

Reason077 3y ago

> ”Most microplastic in water come from tires.” And also synthetic clothes. According to the study they found more plastic fibres than plastic particles in many samples. These get released when you launder your clothes, ending up in the drain water and ultimately the ocean. Solution? Buy clothes with natural fibres (cotton, wool, etc) instead of plastics. And wash your clothes in a modern washing machine with a microfibre filter on its drain outlet.

bordercases 3y ago
> And wash your clothes in a modern washing machine with a microfibre filter on its drain outlet. That doesn't solve the whole problem because the microfibres eventually need disposal.
- Reason077 3y ago
  Assuming you dump the sludge in the bin when you clean the filter then it’s much better than going into the ocean. Depending on your location, they’ll either get destroyed by incineration or put in landfill where they’ll do less harm and hopefully break down after a few centuries. Of course, if you clean the filter by flushing the sludge down the sink then you didn’t solve anything.
  - bordercases 3y ago
    The risk is runoff into the ocean or insertion into the water table through seepage within the dump into the soil. Furthermore incineration doesn't atomize these plastics; the smoke plumage may become a part of rain clouds which either recirculates the contaminants into the water cycle, and thus either in the local environment or into the ocean, again. Obviously these are geography-relative concerns. But they aren't rare.