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The current recycling paradigm has been an obvious failure of catastrophic proportions. What is needed is not new recycling processes, but a government that is

The current recycling paradigm has been an obvious failure of catastrophic proportions. What is needed is not new recycling processes, but a government that is not beholden to plastics industry lobbying. Can we have a new process for good government too, please?

lefstathiou 2y ago
100%. Collect all garbage (and recyclables) in one shot and sort at the destination!!! So many billions of hours and dollars lost to this nonsense.
- Over2Chars 2y ago
  What "destination" is that? It gets shipped to another country where it's dumped. (one article picked at random from a search for "recycling fraud") https://eia-international.org/news/exposed-the-plastics-waste-trade-scams-that-fuel-crime-and-injustice-around-the-world/ https://eia-international.org/news/exposed-the-plastics-wast...
  - barbazoo 2y ago
    Depends. Lots of places recycle significant amounts locally.
- tempestn 2y ago
  If you do it that way, the garbage contaminates everything else, making recycling much more difficult or impossible. Especially for paper and cardboard, which is very recyclable.
- whimsicalism 2y ago
  i’ve basically never seen single stream actually work somewhere… every time i’ve looked into the details it appears they just skim off the metal and landfill/burn the rest
- hooverd 2y ago
  Why doesn't everyone already do that if it's so simple?
nickff 2y ago
The problem isn’t that governments are beholden to the plastics lobby; this is more of a ‘bootleggers and baptists’ situation where most people like plastics because they’re cost-effective, and ‘recycling’ lowers their perceived environmental costs
- Over2Chars 2y ago
  Plastics are cost effective because they're allowed to be dumped into the environment without any cost, under the guise of fake recycling efforts. If the plastics industry had to bear the cost of their product, it wouldn't be as cheap. "For many years, recycling was relatively cheap. North American and European countries were sending millions of tons of recyclables to China, where they were bought at a price that helped offset the cost of local recycling schemes in exporter countries." https://www.rts.com/blog/is-recycling-worth-it/ https://www.rts.com/blog/is-recycling-worth-it/ (randomly picked from search "cost of recycling")
  - nostromo 2y ago
    Plastics are incredibly cheap if you put them in a landfill at the end of life. I agree that we should try and reduce our use of plastics. But their environmental impact is very small when they are disposed of properly.
- lurking_swe 2y ago
  the price of plastics that we pay is not the TRUE cost in my opinion. The solution would be to address this. Then i bet you plastic won’t look as competitive anymore… For example, are plastic producers mandated to pay for plastic cleanup efforts? No. Well…why not? All the garbage ends up in the ocean and then destroys the food chain slowly. And then new companies like the “ocean cleanup project” have to scrape by and beg for donations to fund their ocean and river cleanup efforts. Increased plastic prices would also encourage research into alternatives.
  - TheSpiceIsLife 2y ago
    Just burn it in a gasifier, use the gas to generate electricity (combined cycle gas turbine).
spacemanspiff01 2y ago
Northern Europe seems to do recycling well, there is a 25 cent bounty on each bottle, and grocery stores have automatic sorter/collectors.
- mqus 2y ago
  As a german, we do "collection" well. Recycling(of plastics)... not that much.
  - Over2Chars 2y ago
    Well said.
- vinay427 2y ago
  This has been a thing in Michigan and likely a few other states for decades, although with a 10 cent bounty at least 10-20 years ago. There was apparently a 90-95% recovery rate last I checked, but I'm not sure how reliable those statistics are. That still doesn't solve the problem of recycling plastics or bottles in general, which this research may advance.
  - Mountain_Skies 2y ago
    The ten cent deposit has been in place in Michigan since the 1970s. Back then ten cents was a big deal but over 500% inflation since then has eaten away at the incentive. What has changed is attitudes regarding recycling and waste disposal in general. Back when Michigan put the deposit in place, it made a very noticeable difference in the reduction of litter in Michigan and also in how litter compared to states without a deposit. From my purely personal experience, that difference is mostly gone now. People hauling empties all over the place doesn't seem as eco friendly as it once did, especially when so many people have recycling pickup curbside with their trash pickup. In deposit states, you can't crush your cans before returning them but in non-deposit states you can, saving space. Eliminating the deposit probably would result in some amount of plastic going into trash cans instead of recycling bins, but it would be very far from being 100%. The math gets fuzzy when you start deciding on if people make special trips to return empties or are they usually returning them when they already were going to the store to shop. Same the more upstream you go. But that recycling bin at the curb is still there, waiting to be used more.
landryraccoon 2y ago
> What is needed is not new recycling processes, but a government that is not beholden to plastics industry lobbying. I honestly don’t understand what this statement even means. Are you saying that recycling technology is so cheap, efficient and easily deployed that government is the only obstacle to better waste management? If that’s the claim, it’s audacious to say the least. Where’s your evidence to back it up?
- tantalor 2y ago
  I think recycling, or reuse, could be made to be cheaper or more effective with better policy. This has to come from the top down. For example, by regulation on product design, or better incentives for consumer recycling (like deposits).
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- atmavatar 2y ago
  I thought it had more to do with the fact that plastic recycling is largely a scam - i.e., recycling logos are printed on nearly all plastics, less than half of which are actually recyclable. Yet, there's been no crackdown on such brazen fraud. I'm sure the assumption by most is that's due to lobbying.
  - potato3732842 2y ago
    They're all recyclable. Just not into grades of plastic anyone wants to manufacture things out of. Recycled plastic are used heavily in things that people touch and need a lot of chonk to them relative to their strength to feel substantial and high quality or stuff that'll almost purely be loaded in compression (like bolt on plastic pads that prevent metal to metal contact or allow nice sliding).
jonas21 2y ago
Good luck with that. In the meantime, recycling process improvements can make plastic recycling less of a failure, and eventually a success.
- XorNot 2y ago
  Virtue motivated reasoning: a bunch of people are dead set on something being morally bad, and it's deficiencies are interpreted as karmic punishment. Therefore improvements and optimisations are to be opposed or derided. See also: all the people completely certain that Semaglutide will definitely cause HyperCancer or something "soon".
gosub100 2y ago
You're almost right about a government mandate. But instead it should mandate that waste management corporations step up their game and actually do the "manage" part. First of all, no more recycling trucks. Force them to sort the garbage and pull the plastic, aluminum, and glass out of the waste stream. This will get trucks off the roads and offload the mental tax (as well as political element) from consumer households. If the separated plastic is able to be recycled, WM can do so. If not, store it and all other materials in segregated areas of the landfill so if that changes in the future, the material can be easily dug up. They are the ones who should be "going green", consumer's job is to use the service they are paying for. There is no reason WM should get a free pass to stagnate while most other companies are innovating.
blackqueeriroh 2y ago
Do you have any idea how critical plastics are to medicine? How much more expensive health care would be without them? You could reduce and recycle and in some cases reuse plastics in healthcare, but you cannot get rid of them without significantly affecting the quality of the medical care we all get today.
- Over2Chars 2y ago
  plastics are, for some applications, a miracle material. My argument is about the fraud of recycling, not the evil of plastics.
- dahart 2y ago
  Nobody’s saying eliminate plastic completely, you don’t need to defend medical uses. Healthcare is maybe ~3% of plastic use (based on very quick googling). I’m sure healthcare plastic use can be reduced, but let’s first go after the 50% of plastic production that’s unnecessarily going to single-serving drinks and food. BTW, in 2024 we use as much plastic for drinks as we produced globally in the year 2000. Plastic production has gone way up, and it doesn’t need to.

lefstathiou 2y ago

100%. Collect all garbage (and recyclables) in one shot and sort at the destination!!! So many billions of hours and dollars lost to this nonsense.

Over2Chars 2y ago
What "destination" is that? It gets shipped to another country where it's dumped. (one article picked at random from a search for "recycling fraud") https://eia-international.org/news/exposed-the-plastics-waste-trade-scams-that-fuel-crime-and-injustice-around-the-world/ https://eia-international.org/news/exposed-the-plastics-wast...
- barbazoo 2y ago
  Depends. Lots of places recycle significant amounts locally.
tempestn 2y ago
If you do it that way, the garbage contaminates everything else, making recycling much more difficult or impossible. Especially for paper and cardboard, which is very recyclable.
whimsicalism 2y ago
i’ve basically never seen single stream actually work somewhere… every time i’ve looked into the details it appears they just skim off the metal and landfill/burn the rest
hooverd 2y ago
Why doesn't everyone already do that if it's so simple?

nickff 2y ago

The problem isn’t that governments are beholden to the plastics lobby; this is more of a ‘bootleggers and baptists’ situation where most people like plastics because they’re cost-effective, and ‘recycling’ lowers their perceived environmental costs

Over2Chars 2y ago
Plastics are cost effective because they're allowed to be dumped into the environment without any cost, under the guise of fake recycling efforts. If the plastics industry had to bear the cost of their product, it wouldn't be as cheap. "For many years, recycling was relatively cheap. North American and European countries were sending millions of tons of recyclables to China, where they were bought at a price that helped offset the cost of local recycling schemes in exporter countries." https://www.rts.com/blog/is-recycling-worth-it/ https://www.rts.com/blog/is-recycling-worth-it/ (randomly picked from search "cost of recycling")
- nostromo 2y ago
  Plastics are incredibly cheap if you put them in a landfill at the end of life. I agree that we should try and reduce our use of plastics. But their environmental impact is very small when they are disposed of properly.
lurking_swe 2y ago
the price of plastics that we pay is not the TRUE cost in my opinion. The solution would be to address this. Then i bet you plastic won’t look as competitive anymore… For example, are plastic producers mandated to pay for plastic cleanup efforts? No. Well…why not? All the garbage ends up in the ocean and then destroys the food chain slowly. And then new companies like the “ocean cleanup project” have to scrape by and beg for donations to fund their ocean and river cleanup efforts. Increased plastic prices would also encourage research into alternatives.
- TheSpiceIsLife 2y ago
  Just burn it in a gasifier, use the gas to generate electricity (combined cycle gas turbine).

spacemanspiff01 2y ago

Northern Europe seems to do recycling well, there is a 25 cent bounty on each bottle, and grocery stores have automatic sorter/collectors.

mqus 2y ago
As a german, we do "collection" well. Recycling(of plastics)... not that much.
- Over2Chars 2y ago
  Well said.
vinay427 2y ago
This has been a thing in Michigan and likely a few other states for decades, although with a 10 cent bounty at least 10-20 years ago. There was apparently a 90-95% recovery rate last I checked, but I'm not sure how reliable those statistics are. That still doesn't solve the problem of recycling plastics or bottles in general, which this research may advance.
- Mountain_Skies 2y ago
  The ten cent deposit has been in place in Michigan since the 1970s. Back then ten cents was a big deal but over 500% inflation since then has eaten away at the incentive. What has changed is attitudes regarding recycling and waste disposal in general. Back when Michigan put the deposit in place, it made a very noticeable difference in the reduction of litter in Michigan and also in how litter compared to states without a deposit. From my purely personal experience, that difference is mostly gone now. People hauling empties all over the place doesn't seem as eco friendly as it once did, especially when so many people have recycling pickup curbside with their trash pickup. In deposit states, you can't crush your cans before returning them but in non-deposit states you can, saving space. Eliminating the deposit probably would result in some amount of plastic going into trash cans instead of recycling bins, but it would be very far from being 100%. The math gets fuzzy when you start deciding on if people make special trips to return empties or are they usually returning them when they already were going to the store to shop. Same the more upstream you go. But that recycling bin at the curb is still there, waiting to be used more.

landryraccoon 2y ago

> What is needed is not new recycling processes, but a government that is not beholden to plastics industry lobbying. I honestly don’t understand what this statement even means. Are you saying that recycling technology is so cheap, efficient and easily deployed that government is the only obstacle to better waste management? If that’s the claim, it’s audacious to say the least. Where’s your evidence to back it up?

tantalor 2y ago
I think recycling, or reuse, could be made to be cheaper or more effective with better policy. This has to come from the top down. For example, by regulation on product design, or better incentives for consumer recycling (like deposits).
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
atmavatar 2y ago
I thought it had more to do with the fact that plastic recycling is largely a scam - i.e., recycling logos are printed on nearly all plastics, less than half of which are actually recyclable. Yet, there's been no crackdown on such brazen fraud. I'm sure the assumption by most is that's due to lobbying.
- potato3732842 2y ago
  They're all recyclable. Just not into grades of plastic anyone wants to manufacture things out of. Recycled plastic are used heavily in things that people touch and need a lot of chonk to them relative to their strength to feel substantial and high quality or stuff that'll almost purely be loaded in compression (like bolt on plastic pads that prevent metal to metal contact or allow nice sliding).

jonas21 2y ago

Good luck with that. In the meantime, recycling process improvements can make plastic recycling less of a failure, and eventually a success.

XorNot 2y ago
Virtue motivated reasoning: a bunch of people are dead set on something being morally bad, and it's deficiencies are interpreted as karmic punishment. Therefore improvements and optimisations are to be opposed or derided. See also: all the people completely certain that Semaglutide will definitely cause HyperCancer or something "soon".

gosub100 2y ago

You're almost right about a government mandate. But instead it should mandate that waste management corporations step up their game and actually do the "manage" part. First of all, no more recycling trucks. Force them to sort the garbage and pull the plastic, aluminum, and glass out of the waste stream. This will get trucks off the roads and offload the mental tax (as well as political element) from consumer households. If the separated plastic is able to be recycled, WM can do so. If not, store it and all other materials in segregated areas of the landfill so if that changes in the future, the material can be easily dug up. They are the ones who should be "going green", consumer's job is to use the service they are paying for. There is no reason WM should get a free pass to stagnate while most other companies are innovating.

blackqueeriroh 2y ago

Do you have any idea how critical plastics are to medicine? How much more expensive health care would be without them? You could reduce and recycle and in some cases reuse plastics in healthcare, but you cannot get rid of them without significantly affecting the quality of the medical care we all get today.

Over2Chars 2y ago
plastics are, for some applications, a miracle material. My argument is about the fraud of recycling, not the evil of plastics.
dahart 2y ago
Nobody’s saying eliminate plastic completely, you don’t need to defend medical uses. Healthcare is maybe ~3% of plastic use (based on very quick googling). I’m sure healthcare plastic use can be reduced, but let’s first go after the 50% of plastic production that’s unnecessarily going to single-serving drinks and food. BTW, in 2024 we use as much plastic for drinks as we produced globally in the year 2000. Plastic production has gone way up, and it doesn’t need to.