my wife recycles all the plastics we got, because she really wants to try and I just can't break her heart and tell her how shit it all is.
this post was submitted on 02 Sep 2024
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Plastic has multiple type that each require a different process for recycling.
Having a bunch of plastic all mixed up together needs people to manually separate them.
It's a joke.
So that’s what those things are worth for
Plastic companies created the 'recycling' efforts to get the public to believe their use of plastics wasn't as bad as it is. In reality, it is horrible for the environment.
Sort of a non story. Places that have regular collection don't stop collecting if a plant moves or is over capacity. It is stored. Stopping collection till plant opens gets people out of the habit of separating recyclables ar home. The quote about fuel pellets creating fumes, it is in place of oil burning for heat/energy. Oil releases same fumes, and using plastic fuel while not ideal use, reduces oil and coal mining and processingbto get a usable heat source.
Almost no plastic gets recycled. I believe the last number I read about was less than 9%
This is a non story for those who have read about the scam "recycling plastics" is
To me that is an attempt by corporations to make you forget about recycling and not care what is produced...like ah eff it whats the point. Each country and state, and city is different. I'm in Vancouver they claim 96% recycle rate of what is collected. My family member works at a recycle facility where they sort and regrind material into pellets for resale. The industries often can't get enough pellets that they desire, especially because price of plastic is tied to oil prices. So when oil goes up manufactures desire more recycced pellets because it is cheaper. Eapecially in auto industry where recycle mixed in has mandate to come from autograde material. What isn't usable becomes fuel pellets. We don't do films here, but I believe Germany had set up plastic film recycling. But a US company has developed a method of taking plastic films and old starbucks coffee grounds to make stacking pallets, instead of wood pallets.
Hey this is all good news to my hears... Happy to hear that at least in some locales, recycling actually happens
I haven given up, I recycle all I can but I was always sad knowing barely any gets recycled. I figured at least we have the habit so when someday we do recycle we are not starting from scratch
Yep every place is different and that is part of the issue, some places just trash it all. Here they are proactive, garbage collection in many communities is only twice a month, while recycling and compost bins are gathered every week. It forces people to rethink what goes in the garbage
This was already discovered some years back. The estimate of recyclables not being recycled was way beyond high. I can't remember the number so I'm not quoting it.
Demand corporations reconfigure their packaging operations instead of letting them gaslight into thinking we're the problem.
Almost NO plastics are recyclable. That little recycling icon means absolutely nothing. Plastic producing companies should be paying to clean this planet up for their catastrophic deception.
Fuck yes.
A company that massively produce plastic consumer goods should at the very least, have some kind of way to recycle what they produce. Leaving that in the hands of the everyday people won't cut it.
One of the big issues with recycling plastics is that plastic has a very specific chemical makeup that gives it the properties it requires, and one major way to mess up that composition is heat. So, even if you can perfectly sort plastics into their respective types, simply heating them up to re-cast into pellets or something else can affect their properties to a state that they're not usable anymore. Add on top the fact that you will not be able to perfectly sort plastics by composition so you will always end up with a significant amount of impurity makes recycling very difficult.
This is the answer. The best way to deal with the plastic problem is to stop producing it. The three R's are in the order they are for a reason. Recycling is the last thing to try.
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