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Most plastic simply cannot be recycled, a new Greenpeace USA report concludes. Circular Claims Fall Flat Again, released today, finds that U.S. households generated an estimated 51 million tons of plastic waste in 2021, only 2.4 million tons of which was recycled.
The report also finds that no type of plastic packaging in the U.S. meets the definition of recyclable used by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation’s New Plastic Economy (EMF NPE) Initiative.
...
“Corporations like Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Nestlé, and Unilever have worked with industry front groups to promote plastic recycling as the solution to plastic waste for decades. But the data is clear: practically speaking, most plastic is just not recyclable. The real solution is to switch to systems of reuse and refill.”
The answer is always regulations.
According to the report, here are the five reasons that plastic recycling has failed.
Mechanical and chemical recycling of plastic waste has largely failed and will always fail because plastic waste is: (1) extremely difficult to collect, (2) virtually impossible to sort for recycling, (3) environmentally harmful to reprocess, (4) often made of and contaminated by toxic materials, and (5) not economical to recycle.
Paper, cardboard, metal, and glass do not have these problems, which is why they are recycled at much higher rates.
Note #5... can't make any money on recycling plastic.
I actually said recycling items other than glass, paper, and metals were a waste of time over three years ago.
Quote:
Originally Posted by DRob4JC
Recycling is not what it is hyped up to be.
From a human reasoning perspective without any other criteria - it would make sense to reuse items and the result would be some sort of savings. However...
Despite decades of exhortations and mandates, it’s still typically more expensive for municipalities to recycle household waste than to send it to a landfill. Prices for recyclable materials have plummeted because of lower oil prices and reduced demand for them overseas. The slump has forced some recycling companies to shut plants and cancel plans for new technologies.
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As cities move beyond recycling paper and metals, and into glass, food scraps and assorted plastics, the costs rise sharply while the environmental benefits decline and sometimes vanish. “If you believe recycling is good for the planet and that we need to do more of it, then there’s a crisis to confront,” says David P. Steiner, the chief executive officer of Waste Management, the largest recycler of household trash in the United States. “Trying to turn garbage into gold costs a lot more than expected. We need to ask ourselves: What is the goal here?”
The article was rolling along nicely until it mentioned a study on the social costs of recycling and suggested a carbon tax on garbage. Seriously? Most people pay taxes on water and sewage. And what the heck is a social cost?
I do want to note this for those who recycle...
According to the E.P.A.’s estimates, virtually all the greenhouse benefits — more than 90 percent — come from just a few materials: paper, cardboard and metals like the aluminum in soda cans.
Recycle those items. The rest is a waste of time and resources.
The mandates for Recycling are crazy. A town near me banned the use of plastic bags so many stores including Walmart were forced to move to paper bags. The paper bags were thin and unless handled carefully would rip easily if more than a few items were placed in them. I went to the Walmart yesterday and now they are using these really thick plastic bags that the user can supposedly wash out and reuse up to 10 times. Who does that? Now I have 2 extra thick plastic bags that I cannot recycle in my town, I can't use to pick up dog poo, I can't use as a wrap to protect say a Christmas ornament in a box and I can't use to wrap a paint brush during a project. I can bring it back to Walmart and they will recycle it but how many do that?
I'd say most of these extra thick "reusable" bags get thrown in the trash.
They need to bring back paper, tin and glass and limit the plastic.
Finally some truth. It's crazy how we all knew this, but the left simply fails to believe the truth unless the person who creates the mistruths discloses it to them.
Most of that plastic we recycled ended up in the Pacific Ocean dumped by the Chinese. That plastic that wasn't recycled ended up in safe landfills in the USA.
Walking my subdivision on recycle day informs me that the half of us who recycle never read the instructions. About 1/3 of the neighborhood even bothers to recycle.
Many of the items in the bin are items that will be trashed due to not being clean or plastic, like foam packing material that is not recyclable. Dirty HVAC filters and used pizza boxes are always in some bins.
And we are paying a recycle fee around 16 a month to throw out extra trash. Go figure.
We use too much plastic, it's terrible for the environment, and it sticks around for 1000's of years. Those are the real problems. Not the fact that it's not economical or even practical to bother with recycling most of it. We were sending it to China for them to sort through for a very long time. Now with the higher wages over there and all the inflation/rising energy costs, that has pretty much stopped from what I understand.
We can recycle mass produced and standardized items like soda bottles. Some factories crush up scrap plastic into pellets and reuse them, but that's only if they know exactly what that plastic is. Good luck doing that with a bunch of mixed up plastic items that people throw away. You'll end up with junk if you try that, and no one will buy your products because no one wants inferior quality products. Heck, we don't even make much anymore here, so it's not like we alone can save the planet.
How did people ever survive before everything came in plastic containers and packing? Would love to go back to glass and coated cardboard. Aluminum is ok, that should get recycled.
We use too much plastic, it's terrible for the environment, and it sticks around for 1000's of years. Those are the real problems. Not the fact that it's not economical or even practical to bother with recycling most of it. We were sending it to China for them to sort through for a very long time. Now with the higher wages over there and all the inflation/rising energy costs, that has pretty much stopped from what I understand.
We can recycle mass produced and standardized items like soda bottles. Some factories crush up scrap plastic into pellets and reuse them, but that's only if they know exactly what that plastic is. Good luck doing that with a bunch of mixed up plastic items that people throw away. You'll end up with junk if you try that, and no one will buy your products because no one wants inferior quality products. Heck, we don't even make much anymore here, so it's not like we alone can save the planet.
Have you been listening to Ken Mo "Don't Throw it Away"?
Why did they go from the old, recyclable paper bags to plastic? Paper bags were better for sacking groceries anyway. Go back to glass bottles for soda. They are reusable.
They went to plastic only because it is cheaper, no other reason.
Sadly I've been reading the stories for years where most communities are lucky to recycle 50% of what is collected as recyclable because of dirty loads ie trash mixed in or certain categories of plastics and paper that cannot be recycled or need different treatment.
Plastic and glass should be one of the easier things to do IF done right including ensuring there are 'clean' loads but too many don't bother to separate trash from recycling or not putting certain types or categories. Also all those different numbers on plastics means it should be treated recycled differently. Local town finally had to explicitly say no #6 with plastics. Metalic paints or ink cannot be recycled on paper or cardboard. Too hard for most to pay attention to. Heck too many still liter don't even bother with trash.
I partly blame those who want recycle to ensure people are eductated. You can't put a list of unrecycleable plastics in fine print in a news letter. If that recycling triangle is on a blue can they assume anything with a triangle can be recycled which is not true. This comes from the lack of PSAs along with the local town or apartment clearly stating what can be recycled. Most don't want to take that kind ot time nor do these progressive billionaires want to invest in modern recycling plants, equipment and tech.
Last edited by anononcty; 10-31-2022 at 09:54 AM..
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