Plastic recycling is a problem consumers can't solve • Hacker News Board

Re: Plastic recycling is a problem consumers can't solve

#301

Post by maxerickson » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 10:23 PM UTC

wutbrodo wrote: post #218

mcny wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So why is this obvious solution not implemented? I have no inside information but I think it is because manufacturers will collude to add this as a visible added cost to the cost of the product. Consumers will think stuff became more expensive because of some idiots in DC/Brussels.

It's a collective action problem like any other. Collusion on a wide scale in competitive markets is pretty damn difficult, since one company can change their manufacturing processes to produce less waste and suddenly undercut everyone else's prices. "Passing the whole price increase onto the consumer" rarely withstands scrutiny, excluding cases with very low demand elasticity or very oligarchic suppliers. Neither of…

The incentive to minimize their packaging already exists though, both in shipping costs and just the material costs.

Re: Plastic recycling is a problem consumers can't solve

#302

Post by nhoth34ntoein » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 10:28 PM UTC

ars wrote: post #292

ryandrake wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d be in favor of requiring manufacturers to take back unneeded product packaging, paying for postage if necessary. EDIT: Reading more of this thread, it looks like everyone is suggesting this, so my comment does not add much. So why is this obvious solution not implemented?

Because mailing garbage is a terrible idea. It's worse for the environment that almost all other options. So is driving your garbage back to the store where you bought something. The whole process, taken as a whole, just doesn't make any environmental sense.

Unless it's a store that you have to drive to anyway. For example, my dry cleaner years ago used to "recycle" hangers. You could bring back your hangers from the previous time and get like 2 to 10 cents off your current order for each hanger you returned. (Don't recall the exact amount, probably closer to 2 cents if I think about it.) This was nice because you were going there anyway, and also because you didn't end up with a closet full of empty hangers!

This is also what we did with soda cans when I lived in Michigan. You'd pay 10 cents extra per can, and then get it back when you returned them. If you didn't return them, the state had 10 cents to use to clean up waste produced by that can. If you did, you got your money back and the can got recycled. It seemed to work pretty well. I remember a year after they started the program noting how much cleaner the roads seemed because people were going out and picking up cans to return them and fewer people were throwing them out their car windows.

Re: Plastic recycling is a problem consumers can't solve

#303

Post by baxtr » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 10:34 PM UTC

Let’s not forget that this is also a cultural issue. When I compare living in Europe with living in the States for example I had to say that Americans use a lot more single use plastic than Europeans. Avoidance is possible. Maybe not to the same extent, but it definitely can play a role

Re: Plastic recycling is a problem consumers can't solve

#304

Post by wedn3sday » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 10:38 PM UTC

dougmwne wrote: post #246

ada1981 wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Burying garbage in a big hole in the ground is not a sustainable solution.

Maybe it is? We can dig some pretty deep holes. It may not be pretty but seems to work.

Im not sure if you correctly understand what the word "sustainable" means. X is sustainable IFF you can keep doing X forever and not have it kill you eventually. "Seems to work" is perhaps a sub-optimal policy objective.

Re: Plastic recycling is a problem consumers can't solve

#305

Post by oldcynic » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 10:40 PM UTC

ars wrote: post #292

ryandrake wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d be in favor of requiring manufacturers to take back unneeded product packaging, paying for postage if necessary. EDIT: Reading more of this thread, it looks like everyone is suggesting this, so my comment does not add much. So why is this obvious solution not implemented?

Because mailing garbage is a terrible idea. It's worse for the environment that almost all other options. So is driving your garbage back to the store where you bought something. The whole process, taken as a whole, just doesn't make any environmental sense.

Most plastic waste is from weekly groceries. No one in their right mind would make a special trip to take the junk back, simply take a black sack with the previous week's garbage when next going shopping. It would be no additional cost and minimal inconvenience.

It's how recycling used to work. There were big skips for glass, paper, textiles etc in most supermarket car parks. They were well utilised by shoppers before entering the store. Before that we used to return the empties for reuse within the store.

If a campaign of returns caused supermarkets to restrict suppliers, and create less in the first place, I would do so diligently.

Re: Plastic recycling is a problem consumers can't solve

#306

Post by idoh » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 10:45 PM UTC

protonimitate wrote: post #128

idoh wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is completely possible to orient purchases away from plastic. In fact if someone believes that plastic is bad then they should have some stake in it by making those decisions themselves. I went through reducing my plastic use myself, it was not difficult to reduce my plastic use by 50% or more: A: look at my trash before I move it to the curb to see what plastic things were in there B: find substitute for the obvi…

I'm all for personal responsibility but I don't think that there is a critical mass to invoke production changes. (Anecdotally) for every one person I know taking the time to be conscious, I know two that couldn't care less. I believe most people fall into the 'not my problem' bucket.

If someone wants to reduce plastic in the world but doesn't change their own behavior then it is hard to take them seriously.

Re: Plastic recycling is a problem consumers can't solve

#307

Post by jimjimjim » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 10:46 PM UTC

unpopular opinion:

Add a sales tax on everything that has plastic in it.

If not using plastic increases the price then the majority of people just will not choose the more expensive option.

Sure motivated people will see the benefit, but most people will see shrink-wrapped item at $5.99 vs 'better' item at $6.50 and will just pick the cheaper one.

The app store pricing is an example of this. "$5 for a game is outrageous, i'm going to play this terrible one for $1 instead." well actually they are going to pick the free game with advertising, tracking, and all kinds of darkpatterns instead. but the idea is the same

Re: Plastic recycling is a problem consumers can't solve

#308

Post by jaggederest » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 10:49 PM UTC

pmiller2 wrote: post #13

jaggederest wrote: post #10

I'm always confused why we aren't pyrolyzing refuse and reusing the hydrocarbons in them. It's energetically and monetarily expensive, but both costs are more or less paid for by the output products and input products, as far as I am aware. And you get out fairly high quality fuels.

My guess is that you may end up with more than just hydrocarbons, and then you have to dispose of those waste byproducts. You certainly wouldn't do this to electronic waste, but, perhaps, if you could guarantee a pure stream of plastics, you could make it work.

Well, one of the major problems is that if you pyrolyze PVC you get hydrochloric acid as a byproduct, but you can extract that by washing. These are known, operating plants, they just aren't operational here, for whatever reason.

Re: Plastic recycling is a problem consumers can't solve

#309

Post by weberc2 » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 10:55 PM UTC

bunderbunder wrote: post #252

dpkonofa wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is such a big part of it and it's amazing that they get away with it. Case in point: Blue Apron. Blue Apron positioned itself as one of the more "recycle-friendly" food delivery services to try and fight the stigma against every delivery having bags upon bags of individually wrapped goods by providing recycling services. As a former Blue Apron customer, I loved that I could separate stuff out (hard plastic, soft…

I wouldn't be surprised if "Pack the box back up and burn a bunch more jet fuel sending it back to New York" turns out to be even worse than just sending it all to the landfill. Given that they require air mailing boxes full of (mostly, by weight) frozen liquids all over the place on a weekly basis, I'm not convinced that these meal kit services can ever be made sustainable. Compared to that cost, worrying about recy…

Certainly they could be at least as sustainable as any grocery store; they’d just need to create more, smaller distribution centers closer to their customers. The DCs can get their supplies locally or via bulk shipments (and sort out recycling on-site) and then assemble the meal kits and add ice for the last mile.

Transporting ingredients in bulk to the DCs is more efficient than transporting a bunch of individually packaged and individually cooked meal kits.

Re: Plastic recycling is a problem consumers can't solve

#310

Post by rdm_blackhole » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 11:02 PM UTC

aeternus wrote: post #267

jdavis703 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd say yes it is a good use of our time. I really want ours to be the generation that stops punting problems out to the next generation. I'd be happy if my friend's children don't need to grow up worrying about how to deal with oceans filled with plastics, global warming induced fire storms and flooded coastal cities.

Interestingly, many of the things that we've though would be huge problems in the future turned out to be non-issues or much less of an issue than we thought. A few examples: -Population crisis -Peak oil & oil crisis -Global cooling concern in the 1970s -Ozone crisis -Rainforest crisis -Worldwide food shortage

You mean to say that we have stopped cutting down entire rainforests??? Do tell me when this miracle happened?

How about the fact that we are going to be 10 billion by the end of the century?

And the only reason that we have managed to avoid a food shortage has been the increase in the use of fertilizers which in turn is depleting the soil at a faster rate than ever before turning arable land into dust bowls and rivers becoming so polluted by the chemicals that there are massive extinction events in the population of fish all around the world?

Same for the oil crisis, the shale oil has stopped the crisis in its tracks but only for a short amount of time as the demand keeps on rising and inevitably the price per liter/gallon is going to be back to what it was before the GFC. Also, fracking is polluting the soil more than ever before.

In short most of the crises that you mentioned have not been solved, but simply delayed.

Eventually, they will catch up with us and somebody is going to have to pay? But who? Most likely taxpayers as always.

What I find baffling is what are you going to say to your kids/ grand-kids when they ask you where the forests went? Why is the air so polluted? Why are the rivers so toxic and completely empty?

Should I go on?