I see comments pointing out that the majority of plastic pollution in oceans come from Asia/Africa. This is true, but there are two points worth considering: 1) Whenever you pay cheaply for anything made in any third world country, you're externalizing the societal cost of pollution to that country (and if it gets into the oceans, to everyone). In other words, you're not paying the true cost of that item--economicall…
> first world nations often export their trash to third world nations Not anymore, pretty much all Asian countries have stopped accepting plastic trash.
Plastic pollution didn't just happen in the past few months. It's been decades.
My theory (no evidence) is that the whole recycling movement has been completely counter productive since most of that material has been shipping abroad to countries that are poorly regulated. Had we just stuffed it into landfill (we have no shortage of space to take care of it, despite what the media says), we would be fine.
On the landfill topic, I found this Slate Star Codex post very interesting: https://slatestarcodex.com/2019/01/01/what-happened-to-90s-e... I'd been idly wondering about the topic for years—specifically, WTF happened to all those environmental things schools & kids' nature magazines & cartoons had all the students worked up about back in the 90s? Are they fine now? Did it all go poorly so they gave up? You know, save…
Save the rainforest is still my main environmental mantra, thanks 5th grade. And I still think the pursuit of biodiversity is the best goal. Way more compelling to the average person than co2. And it it turns out that co2 reduction is necessary to save those lemurs, so be it. But do it for the biodiversity -- to save the rainforest. Not nearly as compelling to save the rainforest in order to reduce co2, or whatever.
> The World Economic Forum estimates that 90 percent of the plastic ending up in the oceans comes from 10 major rivers, and that currently there are 50 million tons of plastic in the world’s oceans." from the WEF: researchers were able to estimate that just 10 river systems carry 90% of the plastic that ends up in the ocean. Eight of them are in Asia: the Yangtze; Indus; Yellow; Hai He; Ganges; Pearl; Amur; Mekong; a…
Maybe we could have a country-specific tag on plastic, like doping the plastic of the 10 largest countries per GDP. We would find out within a year where things are going and from whom. Not that it really matters in the end, but politicians and blame games going hand in hand, that be 'entertaining'...
Past 10 years, Europe is increasing burning waste for generating electricity, and heat for district heating. Especially Sweden is burning 50% of the waste they generate. Waste plastic makes pretty good fuel. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incineration#Incineration_in_E...
And emits CO2. No more plastic, less CO2 from production and from the waste. And it’s clearly our major crisis of the century.
Sweden (5.1) is very close to the world average (4.9 tCO2/capita/year) in fossil CO2 emissions, so they're doing really well for a developed country. (2017 data from Wikipedia.)
Past 10 years, Europe is increasing burning waste for generating electricity, and heat for district heating. Especially Sweden is burning 50% of the waste they generate. Waste plastic makes pretty good fuel. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incineration#Incineration_in_E...
And emits CO2. No more plastic, less CO2 from production and from the waste. And it’s clearly our major crisis of the century.
Let me put it that way: CO2 might be mitigated at some point, but plastic in oceans is a lost cause.
My theory (no evidence) is that the whole recycling movement has been completely counter productive since most of that material has been shipping abroad to countries that are poorly regulated. Had we just stuffed it into landfill (we have no shortage of space to take care of it, despite what the media says), we would be fine.
On the landfill topic, I found this Slate Star Codex post very interesting: https://slatestarcodex.com/2019/01/01/what-happened-to-90s-e... I'd been idly wondering about the topic for years—specifically, WTF happened to all those environmental things schools & kids' nature magazines & cartoons had all the students worked up about back in the 90s? Are they fine now? Did it all go poorly so they gave up? You know, save…
In my school days the main scare problem was acid rain.
My theory (no evidence) is that the whole recycling movement has been completely counter productive since most of that material has been shipping abroad to countries that are poorly regulated. Had we just stuffed it into landfill (we have no shortage of space to take care of it, despite what the media says), we would be fine.
On the landfill topic, I found this Slate Star Codex post very interesting: https://slatestarcodex.com/2019/01/01/what-happened-to-90s-e... I'd been idly wondering about the topic for years—specifically, WTF happened to all those environmental things schools & kids' nature magazines & cartoons had all the students worked up about back in the 90s? Are they fine now? Did it all go poorly so they gave up? You know, save…
> The TL;DR on "ZOMG we're gonna drown in trash if we don't do something!" is that it was always basically bullshit—we didn't fix it, it was just a made-up problem to begin with.
Er, we sent all the trash to other countries, and they dumped it in the ocean.
What's wrong with carrying your own stainless steel straw? I mean if you know you need one it makes sense to me to have your own. Not being snarky, just curious.
It'll stab you in the throat. A real concern for children, and undoubtedly also for some disabled folk: https://www.cpsc.gov/Recalls/2016/starbucks-to-recall-stainl... Just use biodegradable plastic straws.
IKEA sells in Germany straws from paper. Kids love them. Very light.
Can anyone answer whether plastic recycling actually happens? I've tried to search around before but can't find much concrete data on how/where plastic can actually be recycled and what it is recycled into.