I would prefer to see plastic and styrofoam containers outlawed entirely.
Asian countries take a stand against the rich world’s plastic waste
91–100 of 228 posts
Re: Asian countries take a stand against the rich world’s plastic waste
#92Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem with glass is that it isn’t biodegradable. If it gets broken, it can cause a hazard for humans and wildlife. If it gets thrown away, it’s not going to break down. Glass is good for the ideal case, but not great for the other use cases. For milk and juice, it’s seems like thick paper might be a better option, since it’s biodegradable and recyclable.
Glass is essentially sand. Sure it may be sharp when it just broke, but it gets dull pretty fast in nature. Of all the things that got dumped onto this beach at Ft Bragg, glass was the least problematic. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass_Beach_(Fort_Bragg,_Calif...
additionally, isnt glass a semi natural occurring substance? Im pretty sure ive heard of lightning strikes in deserts/sand that created glass.
Re: Asian countries take a stand against the rich world’s plastic waste
#93I just bought 5 new Prusa i3 MK3 and I print lots of ABS and PETG parts, am I contributed to the plastic problem?
Over last 1 month, I ended up using roughly 25KG of plastic.
Re: Asian countries take a stand against the rich world’s plastic waste
#94This might be a dumb question, but: why don't we do glass-style bottles? I live in America now, but when I used to live in Pakistan 20 years ago, I remember that I would buy pepsi or coki in a glass bottle... and if I wanted to buy a second one, I would go back to the store and give them the old empty bottle, and they would compensate me a few pennies for it -- and the bottle then is presumably washed and reused. It'…
This does happen at a small scale in the US. I usually buy milk in glass bottles that when returned are washed and reused.
Re: Asian countries take a stand against the rich world’s plastic waste
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is pretty much what the environmentalists were preaching when I was growing up. Not sure why to be honest. In retrospect it certainly seems like "but the landfills!" is the lesser of all evils.
Probably a combination of NIMBYism and poor land-use planning. Back when many of these landfills were created, they were on the outskirts of urban areas, where "outskirts" = 15-20 miles away. After the wave of suburbanization in the 1950s-80s, suddenly those outskirts are right next to someone's home. Now it's a crisis. Most people's conception of what land is available is limited to their local metropolitan area, an…
Shipping over water is cheaper than shipping over land.
Re: Asian countries take a stand against the rich world’s plastic waste
#96As far as I can understand it, the recycling industry is a well-intentioned waste of resources. It would be much better for the environment for all this waste to be sequestered in a landfill than for people to pay to ship it around the world only for most of it to be dumped or rejected (which, even when the Asian countries in question do accept it, they are likely to do anyway). These materials (plastics) are so chea…
Non-biodegradeable plastic is a carbon sequestering scheme.
Re: Asian countries take a stand against the rich world’s plastic waste
#97Earlier quoted context omitted.
Glass is essentially sand. Sure it may be sharp when it just broke, but it gets dull pretty fast in nature. Of all the things that got dumped onto this beach at Ft Bragg, glass was the least problematic. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass_Beach_(Fort_Bragg,_Calif...
additionally, isnt glass a semi natural occurring substance? Im pretty sure ive heard of lightning strikes in deserts/sand that created glass.
I never heard of that but TIL it's called Fulgurite https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fulgurite
Re: Asian countries take a stand against the rich world’s plastic waste
#98Earlier quoted context omitted.
To be clear: the bottle redemption machines in New York crush bottles, they don't save them for reuse
Wow I did not know that. It’s likely being thrown in a land fill. The garbage companies around me stopped collecting bottles years ago. Do they do it to keep trash off the streets?
If NYC was into keeping the trash off the streets, they'd rather invest in better garbage collection methods than their current one, which is to have people just leave trash bags right there on the sidewalk, leaking all kinds of disgusting fluids all over the place. Really, Manhattan is such a disgusting, dirty, smelly place full of trash, that a few additional glass bottles here and there won't make too much of a difference.
Re: Asian countries take a stand against the rich world’s plastic waste
#99What happened before the recycling movement was that Western waste was burned in Western waste disposal facilities. This created a ton of toxic shit. Shipping it off to Asia or Africa kept our skies clear. So the recycle lie was created.
What is actually produced when we burn a plastic water bottle at high temperature? I've always wondered this but never seen a great answer - are we just releasing gasses, or is the resultant ash toxic?
Re: Asian countries take a stand against the rich world’s plastic waste
#100From what I understand, shipping containers are sent out from Asia stuffed with goods, but there isn't nearly as much going in the other direction. The containers need to go back whether they're full or not, which is why it ends up being so cheap to ship plastic. And the CO2 caused doesn't really change as a result. To the rest of your point though, I agree. My wife is a hardline recycler. I generally am too, but I h…
Is there really much of a point in recycling anything but reasonably clean paper/cardboard (I know stuff like greasy pizza boxes won't get recycled), and clean metals (like aluminum cans). Like, aside for those, will much realistically get recycled?
Aside for the insane amount of amazon boxes I toss in recycling, so very little of my trash fits the bill of things that will reasonably get recycled...