91–100 of 401 posts
> Kellogg's says these lids will still produce the distinctive "pop" associated with the product. No it isn't. Is this "pop" really such a big deal that they've been holding back on the redesign for so long?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
One of the key issues with using bottles is the cost, weight and the fact that there is a lot of breakage. The weight alone increases the cost of the supply chain by several times. One key invention which could really help here is flexible glass packaging. Interestingly, one of the lost technologies from the Roman era is flexible glass: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexible_glass Corning does have flexible glass, bu…
The story of flexible glass had contemporary doubters. My guess is it’s likely apocryphal but created as a fable with political and economic undertones.
Maybe I'm naive, but I don't see a good reason why government can't introduce legislation to enforce standardized packaging across product "classes" to streamline reuse and recycling - for example, all soda bottles of size x, must come in shape y, made out of polymer z. The obvious financial impact would be companies having to potentially retool their factories to facilitate that, but there can also be sensible tax r…
This style of legislation is exactly how we get articles like this posted. Where we can't have new headlight technology in the US because the law exactly prescribes the types of headlights permitted.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24042266
We need to find a way to manage this while still allowing science and technology to do its thing.
Wouldn't it be better to use as much paper as possible in the packaging and certify the paper is sourced from sustainable forestry? They we use the package as a carbon sink.
Unrecyclable waste is increasingly burned in many (most?) developed countries these days.
The Stax chips packaging is almost a 100% reusable plastic bottle, and I think they taste better than Pringle's, so I buy Stax occasionally. If the plastic lid was screw-on, it would be ideal for a relief tube when flying, but it's just press-fit.
The article alludes to removing the plastic components altogether if possible in place of the plastic, so yes, the Stax container is easier to recycle, but still not ideal.
reduce > reuse > recycle
You can learn more here:
Automotive vehicles are the only thing with high rates of recycling - the rate is almost 100% for the metal.
https://www.worldautosteel.org/life-cycle-thinking/recycling...
Household waste in the US is usually quietly landfilled, unless a private contractor can make money recycling it. (The bluebox separation training is helpful though for a future date.)
We need to focus on the second R, reuse. I have mason jars that my grandmother and then my mother used for pickling. The only waste is the rubber ring which needs to be replaced occasionally and THAT could be recycled. Many of these bottles have been used for 80+ years now. I have a few Ball jars which my GREAT grandmother used 100+ years ago. Beer bottles in Canada are reused dozens of times and are recyclable (brow…
Do you have examples of successful packaging reuse for solid dry food such as Pringles? Or cereal? Or sugar? Or chocolate?
(And that's before even getting into packaging of meat, fish, etc.)
Maybe I'm naive, but I don't see a good reason why government can't introduce legislation to enforce standardized packaging across product "classes" to streamline reuse and recycling - for example, all soda bottles of size x, must come in shape y, made out of polymer z. The obvious financial impact would be companies having to potentially retool their factories to facilitate that, but there can also be sensible tax r…
> made out of polymer z. Wow, sounds like you really want to encourage innovation in materials. The variety of polymers we have serve multiple uses and different functions because of their numerous unique properties (and costs).
My immediate thought is it sounds like Kellogg's/Pringles could get a lot of free positive marketing by just switching to a "100% biodegradable" bag? Nobody likes Pringles because they're in a tube.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> That means you need to end...selling stuff in containers entirely. If we energy-cost-accounted for all externalities, then I wonder how returning the containers to the factory to automatically sanitize and re-use compares to recycling. Land filling is not an option: say you're in a closed loop environment like on a generation ship trip to Proxima Centauri b, and the concept of a land fill as we know it is obscenely…
What's most interesting to me about this comment is the use of an example of a closed loop environment, despite the fact that _we're already in a closed loop environment_. We just pretend otherwise with landfill and the convenience of throwing things into a bin.
Generally speaking, our human organizational psychology is extremely vulnerable to the principal agent problem throughout the body of the organization when timelines and scales are larger than an individual can internalize. MEGO is the usual response I get when I speak with most people about timelines exceeding a human lifespan (their human lifespan to be specific), or resource quantities at industrial and global scales.
Until we can solve the problem of shifting on the order of 3e8 metric tons of mass off-planet without ruinous side effects, we're really stuck on our cradle world, and should plan (including actively researching how to get off world at that scale) accordingly.
Recycling mentioned on Hacker News always depresses me. The way problems with it are treated as fundamentally unfixable always strikes me as against the site's ethos, yet people love pointing them out. Recycling just gets dumped in landfill! Ok, lets ban that. But, actually, its more environmentally friendly to landfill it! Are you sure? Science doesnt really agree. But anyway, can we make recycling more efficient? N…
Hum... I do not disagree exactly, but, there is simply no rush to fix landfill. There's a rush to fix climate change, species extinctions and habitat losses, environment pollution and a huge number of problems. Landfill can easily wait for a century or two. So why take focus from the hanging problems and place into it?
So, if climate chamge is an issue you care about, then recycling is one of the fixes and landfill and its methane production and waste of useful materials is one of the causes.
But since we live in a world where even the existence of climate change is a political hot potato, I guess I shouldn't be surprised to see one of the fixes attacked with well funded lies as well.