Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Pringles tube tries to wake from 'recycling nightmare'

bbc.co.uk

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

311–320 of 401 posts

Re: Pringles tube tries to wake from 'recycling nightmare'

#311

Post by cogburnd02 »

chongli wrote: post #19
masklinn wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I love Pringles tubes. We reuse them all over the place around the house. Never really thought of recycling them. Seems like a terrible waste to destroy a perfectly good container just to get a ~penny’s worth of materials out of it. Recyclers are downstream from consumers. They can’t stop consumers from throwing away their pringles cans, and until Kellogg’s starts bulk-selling Pringles in bags… people will throw ca…

That’s where the first R comes in. Only buy as many Pringles cans as you can reuse. People don’t want to do that either, though, because Pringles are addictive. That may be the root problem. There’s no way they’ll sell Pringles in bags though; they’re way too delicate for anything but a purpose-built rigid container.

> a purpose-built rigid container.

Why not Al cans?

Re: Pringles tube tries to wake from 'recycling nightmare'

#312

Post by Nasrudith »

masklinn wrote: post #26
Ensorceled wrote: post #16

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…

> We need to focus on the second R, reuse. That means you need to end both single-use containers and selling stuff in containers entirely . There’s only do much of one type of reusable container you even can have a use for, and that’s assuming you do even have a use for them in the first place: I don’t make jam at home, I buy it, I don’t have a use for a new jam jar a month, and every jam-making friend has more jars…

Container waste needs to be considered with its inversely correlated counterpart, content waste and contamination damage. A single food poisoning case has far more impact than just tossing a non-biodegradable container in a landfill. Especially if they die - every investment in them from vaccinations to education becomes for naught in the future.

Re: Pringles tube tries to wake from 'recycling nightmare'

#313

Post by Y_Y »

bagels wrote: post #308
margo209320 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> meaning 6 figures Pringle cans being sold every year, if not 7 The article states "three million cans are made across Europe every day". That's 10 figures annually in Europe alone.

What kind of millions are we talking? It's probably 3,000,000, which is 6 or 7 figures.

European years typically have on the order of 1e2 days.

Re: Pringles tube tries to wake from 'recycling nightmare'

#315

Post by mensetmanusman »

The use of the word ‘nightmare’ when describing consumer packaging makes discussion of climate issues seem like a joke to the average person.

Do journalists realize they are being mocked when they highlight this terminology? Are they doing it intentionally to make a mockery of these issues?

Re: Pringles tube tries to wake from 'recycling nightmare'

#316

Post by Scoundreller »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #303
adingus wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe they can progressively make Pringles cans bigger so you can store your old cans inside your new cans.

The traditional thing to do is to make packaging smaller (while keeping price the same) - so you'd get to store your new cans in your old cans.

The tradition is to keep the packaging the same, but less content.

The same packaging for less should be a crime with bankrupting fines.

Re: Pringles tube tries to wake from 'recycling nightmare'

#317

Post by mensetmanusman »

The uncomfortable truth:

50% of food is thrown away due to our current habits. This % would be even higher if we didn’t use multilayer materials to protect food from spoiling.

The only way to solve this is by changing our eating habits (e.g. some things would have to go away, because they are not economical to centrally produce and ship everywhere around the world).

That, or you get distributed manufacturing that makes this food on demand locally.

Re: Pringles tube tries to wake from 'recycling nightmare'

#318

Post by Nasrudith »

refurb wrote: post #307
rlpb wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The only containers which are infinitely recyclable are aluminum and coloured glass (nearly), but that takes energy. I've heard people say that the environmental cost of producing the clean water necessary to wash bottles for reuse is also harmful. I'd really like to see a side-by-side comparison of the environmental cost of the different available "obvious" options. > We need to just force manufacturers to bear th…

Indeed, you need to look at total impact, not just the impact of switching a raw material. A college prof did an analysis of plastic versus biodegradable “plastic”. The biodegradable plastic took far more energy and released much more CO2 than just regular plastic.

Releasing more CO2 alone is no surprise since by definition if it isn't burnt the non-biodegradable technically sequesters it - but that has other environmental issues not covered by the metric.

One hypothetical that highlights issues with non-nuanced single issue environmentalism: producing non-biodegradable plastic that doesn't release more carbon filling and dumping it in the ocean to produce carbon credits.

Re: Pringles tube tries to wake from 'recycling nightmare'

#319

Post by zikzak »

chongli wrote: post #199
learnstats2 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you use Pringles cans for that makes them so useful: say you were buying one per week?

I don’t buy one per week. Maybe a few cans per year. I use them for storing sleeves of soda crackers (they fit perfectly even though the crackers are squares). They’re also good for storing snacks of various kinds, dry spaghetti noodles (or any pasta, really). Pretty much any dry goods that you don’t want crushed are a great fit!

Zip ties!

Re: Pringles tube tries to wake from 'recycling nightmare'

#320

Post by Scoundreller »

wruza wrote: post #257
steve_adams_86 wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It gives me the creeps every time I see someone heating up their lunch in an old plastic container. Old dairy containers with snap lids are very common. It must be leaching so much garbage into the food. I can’t tell if that’s phobia due to bad science or these people are actually gradually poisoning themselves.

I have the same concern about the new plastic everyday (food delivery sends these). It feels that old plastics only diffuse components into a food once, and then gradually less, but new ones do that again and again. Idk if that is true or a phobia too.

I believe that. Contact time is a thing.

Kinda like how cars recommend a very short interval for the first oil change: because that’s when all the metal is flaking off. Once your engine is old, everything is smoothed out and there’s a lot less surface area.

Post reply on HN