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New plant-based plastics can be chemically recycled with near-perfect efficiency

academictimes.com

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Re: New plant-based plastics can be chemically recycled with near-perfect efficiency

#251

Post by madacol »

rmason wrote: post #71
ArkanExplorer wrote: post #7

Plastic recycling seems heavily motivated by emotion and virtue signaling. In reality, only about 5% of our crude oil use goes towards plastic. If we rolled out EVs, and then just burned all the plastic trash (using waste-to-energy plants), we would still be far ahead. The biggest challenges with plastics are hormone disruption, and microplastics (particularly in the 3rd world without sufficient landfill or W2E infra…

I remember a time when everything was paper bags. Groceries and retailers went with plastic because it was cheaper. But with plastic there was a hidden cost. Now we're told we must pay a premium for recyclable plastic. Personally I'd rather pay a premium for paper because it's made from a renewable resource. Plus paper will decompose within two months in nature. The only drawback I can find is that paper bags take mo…

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/grocery-bag-environmental...

TL;DR

# Reuses needed to break-even with standard single-use plastic bag (LDPE;Low-density polyethylene)

Organic cotton - 20,000 reuses

Conventional cotton - 7,100 reuses

Composite - 870 reuses

Recycled PET - 84 reuses

Polypropylene, non-woven, recycled - 52 reuses

Polypropylene, woven, recycled - 45 reuses

Unbleached paper - 43 reuses

Bleached paper - 43 reuses

Biopolymer - 42 reuses

Polyester PET, recycled - 35 reuses

Re: New plant-based plastics can be chemically recycled with near-perfect efficiency

#252

Post by madacol »

globular-toast wrote: post #198
rmason wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember a time when everything was paper bags. Groceries and retailers went with plastic because it was cheaper. But with plastic there was a hidden cost. Now we're told we must pay a premium for recyclable plastic. Personally I'd rather pay a premium for paper because it's made from a renewable resource. Plus paper will decompose within two months in nature. The only drawback I can find is that paper bags take mo…

Single use bags are always stupid. You can get bags or boxes that can be used hundreds of times before they need to be replaced.

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/grocery-bag-environmental...

TL;DR

# Reuses needed to break-even with standard single-use plastic bag (LDPE;Low-density polyethylene)

Organic cotton - 20,000 reuses

Conventional cotton - 7,100 reuses

Composite - 870 reuses

Recycled PET - 84 reuses

Polypropylene, non-woven, recycled - 52 reuses

Polypropylene, woven, recycled - 45 reuses

Unbleached paper - 43 reuses

Bleached paper - 43 reuses

Biopolymer - 42 reuses

Polyester PET, recycled - 35 reuses

Re: New plant-based plastics can be chemically recycled with near-perfect efficiency

#253

Post by ars »

cromat3 wrote: post #186
ars wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is enough landfill space effectively forever. It's really not a problem. > What makes you question the need for recycling? The environment makes me question it. Everything I've seen shows recycling anything except metal is bad for the environment. We only do it because it makes people "feel good". The right thing to do with: Metal: recycle it Glass: bury it Paper: bury it Plastic: burn it Everything else: bury…

Why is glass recycling bad for the environment?

Because transporting it (it's heavy) and recycling it consumes more resources than making it fresh.

Additionally glass is harmless in the environment, and it's not something we can ever run out of.

So why do it?

Additionally, if you actually do want to recycle things, glass shards contaminate everything, making it much more difficult and expensive (i.e. consumes more resources) to do it.

Re: New plant-based plastics can be chemically recycled with near-perfect efficiency

#254

Post by aksss »

DenisM wrote: post #238
mqrs wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are we really supposed to be thinking of all currently available land as being flexibly provisioned for landfills.

A 1x1x1 km landfill (they are actually holes in the ground) can contain the entire waste of the US for three years. How many of those can we hide in the western US without anyone ever noticing? Howa bout a 100x100 km patch, that will hold 30,000 years worth of trash. Meanwhile we can focus our energy on the only problem that really matter - the climate problem.

It seems more ethical to bury our trash in our own backyard than bury in a poor country’s backyard or chuck it in the ocean. In the US we definitely have an out-of-site/out-of-mind problem where “recycling” can often really be “another guy’s landfill (e.g. China)”. We value not trashing our own environs with scant recognition that in terms of the global impact of our consumption, it doesn’t matter who’s landfill it goes in. But we’re the same way with strip mining.

Re: New plant-based plastics can be chemically recycled with near-perfect efficiency

#255

Post by aksss »

dTal wrote: post #204
shawnz wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not? You can still live on top of a landfill. Is it better that we live on top of some ecologically inactive rocks instead?

I don't believe you can live on top of a landfill; it's too toxic. In fact I don't think you can even build housing on the site of a former landfill.

Airports and golf courses, on the other hand.. many uses for surface area besides living. I don’t know (truly) if the issue is really toxicity (in a well designed, reclamated landfill) or the simple fact that city services like sewer, water, gas, electric were never under-grounded there by design. You’d think settlement would be a cause for concern too, but I’d also think they have that solved if airports are made atop them.

Re: New plant-based plastics can be chemically recycled with near-perfect efficiency

#256

Post by aksss »

eggsmediumrare wrote: post #167
DenisM wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The countries which are the most preoccupied with recycling plastics, such as the US, are also the least likely to throw they trash into the ocean. Plastic bags do no harm buried in the landfill, and we’re not running out of land.

We are running out of land. I don't disagree with your point that landfill space isn't "a problem." But if you zoom out and look at inefficient land use more generally (like fields for feed corn), you find that there is for all intents and purposes no nature left in many of the places we occupy.

Mm, you’re running out of coastal land in temperate areas. That’s an entirely different problem. I wonder how the carbon footprint of taking trash to a Nevada desert to be buried compares to shipping it to SE Asia. On the surface (sorry) it seems the former would be more efficient and more ethical. Don’t know the numbers tho.

Re: New plant-based plastics can be chemically recycled with near-perfect efficiency

#257

Post by aksss »

digidob wrote: post #188
systemvoltage wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we are fine with Cemeteries in extremely valuable land in major city centers, I’m fine with a square mile landfill in Oklahoma.

I’m not fine with either.

Burn it all, she said!

Re: New plant-based plastics can be chemically recycled with near-perfect efficiency

#258

Post by aksss »

beowulfey wrote: post #249
DenisM wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Assuming that we can keep burying it forever is not a healthy attitude. Yes it is. Just because some decision made in the past is wrong doesn't mean a different decision made in the present is also wrong. There is no harm to landfill, and we know it quite well by now.

It isn’t about being right or wrong. It is about sustainability and foresight. Yes, landfill works now. But the population is growing and eventually the land may need to be reclaimed. It is about recognizing that excess waste now may become a problem for future generations. It is about realizing that things could, you know, maybe be done better. Dumping our trash in the ground is lazy and I just don't understand how…

Well, I’ll have a go - first, most people have no idea where their trash goes and don’t worry about the problem that something has to be done with it. It just magically disappears because we (especially urban and suburban dwellers) are that abstracted from dealing with it.

The options are to make a pile of it, bury a pile of it (ocean or land), burn a pile of it, or eject a pile of it into space, while recycling what we can to reduce load on the aforementioned options (often far, far less than people imagine, btw).

So it’s not an issue of people desiring to put their dirty diapers in the ground for its own sake, but it being the better of several shittier options.

Fundamentally we all make too much trash. Each of us. But while that problem is being worked we still need to put it somewhere where it minimizes sanitation and environmental risk.

Far from being lazy, modern landfills are pretty meticulously engineered for surface reclamation in the developed world. You are probably acting more responsible by putting developed-world trash in a developed-world landfill than by shipping it across the ocean in container barges to the developing world, where often as not it just ends up in an unmanaged, seeping pile (assuming it makes it to and stays on land).

There’s a lot of wishful thinking about what to do with garbage (if “we” only..., “people” just need to...), but the best thing any of us as individuals can do is obsessively reuse finished materials without becoming hoarders, donate, and consume less (opt out of gratuitous packaging, don’t buy tchotchkes for decorations or gifts, buy things that will last for decades or generations, not seasons or years).

How’s that?

Re: New plant-based plastics can be chemically recycled with near-perfect efficiency

#259

Post by aksss »

mping wrote: post #203
DenisM wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The countries which are the most preoccupied with recycling plastics, such as the US, are also the least likely to throw they trash into the ocean. Plastic bags do no harm buried in the landfill, and we’re not running out of land.

Developed countries outsource plasti garbage handling to other less developed nations that are happy to take care of it for a fee.

“Take care of it for free” == put it in a hole in their ground because for the developed world, its “outta site, outta mind”. Pretty stunning ethical blind spot we all have, really. At best, it’s a case of wishful thinking, on behalf of developed-world consumers, that once it’s in the bin something responsible is being done with it.

Re: New plant-based plastics can be chemically recycled with near-perfect efficiency

#260

Post by aksss »

EGreg wrote: post #171
DenisM wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The countries which are the most preoccupied with recycling plastics, such as the US, are also the least likely to throw they trash into the ocean. Plastic bags do no harm buried in the landfill, and we’re not running out of land.

Plastic has found its way into water everywhere on Earth [1] and they don't degrade for centuries. Instead of making people recycle, why not tax the externalities upstream and nudge corporations into using biodegradeable materials? [1] https://qz.com/1299485/antarcticas-waters-now-contain-plasti...

I always struggle with these answers because while the upstream taxing does seem like the “perfect” answer in a model, it has a spotty track record and future. When prices are artificially inflated, and politicians get elected by decreasing drag on your quality of life, a variety of reasonings get used to evade responsible costing as much as possible and to repurpose the proceeds for the initiative of the month. Hence why this nation is 27 trillion dollars in debt. It’s all to sustain an unsustainable way of life. Living off the principle, or indeed future debt, is so imperative to our lifestyle today (and our glide path to retirement and death) that it’s hard to make such burden sharing plans with a straight face. No American generation wants to be the first one to take it on the nose, especially when one of this country’s raisons d'être is to ensure our kids live better than their parents. This country (at least) needs a serious come-to-Jesus moment about consumerism and realistic expectations for sustainability. And yeah, I’m the guy telling you to cut down your drinking while holding a bottle of JD in hand.
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