101–110 of 297 posts
Or what about just actual economic incentives to get people to live sustainably? High taxes on carbon and plastic and highly subsidised public alternatives
I would much rather incentivize non-plastic alternative packaging. Consumers should have better options for metal cans, glass bottles, etc for mainstream goods, as those materials are far more effective targets for recycling. But they're no where near competitive with plastic because the production cost doesn't account for the total lifecycle.
I agree that we must incentivize packaging that's better for the environment. The problem is who gets to define "better". Cloth bags were once thought to be better than plastic for grocery use, but that might not be the case - the cloth has a larger environmental cost to produce (cotton is water-intensive) and has to be used a lot more than one might expect before it surpasses the basic plastic bag. And if the plasti…
I agree that some of the lighter weight ‘cloth-like’ bags made today would not be able to stand that duty cycle.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I agree that we must incentivize packaging that's better for the environment. The problem is who gets to define "better". Cloth bags were once thought to be better than plastic for grocery use, but that might not be the case - the cloth has a larger environmental cost to produce (cotton is water-intensive) and has to be used a lot more than one might expect before it surpasses the basic plastic bag. And if the plasti…
Letting the price mechanism work (externalities accounted for) is a great way to do this.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You mean 'The Green Dot'? This piece of shit thing? https://www.pro-e.org/the-green-dot-trademark How this has been allowed to exist for so long is beyond my ken. The logo should look ENTIRELY different as it's basically false-advertising for the vast majority of people who have no idea what it actually represents. - ed spelling
>You mean 'The Green Dot'? Yup -- another business trick is in McDonalds -- the company that supplies the beef in Ireland is called "100% Irish Beef" and thus they put that on the packaging even if the beef doesn't come from Ireland. I've seen this don't with the equivalent of "100% recyclable" as the name of the company to pass the product off as environmental. However the main problem is still consumer knowledge of…
[1] https://www.rte.ie/news/coronavirus/2020/0323/1124769-corona...
> For years, the United States also shipped much of its plastic waste overseas, choking local rivers and streams. A global convention now bans most trade in plastic waste Most of this article is fine, but I can't believe this specific misinformation continues to be printed. Exported plastic waste virtually entirely goes into landfills overseas, or is incinerated. Whereas the waste choking local rivers and streams e.g…
This is a case where the proposal is actually worse than the headline, I think. From a non-paywall source: https://calmatters.org/politics/2021/08/california-recycling... > Despite the best intentions of Californians who diligently try to recycle yogurt cups, berry containers and other packaging, it turns out that at least 85% of single-use plastics in the state do not actually get recycled. Instead, they wind up in…
You're misreading that quote. It's saying that Californians do put these things in recycling bins, but they aren't actually recyclable, so the recycling facilities have to send them to landfills. People are trying to recycle the wrong things because of the intentionally misleading resin identification codes, and California is trying to fix that.
The waste processing that the various CA communities have contracted for is not recycling those resins, even though they're capable to be recycled and being presented for recycling.
That gives me the view that the most effective action is not an on-the-street "consumers, please put these into the landfill stream" but rather a "communities, please choose to upgrade waste management practices on the blue stream".
Earlier quoted context omitted.
>You mean 'The Green Dot'? Yup -- another business trick is in McDonalds -- the company that supplies the beef in Ireland is called "100% Irish Beef" and thus they put that on the packaging even if the beef doesn't come from Ireland. I've seen this don't with the equivalent of "100% recyclable" as the name of the company to pass the product off as environmental. However the main problem is still consumer knowledge of…
> However the main problem is still consumer knowledge of whats recyclable. Strongly disagree here. Expecting average consumers to know the difference between polypropylene, polyurethane and polystyrene etc..., just by looking at something, is beyond the pale. That doesn't even take into account bonded materials, like paper coffee cups lined with plastic. The "main problem" is manufacturers / supermarkets using any k…
My bottle of sparkling water doesn't really need a green top. The bottle itself doesn't really need to be a light colour tint.
Put branding on paper labels, or better yet - go monochrome and laser-etch/mark everything. Have QR codes on bottles that can have fancy interactive digital marketing/advertising/information.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
>You mean 'The Green Dot'? Yup -- another business trick is in McDonalds -- the company that supplies the beef in Ireland is called "100% Irish Beef" and thus they put that on the packaging even if the beef doesn't come from Ireland. I've seen this don't with the equivalent of "100% recyclable" as the name of the company to pass the product off as environmental. However the main problem is still consumer knowledge of…
Yeah, exactly. The recycling trucks here in LDN have a campaign on the side of them that has words to the effect of "if you're unsure - leave it out!" because as you say, even partial contamination screws entire bales of reclaimed material. My eternal bugbear is Pizza boxes. Used greasy pizza boxes can often be recycled in many municipalities, BUT only in the organic or food waste. Greasy card in the paper recycling…
Nobody in their right mind has the time and space to properly sort and clean the trash. For the rest, inefficient use of water and detergent has an environmental cost too.
This stuff should be all handled by a combination of centralized work at sorting plants and alterations to packaging. Containers can be cleaned more efficiently in a centralized location, and as for the pizza boxes, perhaps it should be mandated that pizza boxes must be fully lined with aluminum foil on the inside - this would be a win for both recycling and product quality, as the pizza would stay warm for longer.
What about adding "not recyclable" messages to things? Maybe along with images of the plastic bag islands or something, like those cigarette pack warnings. Give everyone that painful reminder whenever they buy these things. Or what about just actual economic incentives to get people to live sustainably? High taxes on carbon and plastic and highly subsidised public alternatives
Down here, packs of cigarettes have horror pictures on them and, sure no smoker ever stopped because of them, but once you show that to your kids, they just don't feel like trying anymore...