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California aims to ban recycling symbols on things that aren’t recyclable

nytimes.com

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Re: California aims to ban recycling symbols on things that aren’t recyclable

#261

Post by hotshiitake »

jacknews wrote: post #86
Robotbeat wrote: post #60

I hope they don’t get rid of the symbol entirely! It’s useful to know what resin a product is made of. Things like PLA (which is kinda sorta compostable) are not often recycled, but they can be. If you don’t know what resin the plastic is, then it’s even harder. Keep the resin symbol. Remove the arrows on it. We get better with recycling stuff over time, so eventually more resins could be recycled. But. Part of me wo…

Yes, I've come to the conclusion that it's better to bury most plastic waste. Most plastic comes from oil, which means 'biodegradable' plastic is essentially the same as burning the oil. Actual recycling can work in some cases, but even after all the expense and energy of recycling, the recycled product is usually much lower grade plastic, so it's not sustainable. Better just to bury it (in leak-proof pits), where it…

> Yes, I've come to the conclusion that it's better to bury most plastic waste.

Alright, here is a controversial hot take - we should probably just burn plastics - and most garbage actually - as fuel. Done properly, incineration is a simple way to limit environmental contamination caused by plastics and other waste materials. The extra GHG production would be partially offset by savings from simpler logistics for processing (no more shipping barges of waste plastic going to overseas dumps) , and significantly reduced methane emissions from landfills. And - depending on how cost-effective incineration is - we may be able to take savings from waste processing and double-down on removing emissions from other industries (e.g. Energy, transportation).

Re: California aims to ban recycling symbols on things that aren’t recyclable

#262

Post by blacksmith_tb »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #136
bequanna wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Places with cheap energy… I’ve always wondered about colocating manufacturing near cheap power sources. Is this actually possible? Isn’t the power generated already being used? If it is possible, why doesn’t every manufacturing plant just do this to reduce a huge input cost?

Pretty sure aluminum extraction plants do this. As well as Bitcoin miners. ;-) Recently ... where was I, Eugene, Oregon? There was a shuttered Coca Cola bottling plant. I remember a huge one in Kansas City as well. Maybe someone with expertise can weigh in — but it seems like we used to, as an example, bottle things a lot more locally. It meant factory jobs in the area, transportation (of Coke) was shorter since ther…

Most major metro areas in the US continue to have soft drink bottling plants (though they're using plastic bottles and aluminum cans these days), since transporting huge volumes of water is more expensive than smaller amounts of flavoring and coloring. Eugene OR (pop ~175K) may be slightly too small for that to be practical, but here in Portland I bike to work past two active bottling plants.

Re: California aims to ban recycling symbols on things that aren’t recyclable

#263

Post by stickfigure »

nybble41 wrote: post #260
stickfigure wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Civil courts are not equipped to deal with this issue. At best you will get a lot of very rich lawyers. At worst you will get inaction and a lot of very rich lawyers. Taxes are a traditional way of pricing in a market externality. It seems appropriate here.

Politicians are not equipped to properly assess the externality incurred in each case and see that the affected party is compensated in accordance with the degree to which they were affected. Taxes paint with a very broad brush, do nothing to compensate the victims, and essentially make the government an accomplice in the externality—once the tax is in place, anything which actually reduced the externality will negat…

It is impossible to enumerate the individuals affected by carbon output. So who cares about compensation?

The point of taxing carbon is simply to get less carbon. Full stop. Economists (especially the free-market economists!) broadly agree that it will work. Why are we still having this conversation?

Re: California aims to ban recycling symbols on things that aren’t recyclable

#264

Post by CWuestefeld »

alistairSH wrote: post #103
twoodfin wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Letting the price mechanism work (externalities accounted for) is a great way to do this.

I agree - but that isn't a consumer decision (not a decision made at the time of consumption). A government agency has to determine the cost of the externalities (where the science and economics isn't easy) and then set taxes accordingly (not always politically viable).

Better, the government agency could be removing the reason that the cost can be externalized in the first place.

Admittedly, this is difficult to do for resource extraction or pollution costs. But consider that we can recover the costs of pollution in the ground and (to a lesser extent) the water. The reason we can't internalize the cost of CO2 emissions is because we won't recognize any ownership interest in the air. I'm not sure how to do that either, but I'm hopeful that we could think of something if we'd at least acknowledge this.

Re: California aims to ban recycling symbols on things that aren’t recyclable

#265

Post by IshKebab »

skybrian wrote: post #244
IshKebab wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Only the company picking up the recycling knows what they can really handle. Yes unfortunately they never tell you. Sure they'll tell you the easy stuff like cardboard, paper, cans etc. But there's a near infinite variety of stuff that you might be able to recycle. What about a metal coathanger? What about a plastic-coated metal coathanger? Etc. We have to put paper and cardboard in different containers. What about…

If they don't explicitly say they can take it, assume it's not recyclable.

I doubt that is true. Surely anything with significant metal content is separated magnetically for example. Card isn't explicitly mentioned but I'm pretty sure if they can recycle cardboard and paper then they can recycle card.

Re: California aims to ban recycling symbols on things that aren’t recyclable

#266

Post by reaperducer »

joecool1029 wrote: post #241
billytetrud wrote: post #174

I was thinking about this yesterday when I saw a pizza box with the recyclable symbol on it. It's infuriating that intelligent people can't seem to understand that pizza boxes aren't recyclable after they've had pizza in them. What about oil soaked cardboard says "recyclable" to people?

It's infuriating to me that people like you keep perpetuating this myth. Pizza boxes, even contaminated with some oil and cheese are recyclable (just take any leftover pizza/crusts out). I have family in the recycling industry, here's research on the matter: https://www.westrock.com/greasecheesestudy

The trash company where i live specifically tells its customers that soiled pizza boxes can't be recycled. It's even on a sticker on the supplied recycling bin.

Re: California aims to ban recycling symbols on things that aren’t recyclable

#267

Post by bratcomplex »

jacknews wrote: post #86
Robotbeat wrote: post #60

I hope they don’t get rid of the symbol entirely! It’s useful to know what resin a product is made of. Things like PLA (which is kinda sorta compostable) are not often recycled, but they can be. If you don’t know what resin the plastic is, then it’s even harder. Keep the resin symbol. Remove the arrows on it. We get better with recycling stuff over time, so eventually more resins could be recycled. But. Part of me wo…

Yes, I've come to the conclusion that it's better to bury most plastic waste. Most plastic comes from oil, which means 'biodegradable' plastic is essentially the same as burning the oil. Actual recycling can work in some cases, but even after all the expense and energy of recycling, the recycled product is usually much lower grade plastic, so it's not sustainable. Better just to bury it (in leak-proof pits), where it…

Gasification, using it as a fuel makes more sense. Reducing it down to basic carbon constituents. At least in this forum it’s productive and photosynthesis can turn it into organic mater.

Re: California aims to ban recycling symbols on things that aren’t recyclable

#268

Post by smileysteve »

duckmysick wrote: post #202
jacknews wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I've come to the conclusion that it's better to bury most plastic waste. Most plastic comes from oil, which means 'biodegradable' plastic is essentially the same as burning the oil. Actual recycling can work in some cases, but even after all the expense and energy of recycling, the recycled product is usually much lower grade plastic, so it's not sustainable. Better just to bury it (in leak-proof pits), where it…

> Better just to bury it (in leak-proof pits), where it will turn back into oil eventually. What's the time scale of turning back into oil? How long those pits are estimated to stay leak-proof?

Given our best sealants are plastics, this is the best question.

Re: California aims to ban recycling symbols on things that aren’t recyclable

#269

Post by alistairSH »

nybble41 wrote: post #228
alistairSH wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree - but that isn't a consumer decision (not a decision made at the time of consumption). A government agency has to determine the cost of the externalities (where the science and economics isn't easy) and then set taxes accordingly (not always politically viable).

Taxes are not the right answer. If you are impacted by a negative externality then you have legitimate standing to sue the source of the externality in civil court (individually or as a group) in accordance with how much the side effects of their actions cost you. If you can't demonstrate that you were actually affected, or the damage is too trivial to be worth taking to court, then for all practical purposes there i…

In theory, that works. In practice, I can't afford enough lawyers to take on Big Business. I'm also not sure how I prove damages for something like climate change. But yet climate change is real. And by the time I have obvious damages, it will be too late.

Re: California aims to ban recycling symbols on things that aren’t recyclable

#270

Post by q1w2 »

asoneth wrote: post #245
q1w2 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Resin code was designed to help with recycling to determine what can be recycled. It says so in the article you linked. It's the last column on the first chart.

The charitable interpretation is that their original intent of using the well-known recycling symbol around the resin code was to provide consumers with information to help them recycle more effectively. However the fact that recycling programs (at least in my state) advise consumers to ignore the number and focus on the shape of the plastic means that (at least in my state) these symbols are not serving their intend…

> The charitable interpretation is that their original intent of using the well-known recycling symbol around the resin code was to provide consumers with information to help them recycle more effectively.

This isn't the "charitable interpretation" - this was the stated and official purpose of the symbols with the numbers.

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