An illustrated guide to plastic straws (2021)
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An illustrated guide to plastic straws (2021)
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Re: An illustrated guide to plastic straws (2021)
#2It's a deceptive title, but it comes straight from the blog post. It's not going to teach you about straws (thankfully...are straws that interesting?). It tells you about the sources of plastic waste in general and justifies the most efficacious solutions to avoid plastic pollution. It is a short article focused on common sense, appropriate pictures, and well-chosen data.
Re: An illustrated guide to plastic straws (2021)
#3I agree with the message, but some states, the type that ban plastic straws, have made recycling a requirement.
A message not touched on is reducing the amount of plastic that we produce and consume should be a goal, but with attention paid to the secondary effects. For example, if you don’t wrap those peppers in plastic they’ll spoil and that may be worse for the planet than shrink wrap. But what if you cover them in edible wax instead? Whats the footprint of each decision?
Sometimes plastic will win out and other times we are being wasteful. In SE Asia, when you buy a single drink from the convenience store, it comes within a plastic bag, and you always get a straw. A plastic bag and plastic straw for a drink in a plastic bottle.
Re: An illustrated guide to plastic straws (2021)
#4A a glance, it seems to make sense that burying straws/garbage in a landfill is better than throwing it in the ocean but chemically, plastic decomposes significantly faster when exposed to UV/sunlight. It also seems as though ocean organisms are more able to consume plastic & oil.
It sounds crazy, but could it be that trash in the ocean is actually a better option?
Re: An illustrated guide to plastic straws (2021)
#5A a glance, it seems to make sense that burying straws/garbage in a landfill is better than throwing it in the ocean but chemically, plastic decomposes significantly faster when exposed to UV/sunlight. It also seems as though ocean organisms are more able to consume plastic & oil. It sounds crazy, but could it be that trash in the ocean is actually a better option?
if it is buried in a landfill is there less chance that it will end up in the body of an animal and work it's way up the food chain?
Re: An illustrated guide to plastic straws (2021)
#6If you want to save the oceans, ban plastic fishing equipment, as nets and other gear is the biggest plastic polluter in the oceans:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/nov/06/dumped-f...
Re: An illustrated guide to plastic straws (2021)
#7The Pasig River in Manila doesn't seem to look nearly as bad as the author claims:
https://www.google.com/maps/@14.5674227,121.0375559,3a,90y,7...
Re: An illustrated guide to plastic straws (2021)
#8The Pasig River in Manila doesn't seem to look nearly as bad as the author claims: https://www.google.com/maps/@14.5674227,121.0375559,3a,90y,7...
That particular river was cleaned up in 2018: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rehabilitation_of_the_Pasig_Ri...
There are plenty of (older?) pictures of it covered in plastic online. I don't think there's any reason to doubt the author's picture.
Re: An illustrated guide to plastic straws (2021)
#9A a glance, it seems to make sense that burying straws/garbage in a landfill is better than throwing it in the ocean but chemically, plastic decomposes significantly faster when exposed to UV/sunlight. It also seems as though ocean organisms are more able to consume plastic & oil. It sounds crazy, but could it be that trash in the ocean is actually a better option?
Theoretically possible, but we should want a lot more data to support that conclusion. There seems to be data that suggests that at least certain types of plastics have a deleterious effect on humans, and probably other animals as well. As long as the ecological effects of plastic aren't completely understood, it's probably better for it to wind up in landfills than in the food chain. After all, plastics are derived from petroleum which came from underground to begin with.
Re: An illustrated guide to plastic straws (2021)
#10I agree with the message, but some states, the type that ban plastic straws, have made recycling a requirement. A message not touched on is reducing the amount of plastic that we produce and consume should be a goal, but with attention paid to the secondary effects. For example, if you don’t wrap those peppers in plastic they’ll spoil and that may be worse for the planet than shrink wrap. But what if you cover them i…
> But what if you cover them in edible wax instead? Whats the footprint of each decision?
"states that ban plastic straws" generally use something biodegradable instead.
The policy, IMO, is pretty simple to figure out. The reason plastic is used everywhere is because plastic is uber cheap. Those peppers are wrapped in plastic because it adds less than a penny per unit and gives them a much better shelf life.
So, the simple solution isn't an outright ban of plastics, but rather a plastic tax. And what's the easiest way to impose that? Via a fossil fuel oil tax.
This would allow companies producing these products to evaluate their individual cost benefits of wrapping everything in plastic.
The rub is, this would have to be a global tax. Otherwise, we'll just be outsourcing our pollution problems. You'd also have to increase shipping taxes to a point where local manufacturing is the better financial option so bad actor companies don't simply manufacture in a nation with no oil tax.
Unfortunately, I think anything else is just posturing that will fall short. If businesses don't feel a squeeze, they won't change behavior. And the only squeeze they feel is financial.