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Plastic experts say recycling is a scam. Should we even do it anymore?

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Re: Plastic experts say recycling is a scam. Should we even do it anymore?

#101

Post by dmoy »

wreckdropibex wrote: post #76
dmoy wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean from like an energy perspective. Glass and paper are not significantly more efficient to recycle than to manufacturer new stuff. Paper is like 2x more efficient to recycle. Glass is... somewhere around there I forget. In both cases you can recycle all of the stuff, but it costs comparable-ish energy. For paper it's sometimes a clear win because trees. Aluminum is like 20x more efficient for energy use.

Recycling glass is ~30% more energy efficient than creating new glass https://www.palpa.fi/juomapakkausten-kierratys/eri-juomapakk... I have no idea about glass industry economics, but 30% energy savings would seem significant for any industry.

Ok yea that makes sense. I had a vague memory it was less efficient than paper but still net better energy.

Still almost everything pales in comparison to 2000% on aluminum

Re: Plastic experts say recycling is a scam. Should we even do it anymore?

#102

Post by CatWChainsaw »

aspenmayer wrote: post #48
CatWChainsaw wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read a Pocket story recently about cartels of cardboard thieves. Just the concept itself was wild.

Diversion and repurposing on an individual and industrial scale also happens with milk crates and especially with wooden pallets, and probably also with plastic pallets.

No doubt. I was mystified by the repurposing being so lucrative as to encourage full blown cartels.

Re: Plastic experts say recycling is a scam. Should we even do it anymore?

#103

Post by ZeroGravitas »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #8

One of the big problems with plastic recycling is that people read "plastic recycling is a scam" but internalize "recycling is a scam". Some types of recycling are massively successful and efficient, like the recycling of vehicle lead acid batteries or post industrial steel recycling.

I'd say it's the other way round.

There's a powerful and vocal contingent in the USA/Silicon Valley/HN that hate all recycling as a matter of libertarian principle.

It's basically a sin against the gods of free markets for any government program to fix market externalities and worse to be successful and popular.

The only type of recycling they've had any real success in demonising is plastic, so they use that as a wedge to bad mouth the whole thing.

Very similar process, often with the same players, with climate change.

Re: Plastic experts say recycling is a scam. Should we even do it anymore?

#104

Post by hinkley »

bombcar wrote: post #100
hinkley wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if that was true when Coke had licensees in every town handling the bottling? I don’t think people appreciate what a franchising operation Coke is. Because they don’t have names.

The shorter the distances the easier to break even, which could probably be done with a bit of effort. I wonder if the loss of glass had more to do with plastic ease of use (no bottle openers) than directly cost.

Heavy packaging definitely loses as miles travelled increases.

Years ago Method defended using thin walled, but non recyclable plastics for their products based on a bunch of factors, including miles traveled, product to packaging ratios, and the recovery percentage of plastic containers. Unlike aluminum and glass, only a fraction of the feedstock comes out of the process.

So if you have an HDPE recycling process that’s 25% effective, you could keep an equal amount of material out of the landfill by making a product with 3/4 the material of HDPE. Which they did (and more) with blister packs.

They list them as recyclable now, but and I think they did the right thing at the time regardless.

Re: Plastic experts say recycling is a scam. Should we even do it anymore?

#106

Post by baggy_trough »

epistasis wrote: post #85
baggy_trough wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That may well be true, and yet, getting rid of oil and cars would be much worse by many orders of magnitude.

You think getting rid of oil and gasoline cars would kill 6-8 billion people and injure all the rest?

Getting rid of oil and cars would be much more likely to lead to civilizational collapse than climate change in my opinion.

Re: Plastic experts say recycling is a scam. Should we even do it anymore?

#107

Post by riversflow »

ofrzeta wrote: post #64
riversflow wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t know where you read that. To quote wikipedia: > Recycling scrap aluminium requires only 5% of the energy used to make new aluminium from the raw ore https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium_recycling Which cites this article from The Economist: https://www.economist.com/leaders/2007/06/07/the-price-of-vi...

Ok, one example (granted it's a bit niche): "Since the demand for recycled aluminum continues to increase, the discarded aircraft provide a large source of valuable metal. However cost-effective recycling of aircraft alloys is complex because aircraft alloys are: (a) typically relatively high in alloying elements and (b) contain very low levels of impurities to optimize toughness and other performance characteristics…

Fascinating, thanks.

I can maybe shed some light, however I’m not 100% positive. And you very well might know all this:

My read here is that “aircraft grade” alloys, probably like 2000 and 7000 series, are relatively harder to recycle. They are less used and more expensive, I cba to look up stats on raw production estimates, if they exist publicly.

This is separate from recycled Aluminum being treated as a separate product(green aluminum), with effort made to bring it to parity with traditional Aluminum.[1]

Again I don’t know for sure, but I suspect a lot of it comes down to Aluminum cans being the highest single use of Aluminum globally and being efficient to recycle and make with recycled aluminum.

[1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S007964252...

Re: Plastic experts say recycling is a scam. Should we even do it anymore?

#108

Post by beej71 »

switch007 wrote: post #40
hn72774 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Single use plastic bags were banned here. Two things happened as a result - the plastic thickness was increased so they can call them reusable instead of single use, and stores started charging for them. Instead of reducing plastic waste it had the opposite effect.

> it had the opposite effect. Are you saying that the annual total tonnage of plastic bags increased?

Not the gp, but I think they're referring to this: https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2024-02-12/califor...

Re: Plastic experts say recycling is a scam. Should we even do it anymore?

#109

Post by MPSimmons »

epistasis wrote: post #23
MPSimmons wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If plastic becomes toxic, it won't _become toxic_, it will become recognized as toxic, which would mean that it's toxic right now, and while that's true for some plastics, it doesn't seem to be true for the majority of food-safe plastics in use. I think it's more likely that there's some kind of subtle effect from the introduction of microplastics into the ecosystem that we haven't identified yet, but as of right now…

Agree 99%, but as plastics break down there's a chance that they do become toxic. For example, a chemical used in tires is extremely toxic to salmon, but only after breaking down a bit: https://www.science.org/content/article/common-tire-chemical...

Oh wow, that's really interesting. I wasn't aware. Thank you!

Re: Plastic experts say recycling is a scam. Should we even do it anymore?

#110

Post by SomeoneFromCA »

isthispermanent wrote: post #50
SomeoneFromCA wrote: post #46

I call it bullshit. PET used in plastic bottles can easily be depolymerized or even used as fuel. I live in a poor ex-USSR republic, and plastic recycling is a popular business; it were a scam no one would do that, as government neither mandate nor sponsor recycling.

What country do you live in if you don’t mind me asking?

mind
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