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Grapevine canes can be converted into plastic-like material that will decompose

sdstate.edu

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Re: Grapevine canes can be converted into plastic-like material that will decompose

#241

Post by jraph »

philipallstar wrote: post #239
jraph wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Different things, same group of people (money matters aside - people don't buy because it's more expensive, but despite it), no? The "I have money" part is obviously unfortunate. Buying healthy and environmentally-friendly shouldn't be conditioned by money. The next best individual thing is voting with one's own wallet in the meantime. The "I don't like pesticides"¹ and the "I don't like eternal plastic waste" are ve…

> (money matters aside - people don't buy because it's more expensive, but despite it), no? I didn't say people buy it because it's more expensive.

Indeed, but removing the money part of your sentence:

> They're different types of environmental. One is "I don't like pesticides" and the other is "I don't like eternal plastic waste".

Makes its clear that both concerns would come from the same group of people, more or less.

Or not? This is my question to you. Just take my previous comment as "What do you mean, different?".

You have a point with your money thing. Supermarkets absolutely make their choices with individualistic assumptions, taking in account classes of people and their revenues, and I suspect this is how we ended up with this wrapped organic vegetables heresy.

Re: Grapevine canes can be converted into plastic-like material that will decompose

#242

Post by latexr »

ehnto wrote: post #101
lstodd wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. HDPE lasts. So reuse it. Cardboard not so much, but where I live one can just take how many boxes one can haul off various shops and they will just thank you.

You can bring your own, non-plastic bags. I do wonder if maybe some cultures just don't have this and so the deprecation of plastic bags has left everyone quite confused. It's a very solved problem, has been for centuries probably. You can even get some with little wheels! If you absolutely can't handle the looseness of the fruits amongst your shopping, you could use string nets.

> You can bring your own, non-plastic bags.

For sure. But reusing the plastic bag you already have is cheaper and more environmentally friendly than buying a new cloth bag, yet many people never even think of using the same plastic bag twice. Even if some food juice spills inside, you can quickly rinse it off, hang it, and it’s good as new.

In my original reply I was trying to convey that you can be the laziest, most forgetful person, and still have an easy solution.

Re: Grapevine canes can be converted into plastic-like material that will decompose

#243

Post by lupusreal »

DownGoat wrote: post #234
jajko wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Road to hell is paved with good intentions... I wonder how many here even notice the most important comment here from you and just keep repeating how plastic bags are worse. Yes they are terrible, but we shouldn't just blindly replace them with anything and call it a day but do the (continuous) investigation for best solution, poisons are these days everywhere.

You have the same problem with plastic. Recycled plastic may not be food safe, and have contamination from whatever it was used for before recycling.

About a year or so ago, somebody in the chain of suppliers of plastic PET bottles for seltzer water, used by several different brands, switched to a recycled plastic with a distinct dark tint to it. Immediately obvious because the product, water, is obviously clear.

My family returned six cases of 15 bottles each to Costco, then found that the other brands at local stores were the same way. A couple of months later the bottles went back to normal. I still wonder if they switched back due to customer rejection of the new plastic, or if they found the new plastic was in some way leeching contaminants.

Re: Grapevine canes can be converted into plastic-like material that will decompose

#244

Post by darkwater »

upcoming-sesame wrote: post #235
darkwater wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We bring tupperwares when buying groceries for the meat, ham, cheese, fish etc and even if the cynic might say it's just a "feel good" action, well, I still put a lot of plastics in our recycle bin but we halved it since we started doing that (and some other trick). Yes, it definitely feels good.

doesn't it add significant weight to the price ?

They simply adjust the tare weight in the scale and that's it. They do it anyway with their own 1-use plastic boxes or sheets.

Re: Grapevine canes can be converted into plastic-like material that will decompose

#245

Post by sitharus »

forgotusername6 wrote: post #154
sitharus wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate to break it to you, but the loose produce in store isn't clean. That's why you must wash produce before you eat it.

Any washing you do to the produce at home has basically zero chance of killing/removing anything. It's hygiene theatre. People typically don't wash their produce in bleach or soap.

I’m pretty sure I’d rather remove the dirt from my vegetables, but you do you.

You can also read the studies that show mechanical action (brushing, rubbing) under running water effectively reduces the bacteria count https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0362028X2...

It’ll never be sterile, but it doesn’t need to be for a healthy human. Probably shouldn’t be either.

Re: Grapevine canes can be converted into plastic-like material that will decompose

#246

Post by nandomrumber »

foobar1962 wrote: post #231
mcv wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I still don't understand why brown paper bags aren't more standard for everything. I do see some manufacturers reducing plastic, fortunately. For example, my box of tea bags used to come wrapped in plastic, and now it suddenly doesn't, and I'm wondering why it ever needed plastic. But there's still so much stuff that comes wrapped in plastic, and often multiple layers of it. Just ban it. There are excellent alt…

I'm old enough to remember when supermarkets only had brown paper bags. They were weak and the handles tear off easily, and anything cold will make the bag wet and it will fall apart usually from the bottom. Supermarkets must have spent a lot of money replacing customer's broken items when bags failed even before leaving the store. So when doing the calculus for brown paper bags don't forget to include the cost goods…

Australian supermarkets have excelled at replicating this paper bag fiasco.

The white plastic bags they replaced are magnitudes of order more durable and able to carry, I should test this, at a guess ten times the weight. Basically you can fill a white plastic bag with 1.25 litre water bottles to the extent no more can physically fit in the bag and it will be safe to carry and reuse 50 times.

Fortunately the white plastic bags are still available online (eBay / Amazon / etc) so I just buy 50 for my own use as required and use them till they nearly fall apart then repurpose them as bin liners.

They’re incredibly cheap, don’t really get dirty in an unhygienic way, can be washed if something does spill in them, and they fold up in to almost no space.

Re: Grapevine canes can be converted into plastic-like material that will decompose

#248

Post by pfdietz »

mcv wrote: post #181
jon_adler wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, all the actual tea bags are usually plastic. The wrapping is probably a small percentage of the plastic in this product.

I'm pretty sure my tea bags are paper, and have always been paper. It's the more recent "pyramid" shaped tea bags that I think are made of plastic. The most recent change to my tea bags was to remove the staple so they could go in organic waste.

Why can't staples go in organic waste? They go into my compost pile and will rust. Iron is like 5% of average crustal rocks and is abundant in soils.

Re: Grapevine canes can be converted into plastic-like material that will decompose

#249

Post by trallnag »

AlecSchueler wrote: post #197
cm2012 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People dramatically over weight how bad plastic is for the environment. The impact of a 10 min car ride = 10,000+ plastic bags of emissions. And in first world countries almost no household plastic ends up in the environment.

I cycle to the supermarket and every bush I pass on the way is full of plastic.

How is that the fault of plastic wrappings and not the fault of people throwing trash onto the side of the road?

Re: Grapevine canes can be converted into plastic-like material that will decompose

#250

Post by latexr »

fy20 wrote: post #140
latexr wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why don’t you bring plastic bags from home? They are very much reusable, you don’t have to throw them out. They are also quite easy to fold into small shapes and keep on you, or your car, or whatever. I have plastic bags which have endured for literal years. I also decided early on that if I forget to bring a bag, I either do without or have to go back to get one. You start remembering really fast after a few times o…

I have a cupboard full of bags at home I can reuse. It's right next to my door. Really easy to get to. 75% of the time I forget to take a bag to my car. As well as all the single use bags (paper and plastic) I bought, I also have jute bags that I got years ago and are still holding up. I like them better as they are bigger and stronger. Even if I managed to get a bag, the other 75% of the time I forget to take it int…

> 75% of the time I forget to take a bag to my car.

Then take a bunch in the other 25%. You can just leave them in the car.

Grab a bundle right now, or whenever you’re at home and remember, and put them next to your keys, your wallet, or hang them on the handle of your door.

> I like them better as they are bigger and stronger.

Sure, use whatever you like. Just don’t let perfect be in the way of good.

> Even if I managed to get a bag, the other 75% of the time I forget to take it into the shop and leave it in my car.

Then go back to your car! It will be mildly annoying the first two times, and the third time it won’t happen. I mentioned exactly that in my comment.

> Even if I manage all of that, 25% of the time I will end up not having enough bags.

Then start bringing more. This isn’t hard. Leave the extras in your car.

Or just use the cardboard box approach I mentioned.

None of your mentioned obstacles is insurmountable. On the contrary, they are all exceedingly trivial to overcome with the tiniest amount of will to do so.

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