Reducing sugar consumption has long term health benefit, reduce medical cost, and might reduce consumption of plastic bottle. Anyone explored regulating/taxing sugar before?
Five Companies Produce Nearly 25 Percent of All Plastic Waste Worldwide
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Re: Five Companies Produce Nearly 25 Percent of All Plastic Waste Worldwide
#32Reducing sugar consumption has long term health benefit, reduce medical cost, and might reduce consumption of plastic bottle. Anyone explored regulating/taxing sugar before?
In the US, President Wilson proposed a soft-drink tax in 1914, but the already-powerful Coca-Cola Company lobbied to defeat the initiative. In this country, the beverage industry is incredibly influential and has bought off a lot of legislators.
Re: Five Companies Produce Nearly 25 Percent of All Plastic Waste Worldwide
#33Thinking that recycling would address the problem of plastic pollution is wishful thinking. Plastic recycles very poorly. Companies like plastic because it means thicker margins for them, environment be damned; the proper solution is not to buy into the “consumers should be recycling” narrative but to thin out their margins so that using more sustainable and recyclable materials is financially attractive again.
> Plastic recycles very poorly. While I'm sure this is true in general, my impression is that the PET used in drink-bottles recycle well. For drink bottles I don't think we have a good option either? Glass is too heavy, aluminum is more energy intensive (I assume) even when it's recycled. Reusable bottles is unlikely to be realistic.
Why is glass too heavy? For decades, when average income was lower, it was the standard container in which soft drinks came in. Its just that plastic is cheaper, and replaced glass. But surely richer people can afford glass now.
Interestingly, both have different environmental externalities, and not sure how those have changed over the decades and will in the future.
Re: Five Companies Produce Nearly 25 Percent of All Plastic Waste Worldwide
#34Waste isn't inherently bad, littering is. It's not Coca Cola's fault that people throw away plastic bottles into the rainforest, oceans or other fragile ecosystems.
No, but it definitely should be in Coca Cola's charter to explore and invest in biodegradable alternatives. And the only way to hold such immense companies to their environmental responsibilities is either regulation or consumer perception.
Re: Five Companies Produce Nearly 25 Percent of All Plastic Waste Worldwide
#35Waste isn't inherently bad, littering is. It's not Coca Cola's fault that people throw away plastic bottles into the rainforest, oceans or other fragile ecosystems.
No, but it definitely should be in Coca Cola's charter to explore and invest in biodegradable alternatives. And the only way to hold such immense companies to their environmental responsibilities is either regulation or consumer perception.
Re: Five Companies Produce Nearly 25 Percent of All Plastic Waste Worldwide
#36Reducing sugar consumption has long term health benefit, reduce medical cost, and might reduce consumption of plastic bottle. Anyone explored regulating/taxing sugar before?
Yes, the city of Seattle instituted a sweetened beverage tax in 2017 and there was a study with results published in 2023.
https://www.seattle.gov/sweetened-beverage-tax-community-adv...
Re: Five Companies Produce Nearly 25 Percent of All Plastic Waste Worldwide
#37Thinking that recycling would address the problem of plastic pollution is wishful thinking. Plastic recycles very poorly. Companies like plastic because it means thicker margins for them, environment be damned; the proper solution is not to buy into the “consumers should be recycling” narrative but to thin out their margins so that using more sustainable and recyclable materials is financially attractive again.
Yes. As someone who is used to putting far too much thought into grocery shopping, it is virtually impossible to advance this change on an individual level. The company making the sustainable toothbrushes is owned by turtle hating petroleum companies or worse. I probably just seem cynical or shitty, but I would be hesitant to potentially induce guilt in individuals who feel they aren't doing enough when there are no…
A major reason why petrochemicals are such an economical solution in so many places in the supply chain is that petrol companies are drastically subsidized by governments. Merely ceasing those subsidies might go a long way to help
Re: Five Companies Produce Nearly 25 Percent of All Plastic Waste Worldwide
#38To everyone blaming consumers: I encourage you to take a solution driven mindset here. Consumers won't change. There's far too many people, some of which don't care about the environment. Tight regulations and additional tax on single use plastics can reduce plastic waste.
> pieces of plastic that they collected during clean-up events The article is about trash from littering. Surely the consumers fault.
I agree with you, I think this is primarily an issue with selfish people littering the environment. I didn't like how the article framed it as a "companies are littering" thing, as if it's factory waste.
Though... I also agree with the GP. It seems to be too hard to educate or enforce littering laws on consumers (edit: in some countries. Some other countries like Japan have better non-littering cultures). It might be easier to mandate things like biodecomposable plastic or... glass? That would be less harmful even if disposed of improperly. (How else are we going to get sweet drinks? Drink dispensers and enforced personal bottles?)
Re: Five Companies Produce Nearly 25 Percent of All Plastic Waste Worldwide
#39Waste isn't inherently bad, littering is. It's not Coca Cola's fault that people throw away plastic bottles into the rainforest, oceans or other fragile ecosystems.
Waste is inherently bad (in that it is a downstream cost.)
Re: Five Companies Produce Nearly 25 Percent of All Plastic Waste Worldwide
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
> pieces of plastic that they collected during clean-up events The article is about trash from littering. Surely the consumers fault.
I agree with you, I think this is primarily an issue with selfish people littering the environment. I didn't like how the article framed it as a "companies are littering" thing, as if it's factory waste. Though... I also agree with the GP. It seems to be too hard to educate or enforce littering laws on consumers (edit: in some countries. Some other countries like Japan have better non-littering cultures). It might be…
When I was young and playing in wasteland we often came across broken glass bottles etc. Very dangerous.
They were also regularly blamed as the source of wild fires.