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The Violent Afterlife of a Recycled Plastic Bottle

theatlantic.com

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Re: The Violent Afterlife of a Recycled Plastic Bottle

#41

Post by balfirevic »

knughit wrote: post #29
jfoster wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also says: > “Unfortunately the bags themselves can’t be recycled—they are too dirty, so they will end up in a landfill.” This holds true for all plastic items that haven’t been cleaned properly—hence, the leaflets calling for us to “rinse our recyclables.” The cleaner a plastic bottle is, the more likely it will be marked for reincarnation as something new. That bit happens before the washing, so I think the advi…

If you put too much dirty plastic in, it will ruin the whole load, including the clean bottles. But anyway consumer-level recycling is a farce to make consumers feel less bad about and discarding plastic. It doesn't actually help anything.

> But anyway consumer-level recycling is a farce to make consumers feel less bad about and discarding plastic. It doesn't actually help anything.

Do you mind sharing any references about this?

Re: The Violent Afterlife of a Recycled Plastic Bottle

#42

Post by dalke »

pif wrote: post #15
radicalbyte wrote: post #12

The article mentions the Bottle Bill system: this is a system where you pay a small deposit on every bottle you buy which is then refunded when you return the bottle to the supermarket. This results in the bottles being recycled. We have this system here in The Netherlands and I must say it's fantastic: we get proper thick Coke bottles and my bin doesn't get filled up so quickly. Sadly this system isn't used for all…

When I was a child, there was the same system in place in Italy for Coca-Cola glass bottles, and maybe for other sodas as well. It then disappeared, unfortunately.

In the US it wasn't the same system. The soda companies ran the bottle recycling system because it was cheaper to wash and reuse the bottle than to make new ones. They switched to plastic because it was cheaper to make new plastic bottles than reuse old glass ones.

The government systems described here went into place as a way to reduce the resulting trash.

Re: The Violent Afterlife of a Recycled Plastic Bottle

#43

Post by evan_ »

justifier wrote: post #36
WJW wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The alternative that most people will think of first are glass bottles, which are significantly heavier. Transport of bottled liquids is already weight-bound, so if you make the packaging heavier you'd need more trucks to transport the same amount of bottles.

i'm going to ignore the financial costs until a direction has been settled so your point would be an optimisation problem in regard to environmental effect ie. what's less damaging? pacific garbage patch or truck diesel emissions? if i had to dream up a bottling system now my interest would be in resource renewal.. mainly biodegradable substances perhaps a waxed paper? i'm unsure what the weight costs would be on pap…

Coconut water and children's juice seem to be the only drink that comes in a waxed cardboard "tetrapak" container, I wonder if they just can't handle carbonated beverages?

Re: The Violent Afterlife of a Recycled Plastic Bottle

#44

Post by toomuchtodo »

douche wrote: post #18
radicalbyte wrote: post #12

The article mentions the Bottle Bill system: this is a system where you pay a small deposit on every bottle you buy which is then refunded when you return the bottle to the supermarket. This results in the bottles being recycled. We have this system here in The Netherlands and I must say it's fantastic: we get proper thick Coke bottles and my bin doesn't get filled up so quickly. Sadly this system isn't used for all…

A number of the states in the US have a bottle deposit, which sounds like the same idea. Problem is, it is only 5 cents, where it has been for like forty years, so it is only worth collecting and trading in the bottles if your time is effectively value-less. And it's not universal, so we still get the crap thin plastic bottles, they just cost a nickel more in some places than others. There was a Seinfeld episode invo…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1blsZxXDCU

Re: The Violent Afterlife of a Recycled Plastic Bottle

#45

Post by ck2 »

classicsnoot wrote: post #32
ck2 wrote: post #11

So dumb question but when they recycle plastics into water/soda containers - how do they know it is food-safe plastic making it back into the chain and not contain molecules that will "bleed" into the beverage/food?

Read the article. It addresses that.

I did read it, it doesn't address that, at least not in any detail what-so-ever.

The plastic flakes must be sterilized and tested to meet food-grade standards

Is that tested like how a certain number of roaches are allowed into food mixes in factories and that there is 1 FDA inspector for every thousand factories so there is no actual regulation going on thanks to congressional defunding?

Because that means the plastic is most definitely contaminated.

Re: The Violent Afterlife of a Recycled Plastic Bottle

#46

Post by justifier »

classicsnoot wrote: post #30
justifier wrote: post #23

i'm fanning an interest in getting involved in moving legislature making plastic bottling illegal anyone have any early objections i could work on developing responses to?

Not so much an objection, but more of a line of inquiry on tactics. Why try to make something illegal? Why not make something legal? Like instead of 'No Plastic', bonus for Plastic01 and 02. Plastic, like guns and cars and markets, are inherently useful. It is the production, use, and misuse that is the problem. On a legislative level, I feel it is a mistake to always use the limitation of action as an agent for chan…

i've been thinking a lot about your inquiry and my response, so i thank you for taking the time to make it

you've caused me to really consider what my goals are

i am uninterested in making plastics illegal but rather i'm interested in reducing the amount of plastic waste in the world

my initial reaction is the best way to halt this is to remove the ability to create more plastics

but as you pointed out it's more interesting to promote stead limit

so perhaps instead of making plastic use for superficial, yet to be clearly defined, uses illegal perhaps there is a buy in for use allowance

meaning plastic bottling is illegal unless you pay for the rights for so much plastic use

but the caveat is two fold

first: in order to pay for the rights you need to agree to reduce overall plastic waste in the world

meaning, you can use plastic bottles for your product, but you need to be diminishing old plastic accumulation

if you fail to reduce at the rate agreed in the permission then your rights are again revoked

second: the only ones who can buy the rights to create plastics are research teams attempting to decompose existing plastics

in this way the research is funded by the sponsorship of plastic users

meaning, a big corp that bottles in plastic uses profits to fund research in plastic decomposition for the ability to continue to bottle in plastics

.

any thoughts?

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