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Canada declares plastics toxic, paving the way for restrictions

motherjones.com

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Re: Canada declares plastics toxic, paving the way for restrictions

#61

Post by datavirtue »

_qwfv wrote: post #6

Great. Regulation and reduction of plastic production is long overdue. There are some places where it makes sense to use plastic, but we're far, far overproducing the stuff because it's convenient. It's fantastically difficult to recycle in practice, burning it produces toxic smoke and carbon emissions, and putting it into the waste stream results in a bunch of it getting dropped on the sides of roadways.

There is a process being developed where plastic can be recycled back into an oil be burning it and condensing the vapors/smoke into a liquid (capturing it). This is also very good news given the issues we have with recycling. This process would make it much easier since you would not have to sort.

Re: Canada declares plastics toxic, paving the way for restrictions

#62

Post by caenorst »

hirundo wrote: post #7
maxqin1 wrote: post #2

The focus here is on the environment. However, plastic is linked to many health issues as well.

Plastic packaging makes hygienic food more accessible as an effective and cheap barrier to pathogens, incoming and outgoing. Such public health interests should be balanced against their toxicity. It's easier for wealthier people to substitute with restaurants, servants and higher quality materials. So a general plastic ban would amount to a regressive tax on sanitary food.

Why is this comment downvoted? It seems to be nuanced, or are there some studies showing that this is absurd? I'm genuinly curious

Re: Canada declares plastics toxic, paving the way for restrictions

#63

Post by cmrdporcupine »

908B64B197 wrote: post #5
version_five wrote: post #3

The canadian government is big into the business of making these kind of "declarations" these days, so our PM can demonstrate to everyone how progressive he is. Although I don't think Mother Jones is a legitimate news source, so would be careful about taking anything in the article at face value.

> so our PM can demonstrate to everyone how progressive he is. Maybe he should focus on providing vaccines instead (Canada's vaccination rate sits at barely 4% while the US is at 38%) [0] and stop pushing pipelines to export some of the most environmentally destructive oil on the planet [1]. [0] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/world/covid-vaccina... [1] https://news.yahoo.com/trudeau-stresses-disappointment-…

The Canadian vaccination rate is not 4%. It's as of today in Ontario at 60% of adults single dosed (49% of the population, and 58% of those 12+). The Canadian strategy is to get herd immunity on single doses before moving onto second doses. And judging from what I've seen happen in other countries, and from the emerging data about single-dose effectiveness, it's turning out to be the best strategy.

Re: Canada declares plastics toxic, paving the way for restrictions

#64

Post by maxwell »

lstamour wrote: post #41
galangalalgol wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there a good list of what things we can reasonably replace? As I'm typing this I wonder what we would use for shock absorbant things like phone cases or water proof seals like cv boots on car suspensions. Edit:. Looking around, electrical insulation, seals, and shock absorbers are the three things that I cant think of a good replacement for. Some seals like for weather proofing you could use spring bronze.

Anything that can be made from paper, should be. Primarily bags, shipping containers, product packaging, etc. I've seen Amazon replace plastic bubble wrap with paper-based bubble wrap, for example. They use really fine bits of paper and presumably glue to create the "bubbles". Instead of using plastic to wrap shipping containers, you could use a more re-usable material. Or perhaps we could come up with cardboard "rin…

True to a point, but plastic and the cloud were transitioned to for many things a few years ago because of "saving trees". And then overused to the point of surpassing paper's previous carbon output.

Calling to mind palm oil, adopted as more healthy and sustainable. And then also over-done.

Disposability seems a deeper issue: a retreat to forest products doesn't seem the solution.

The fish-catching clear plastic rings that you throw away, or cut up, are bad, the cardboard packaging coated in paints is bad, but the craft beer heavy duty Paktech rings [1] and Roberts' Craft-Paks [2] seem harbingers of a more reusable + indefinably recyclable future, regardless ultimately of the specific materials involved.

A piece of the wider craft brewery innovation of the '10s in the U.S. [3]

1. https://paktech-opi.com

2. https://shop.robertspolypro.com/collections/craft-pak

3. https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2018/01/craft-b...

Re: Canada declares plastics toxic, paving the way for restrictions

#65

Post by blihp »

galangalalgol wrote: post #28
_qwfv wrote: post #6

Great. Regulation and reduction of plastic production is long overdue. There are some places where it makes sense to use plastic, but we're far, far overproducing the stuff because it's convenient. It's fantastically difficult to recycle in practice, burning it produces toxic smoke and carbon emissions, and putting it into the waste stream results in a bunch of it getting dropped on the sides of roadways.

Is there a good list of what things we can reasonably replace? As I'm typing this I wonder what we would use for shock absorbant things like phone cases or water proof seals like cv boots on car suspensions. Edit:. Looking around, electrical insulation, seals, and shock absorbers are the three things that I cant think of a good replacement for. Some seals like for weather proofing you could use spring bronze.

Don't throw away your phone every couple of years and that phone case will last many, many years. Think of anything plastic that you throw away. The items you list are durable goods and are likely environmentally better and less toxic than what was used prior to plastic.

Re: Canada declares plastics toxic, paving the way for restrictions

#66

Post by grecy »

standardUser wrote: post #24
aussieguy1234 wrote: post #14

Many people might think something as massive as the ocean is basically unlimited and that there's no way us humans could screw it up. Not true. Take a sample of seawater from almost anywhere right now and you'll find microplastics. Something like 80% of the world's fish stocks are also gone from overfishing.

I can't understand this perspective at all, but it seems to have been a key philosophy guiding human development for a very long time. Was it just a belief based on convenience?

Read the book "The Golden Spruce" to get a really good understanding of how quickly we decimated the trees in the West.

The rate of forest destruction accelerated so quickly with machinery I don't think it's possible to grasp.

Re: Canada declares plastics toxic, paving the way for restrictions

#67

Post by tkzed49 »

wearywanderer wrote: post #53
pharke wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a lot more to tires than rubber: https://www.ustires.org/whats-tire-0 Synthetic fibers include Rayon, Nylon, Polyester, Acrylic, and Spandex among the more widely used ones https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_fiber

These are the fibers in the reinforcing bands and rims, right? Those are buried under the rubber and if your tire is shedding material from those bands then your tire must be truly worn to nothing. I think the vast majority of material shed from tires must be the rubber itself. Illustration of a tire cross section: https://www.michelintruck.com/img/tires/xze-zoomer.jpg

I think the point of the second part was that a lot of textiles are made of plastic fibers

Re: Canada declares plastics toxic, paving the way for restrictions

#68

Post by cmrdporcupine »

caenorst wrote: post #62
hirundo wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plastic packaging makes hygienic food more accessible as an effective and cheap barrier to pathogens, incoming and outgoing. Such public health interests should be balanced against their toxicity. It's easier for wealthier people to substitute with restaurants, servants and higher quality materials. So a general plastic ban would amount to a regressive tax on sanitary food.

Why is this comment downvoted? It seems to be nuanced, or are there some studies showing that this is absurd? I'm genuinly curious

Because of the "dihydrogen monoxide" snark.

Re: Canada declares plastics toxic, paving the way for restrictions

#70

Post by bogidon »

datavirtue wrote: post #61
_qwfv wrote: post #6

Great. Regulation and reduction of plastic production is long overdue. There are some places where it makes sense to use plastic, but we're far, far overproducing the stuff because it's convenient. It's fantastically difficult to recycle in practice, burning it produces toxic smoke and carbon emissions, and putting it into the waste stream results in a bunch of it getting dropped on the sides of roadways.

There is a process being developed where plastic can be recycled back into an oil be burning it and condensing the vapors/smoke into a liquid (capturing it). This is also very good news given the issues we have with recycling. This process would make it much easier since you would not have to sort.

Curious if we can put said oil back into the earth we extracted it from, or if there are reasons that ecologically would be a bad idea. It’s interesting to me thinking about restoring the environment to a state prior to human interference.
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