71–80 of 206 posts
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Subsidies would help with that.
+1 us gov Does this for agriculture. Ensuring that farmers have a price floor by purchasing surplus
Last I looked most countries get very upset when others dump products on their markets at below cost. Chinese steel in America being a prime example.
What happened to the futuristic plasma furnaces that were supposed to be able to melt all this stuff into elemental components?
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What would be an example of an evil of capitalism that is not attributable to mispriced externalities? I have trouble coming up with one myself.
Somebody could be born, by no fault of their own, with a rare disease that would cost more to treat than they can realistically earn, and which insurers can easily detect as a pre-existing condition.
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We need reducing, not recycling. Recycling is an amazingly inefficient and polluting solution to a problem that should not exist (in its current magnitude) in a sanely-managed planet.
"We need reducing, not recycling." Why not more of both?
Eventually those of us in America and Europe will have to start actually recycling rather than just saying we are while shipping it to other countries. Obviously part of the solution is going to necessarily require companies stop putting so much waste packaging on products.
We need reducing, not recycling. Recycling is an amazingly inefficient and polluting solution to a problem that should not exist (in its current magnitude) in a sanely-managed planet.
There is almost no focus on reuse in the US. If you want to get groceries, you don't take a container to fill, you buy your food wastefully prepackaged. Fast food restaurants don't give you a plate and glass, they give you disposable wrapping and a plastic cup. Even clothes are meant to be disposable - most people don't repair their shoes, they just throw them out and buy new ones.
I don't see this mentality changing any time soon, and it's really sad. We should start changing companies for the disposal costs of their products and packaging, rather than hiding the cost in environmental damage.
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What does safely burned in the context of plastic packaging mean?
Waste to energy programs, where exhaust is contained and not released into the atmosphere, is a viable means of disposal for many materials. Particularly viable for those which are oil based, like plastic, which are highly pollutive if not contained (see our oceans), take a massive amount of time to naturally decompose, and have relatively high potential energy (because they are petroleum based). Edit: I notice you s…
The dumping of "recycling" onto other countries just goes to show what a lie recycling actually is. It's not recycling, it's just garbage, but the word recycling makes us feel good about sending it to some other country to be dumped. With India and China refusing it, look to the "recycling" companies to make deals with countries that don't have the political will to say no to accepting the worlds plastic and paper ga…
Is a problem that we use a single label ('recycling') to describe many different efforts with different outcomes? E.g. paper and aluminum recycling seem to result in products being efficiently returned to use. While some mixed recycling basically gets routed to landfills? Edit: Agree on turning off the tap. That's the primary thing we need to focus on.
Aluminum is pretty much the only material that is economically viable to recycle.
The dumping of "recycling" onto other countries just goes to show what a lie recycling actually is. It's not recycling, it's just garbage, but the word recycling makes us feel good about sending it to some other country to be dumped. With India and China refusing it, look to the "recycling" companies to make deals with countries that don't have the political will to say no to accepting the worlds plastic and paper ga…
You are absolutly right. To others seeing this comment, i‘d recommend you watch the Documentary named „Plastic China“. It is on YT, but you support the makers here: https://www.plasticchina.org We need to stop plastic polluttion now, or im afraid the earths ecosystem will collapse sooner or later.
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Waste to energy programs, where exhaust is contained and not released into the atmosphere, is a viable means of disposal for many materials. Particularly viable for those which are oil based, like plastic, which are highly pollutive if not contained (see our oceans), take a massive amount of time to naturally decompose, and have relatively high potential energy (because they are petroleum based). Edit: I notice you s…
Thank you for your swift and comprehensive reply. I wasn’t aware plastics could be burned and the exhaust contained / treated / whatever.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Waste to energy programs, where exhaust is contained and not released into the atmosphere, is a viable means of disposal for many materials. Particularly viable for those which are oil based, like plastic, which are highly pollutive if not contained (see our oceans), take a massive amount of time to naturally decompose, and have relatively high potential energy (because they are petroleum based). Edit: I notice you s…
Paper does not biodegrade once it is in landfill no longer exposed to air or the elements. Not even newsprint. There is a whole discipline of archeology consisting of digging in landfills and they often find perfectly preserved newspapers that are 50 years old or more.
My point was that paper can decompose more easily if/when it’s improperly disposed of/littered. It’s not ideal, but at least it will be gone in shorter time than plastic, and it won’t destroy wildlife, etc.
The other benefit of more paper based products is they retain greater value than plastics (both economic and practical - your McDonalds napkin was formerly a newspaper, which is former office paper, etc) and therefore market forces will typically support a clean stream recycling program for mixed paper, office paper, and corrugated cardboard.