Once they touch the factory floor’s floor, plastics become filthy and cannot be used for high-quality applications - food wrappers, anything with body contact. Oils and heavy metals are the biggest contaminants, a plastics-producing company I used to work for concluded. They either sent it all to a recycling factory or used it for very low-quality stuff like trash bags.
Now with post-consumer plastics, not only are they extremely heterogeneous, they will also have even worse contaminants like mold which proved to be very resistant to cleaning, a EU study concluded. So you might want to pyrolyze them like you do with crude oil, but there’s just too much O, N, S and halogens, so the output will be too corrosive, but also too heterogeneous for it to make economic sense.
That’s a bit cynical take. In many countries, including mine, there are dedicate bins for plastic waste which is the majority of waste from your typical household. It’s all being recycled into new products, not being shipped anywhere. Also, when it comes to plastic bottles for example, close to 100% of them are returned and recycled into new bottles. I’ve got a tiny-ass bin for the stuff that ends up in landfill because I separate and recycle it all as does most other people.
EDIT: Nevermind then. It’s all apparently dumped into the ocean. Sorry about the attempt in some positivity.
Seems far more likely that the recycling rate is low because not every piece of plastic waste is put into recycling. Not that they simply don’t recycle it.
The problem is that there are quite some different sorts of plastics and that plastic containers are not standardized. If you mix different kinds of plastics or plastics with other materials you can’t use it anymore in an automated processing and it usually gets burned. Also mostly recycling is a downgrade, so usually if you recycle some packaging, it is not made into packaging again but into things like pallets or construction fence bases.
In my country (Aus), last I heard our recycling was mostly shipped off to Indo or somewhere else in SEA (previously China before China banned it).
I suspect very little ever sees recycling, but the neoliberal model means privatised companies paid by government, so they’re out to cut expenses to maximise profits and shipping it off to someone else to do the illegal thing where it’s not illegal isn’t illegal.
I read somewhere that because recycling plastic isn’t profitable, under the capitalist system there’s no incentive to do so.
Not just unprofitable in a capitalist sense, but inefficient. A typical plastic beverage container can be recycled two or three times before the plastic degrades too much to be usable.
Socialism won’t save you here. Unless said socialism bans plastic products.
I read somewhere that because recycling plastic isn’t profitable, under the capitalist system there’s no incentive to do so.
Most plastics due for recycling just gets shipped off to poor countries for “reclycing” but isn’t at all, and a lot of it just ends up in the ocean.
So you’re better off just throwing plastics in the garbage where it will at least end up in landfill and not in the ocean.
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Once they touch the factory floor’s floor, plastics become filthy and cannot be used for high-quality applications - food wrappers, anything with body contact. Oils and heavy metals are the biggest contaminants, a plastics-producing company I used to work for concluded. They either sent it all to a recycling factory or used it for very low-quality stuff like trash bags.
Now with post-consumer plastics, not only are they extremely heterogeneous, they will also have even worse contaminants like mold which proved to be very resistant to cleaning, a EU study concluded. So you might want to pyrolyze them like you do with crude oil, but there’s just too much O, N, S and halogens, so the output will be too corrosive, but also too heterogeneous for it to make economic sense.
What was it like working in plastics production? I imagine you were breathing in vapors all the time?
Maybe with some additives? Or removing them, in the first place? But expensive i guess.
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That’s a bit cynical take. In many countries, including mine, there are dedicate bins for plastic waste which is the majority of waste from your typical household. It’s all being recycled into new products, not being shipped anywhere. Also, when it comes to plastic bottles for example, close to 100% of them are returned and recycled into new bottles. I’ve got a tiny-ass bin for the stuff that ends up in landfill because I separate and recycle it all as does most other people.
EDIT: Nevermind then. It’s all apparently dumped into the ocean. Sorry about the attempt in some positivity.
https://www.plasticexpert.co.uk/what-country-recycles-the-most-plastic/#:~:text=the most plastic%3F-,The Countries With The Highest Plastic Recycling Rate,recycling rates in the world.
Germany has the highest recycling rate for plastics with 65 %. Not everything you put in the recycling bin is being recycled.
Seems far more likely that the recycling rate is low because not every piece of plastic waste is put into recycling. Not that they simply don’t recycle it.
The problem is that there are quite some different sorts of plastics and that plastic containers are not standardized. If you mix different kinds of plastics or plastics with other materials you can’t use it anymore in an automated processing and it usually gets burned. Also mostly recycling is a downgrade, so usually if you recycle some packaging, it is not made into packaging again but into things like pallets or construction fence bases.
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In my country (Aus), last I heard our recycling was mostly shipped off to Indo or somewhere else in SEA (previously China before China banned it).
I suspect very little ever sees recycling, but the neoliberal model means privatised companies paid by government, so they’re out to cut expenses to maximise profits and shipping it off to someone else to do the illegal thing where it’s not illegal isn’t illegal.
Not just unprofitable in a capitalist sense, but inefficient. A typical plastic beverage container can be recycled two or three times before the plastic degrades too much to be usable.
Socialism won’t save you here. Unless said socialism bans plastic products.
Those countries stopped accepting it.
Gets burned here, same result like with oil it is made of.