Posted on 02/15/2024 2:21:22 PM PST by ChicagoConservative27
Plastics producers have promoted recycling their products as an environmental solution for decades despite firsthand knowledge that it was not feasible, according to a report published Thursday.
More than 99 percent of plastics are produced using fossil fuels, and of these, the vast majority cannot be “recycled” in the sense of being processed and turned into entirely new products, according to the report from the Center for Climate Integrity. Viable end markets, or businesses that buy recyclables to make new products, only exist for polyethylene terephthalate and high-density polyethylene plastic containers, according to the report. Environmental Protection Agency materials have documented this since for at least 30 years.
Moreover, while some local and city recycling programs collect other categories of plastics, they do not fully recycle them. Those other plastics are burned or deposited in landfills, instead. In many cases, chemical additives or coloring make it impossible to recycle the same types of plastic together, while even plastic products that can be legitimately repurposed degrade in quality over time, and the cost of the process is more than that of producing entirely new plastic.
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
“Almost any plastic will burn. They can always be used as fuel of some kind.”
Ironic, isn’t it?
Approach #1: Extract oil. Burn oil in engines to make power.
Approach #2. Extract oil. Make plastics. Burn plastics to make power.
Do they have cords attached to the walls?
If it were worth something, I wouldn’t be leaving it out at the curb.
I read many years ago that the coating on cds were being eaten by bugs in the Bahamas. You were left with just the plastic disc.
No long term storage, just food for something.
Story on the environment that reduces the cd coating.
Communication breakdown: CDs aren’t forever after all
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/communication-breakdown-cds-arent-forever-after-all/article25679646/
My favorite story of opposition to oil products is the introduction of soy-based wiring insulation in automobiles. Mice, rats, and rabbits love to eat the insulation.
Well, technically the source rocks that the hydrocarbons are derived from are full of fossils. Mostly microscopic algae and such. And all limestone reservoirs contain significant amounts of fossils. Most sandstone reservoirs are mostly sand grains.
Yea, I learned that by leaving a tractor out in the elements for a while under a pole barn. Like the father said in “A Christmas Story” - sonsabitches!
I was aghast when, in the early 80’s, Micky D’s started putting every “eat in” sandwich in a foam box so you could carry it a couple dozen feet to your table.
Now that “might” have made sense during the pandemic paranoia but back then it was just plain wasteful and totally needless.
Ping...this one is lots of fun!
Most of us in rural America are true conservationists which should never be confused with enviro-Nazism.
Tonight, I am reducing the residue of windstorm downed trees by burning their stems and split trunks in my wood stove; reusing their carbon compounds as heat; and eventually, recycling their ashy residue as ice-melt on my driveway.
Hah!
Since then the food and medicine people have tried to design packaging that must be obviously damaged to get to the product as a safety feature.
They may say it is "to preserve freshness" or something like that but the real reason is they do not want their brand to become synonymous with people dying.
A reasonable desire.
I have a wood furnace. I burn maybe half a dozen plastic bottles a week. One at a time into a hot hardwood fire… never smell it. There are some good BTUs in there.
“Joe Rogan Confronts Expert Who Says BURN All Plastics“
https://youtu.be/nmxuNblcEVk?si=UHdaWYfvv7GLHmTw
Thanks. I hadn’t made the connection between the foil sealed Hershey bar packaging and the Tylenol murders. Makes sense.
The county I live in takes all recyclables, newspaper, cardboard, glass, steel and most plastics, for free. That saves me a bunch of money over paying the trash service to take it away.
And, no, it isn’t paid for by any taxes. The county recycling program is 100% self-funded. I don’t know how they make money to fund it, I don’t know what they do with it all and I don’t care.
That was great stuff!!
Thanks for posting George Carlin!!
Contaminated product is bad enough but poisoned product is a whole other ball game. Are they over doing it? Possibly. But in their mind no, because it is a real threat.
So look for this packaging trend to continue.
“On the other hand they are great fuel sources.”
TRUE. With the newer incinerator technology, it is surprising this is not being implemented more vigorously:
1. Waste-to-energy
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waste-to-energy
2. Energy Recovery from the Combustion of Municipal Solid Waste (MSW)
https://www.epa.gov/smm/energy-recovery-combustion-municipal-solid-waste-msw
3. The evolution of waste-to-energy incineration: A review
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1364032118302855
EXAMPLES
According to a 2019 UN Environmental Program report, there are 589 WtE plants in Europe and 82 in the United States.
Some examples of Waste incineration WtE plants:
• Essex County Resource Recovery Facility, Newark, New Jersey
• Harrisburg incinerator, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
• Lee County Solid Waste Resource Recovery Facility, Fort Myers, Florida, USA (1994)[35]
• Montgomery County Resource Recovery Facility in Dickerson, Maryland, USA (1995)
• Spittelau (1971), and Flötzersteig (1963), Vienna, Austria (Wien Energie)
• SYSAV waste-to-energy plant in Malmö (2003 and 2008), Sweden
• Algonquin Power, Brampton, Ontario, Canada[36]
• Stoke Incinerator, Stoke-on-Trent, UK (1989)
• Delaware Valley Resource Recovery Facility, Chester, United States
• Teesside EfW plant near Middlesbrough, North East England (1998)
• Edmonton Incinerator in Greater London, England (1974)
• Burnaby Waste-to-Energy Facility, Metro Vancouver, Canada (1988)
• Timarpur-Okhla Waste to Energy Plant, New Delhi, India
• East Delhi Waste Processing Company Limited, New Delhi, India
• SELCHP, South Bermondsey in Greater London, England (1994)
LIQUID FUEL PRODUCING PLANTS:
A single plant is currently under construction, i.e.
Enerkem Waste to Biofuels and Chemicals Facility, located in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada based on the Enerkem-process, fueled by MSW;
1.) “Waste to Biofuels and Chemicals Facility; Turning Garbage Into Fuel”. www.edmonton.ca. City of Edmonton. Archived from the original on 2020-04-11. Retrieved 2020-04-02.
2.) “Facilities & Projects | Clean Technology Around the World”. Enerkem. Retrieved 2020-04-02.
Don’t sell the industry short. It IS possible to recycle significant portions. Not all, no. But enough to make a difference.
This writer doesn’t know much about the subject.
Less food waste ... think of shipping apples or whatever long distances. In the old days it was in a bushel basket or box and say 20% of them got bruised and had to be tossed. Although I’m not sure how they package them now - maybe like an egg-carton thing with individual pockets for each apple?
I don’t know - I just remember the article and that was one of the things they said. I bet moving to containerized shipping helped reduce spoilage too - rather than loading a bunch of bananas into a net, dumping them into the ship’s hold, then digging them out of the hold, dumped into a truck, etc.
Tried to find something about it. Found something else instead. But this in about some packaging company that sells “Reusable Plastic Containers” (RPC) - so also addresses the waste/recycle issues. Although I wonder how the items (eggs in the below article) are packaged and sold to the consumer.
EXCERPT:
RPCs have a proven track record of protecting perishables, preserving quality and freshness, and helping reduce losses caused by damaged and unsaleable product. In fact, in its Sustainable Packaging Playbook, Walmart noted that converting from corrugated cardboard packaging to RPCs reduced damage rates and prevented “37 million eggs from being thrown out” in just the first year alone.
Rigid, reinforced walls with greater structural integrity than corrugated cardboard boxes ensure less damage to product shipped in RPCs. In fact, Tosca RPCs are proven to be 4x stronger than standard corrugated boxes. Better transport packaging with RPCs means better protection for your perishables which translates into more sales.
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