Don’t waste your time recycling plastic

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/04/22/stop-recycling-plastic-earth-day/

by Emotional_Actuator94

11 comments

  2. Save a few steps and dump it directly into the ocean. 

  3. I’d suggest reading the article. It sets out why recycling is a mostly a myth and even in the small miniority of cases where it can be done produces toxic byproducts or harmful microplastics. We need to stop producing so much of the stuff and the myth that you can just recycle it lets manufacturers and consumers off the hook but solves nothing.

  5. Worth noting that some plastics can be heated and distilled down to a crude form of diesel fuel. Not of a quality that I would want to run a truck with, but diesel generators seem to be able to run off it no problem.

    Not a perfect solution, as now all that carbon is expelled into the atmosphere rather than being stored in the plastic, but if we want to aggressively attack existing plastic pollution, and maybe actually start recycling some of it, I can think of worse solutions than turning it into fuel.

  6. Ive been “recycling” mine by using them in various ways in gardening…attempting to extend lifetimes.

    Not sure is that it’s going to cause a microplastic issue in the soil or the crops I’m growing, but well see I guess

  7. Penn & Teller called it right on an episode of their show “Bullshit” devoted to plastic recycling. it goes back 20 years in 2004 on Paramount+ with Showtime

  8. It’s like everyone forgot about REDUCE, REUSE and then Recyle. Everyone went for recycling out of the gate cause of money….

  9. I may start (again) leaving the plastic waste in the supermarket.

  10. I’d say don’t waste time recycling anything but PET. It is highly recyclable in comparison to all the others. It is “No. 1” in the RRR triangle.

    Just so if people wonder. Two different forms of it are used in the marketplace, one is used for bottles (solid state), two is used for staple. (Amorphous). Staple is used in things like clothing and pillow fills. Bottles are relatively easily recycled and cleaned, and then spun into something that can be made into clothing, actually.

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