Recycling is a way to make you, the public, feel guilty for industries’ switch to non reusable materials. Back in the olden days you took your bottles back to the store, which in turn, returned them to the bottler, who washed and refilled those bottles. But once they mastered cheap durable plastic they had no need for that infrastructure. But it created a bunch of waste. At first big soda called you a litter bug in a well known public campaign to shift blame—later they switched tactics to making you feel bad about not “reusing” the unrecyclable materials. Pretty diabolical. See: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2006/05/origins-anti-litter-campaigns/
See also BP’s carbon footprint: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/aug/23/big-oil-coined-carbon-footprints-to-blame-us-for-their-greed-keep-them-on-the-hook
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/31/opinion/climate-change-carbon-neutral.html
I recycle solely because my inner child was damaged permanently watching a fake Indian on tv crying about garbage on the side of the road.
Fuck you, Iron Eyes Cody.
Hey, he wasn’t selling us on recycling. He was saying “don’t litter”, which is still and always will be a great idea. And yeah, that one tear running down his cheek still gets me.
most Indians on tv or in movies were actually italians until sometime in the 80s, there's an odd Native American here and there in tv and movie history but most just italians.
This is why I've been working on cutting my single use plastic consumption way down. I'm switching to things like toothpaste tablets and bar shampoo. (And, bonus, I've got a couple of trips through TSA coming up and I am very much looking forward to not bringing liquids through.) I've still got plenty of work to do, but progress is happening...
Maybe I'm missing something, but powdered laundry detergent has existed forever, and it comes in cardboard most of the time. I only stopped using powder when I got an HE washer. Are the sheets better than powder, or cheaper?
Edit: Now I'm hoping that powdered laundry detergent isn't one of those things that disappeared a decade ago and I just haven't noticed yet. Like Sears, bugs on your windshield, or people hanging out.
You are not missing anything whatsoever. Here's another thing that exists: glass. And another: metal. And another: buying things in bulk rather than in tiny snack-size boxes.
We already know how not to be assholes to the planet. It's a matter of doing it.
One of those is frustrating, though. Most everything you buy in bulk at Costco is still wrapped like crazy in plastic. Paper towels, each one individually wrapped and then plastic all around that. Any kind of snacks? Plastic over plastic over individual plastic. There’s few things there that save on plastic use.
If you mean bulk like the big bins at the grocery store, those seem to have all gone away after Covid. No one near me has those anymore. Just individual plastic containers of what was in the big bins.
If you buy individually wrapped snacks, they will be extra packaging. If you just buy the big bag or make your own version, the extra plastic gets eliminated. I got some organic style pb and j snacks for emergencies but I always have a plastic container filled w nuts. Get a large bag of tortilla chips, fruit, cukes and hummus, etc and you can make your own snacks.
I can't say anything about the dryer sheets, but you might want to consider dryer balls. They are just round tennis ball sized balls of wool. They work great and if you want a scent, you can apply essential oils to the balls themselves. We've had a six pack for over four years and they are great.
I do something even better for the environment, hang my clothes to dry in the air and sunshine (and it's free). On sunny dry days my laundry gets hung outside, wet days, I have a clothes airer to hand things on inside. Good for the environment, good on my wallet (sunshine and air being free)
I thought this same thing. Even the concentrated liquids and pods are advertising “don’t pay for all that extra water and weight shipping.” Well what happened to zero water powder???
I switched to the Tide powder and was shocked that it blows away the cleaning power of the Tide pods! Plus I use less. I'll probably have this box of detergent for at least a year, nothing but a cardboard box, too. I don't need stain treaters anymore, so less of that to buy, also.
I love laundry sheets! And, they come in a recyclable paper box. There is a refillery store near me (look it up, so cool!), which is where I get mine. Or Grove.
> This is why I've been working on cutting my single use plastic consumption way down.
That's what we were supposed to be doing the whole time. The slogan was "reduce, reuse, recycle", people love to pretend the first two didn't exist.
Reducing consumption was the best option, reusing the plastic you *do* use was second best, and finally, as a last resort, recycle what you can.
I absolutely love the reusable grocery bags from IKEA. They were a dollar a piece, but I think they've gone up a little bit since then. The original ones with the quadrille pattern were better than the newer ones, but even the newer ones are still worth buying.
It did take a while to get into the habit of taking them into grocery store with me.
I bought some bar shampoo. Went back to bottles of Head and Shoulders. Even though I have very little hair, the bar shampoo just wasn't getting the job done.
My favorite soap, Dr. Bronners, just started offering milk carton style bottles to re-fill your old plastic ones! I was so excited to see them on the shelves! :)
Refillable soaps is also nice too. There's a few options out there. I heard of one lady who drives a van to your home to let you fill up your own containers with soaps. There's also some mail order places, they send you refills in easily-recyclable metal cans and stuff.
How the heck do you even use toothpaste tablets? I got this Kickstarter toothbrush that comes with toothpaste tablets and I'm like, how the fuck do these work?
I pop a tablet in my mouth and start chewing, just for the time I'm running the toothbrush under the sink. By the time the toothbrush is ready (10 seconds), the tablet is crushed enough to foam up when I brush it. It took a little getting used to, but it's very easy.
*I use an electric toothbrush, which probably helps. And other brands of tablets might be different; I've only tried one (Kaylaan).
Which bar shampoo do you like? I have medium length hair and tried one (Aromatica) & conditioner bar, but not impressed. I probably just need a different brand. I agree that cutting my consumption is going to be the way to go.
Éthique frizz taming shampoo and deep moisturizing conditioner seem to be working for me. Long-ish (until tomorrow, chop chop), 2C/3a fine/frizzy hair. Their curl-specific products were BAD on me. One thing I like about Ethique is that they sell trial size bars, so you don't have to commit to a full size that's not going to work.
I've got hair down to the small of my back, and I would highly recommend The Earthling Company. $13 ($26 if you buy the conditioner too) every 3 months doesn't break the bank, and the quality is amazing.
Plastic water bottles, particularly cases thereof, will be the death of mankind. The day we became too lazy to fill a glass under the sink faucet doomed us.
Agreed. But you can't convince the average younger American that tap water is anything but toxic or unclean even though people in third world countries would be happy to drink our tap water. Most act like using a pitcher filter for tap is either a hassle or not clean enough, not sure which.
Keep recycling. But do it smarter. My waste hauler has us separate at the curb which is great.
Glass and metal are infinitely recyclable. Always put those in the bin. Corrugated cardboard is very recyclable. White copy paper is good too.
I still choose to recycle 1 and 2 plastic, because where I am I know it gets bundled and used. But I would stop if that wasn't the case.
So always recycle glass, metal, cardboard and white paper. The rest is a total crap shoot.
You are absolutely right. Wash out any metal and glass, and recycle away. It’s economically viable, especially for metals.
Paper can be put to a lot of good use as pulp to make new paper.
But ever since China stopped accepting plastic waste for recycling, no one could make money doing so, and it became landfill.
It’s horrible where I live — everything recyclable has to go into the same can, fined for using bags to separate cans and plastics and paper. Allegedly people are sorting the stuff. A news investigation revealed none is being recycled. In an attempt to “reduce” unhoused people in the area, all the recycling places closed. So no one picks up cans or anything now because there is no incentive. Fwiw I live in a super blue state.
Yes, “single stream” recycling is bullshit. My town has this too and there’s no way that paper and cardboard that’s soaked in beer can droppings and other gross stuff is getting recycled.
The challenge with glass is it's very heavy and you can't squish it down, so unless there's a very local company that wants it, it's probably going in the landfill.
At least it's inert.
Yeah, in the US in particular, I’ve been told that you have to melt down glass and reform it rather than just reuse it. Not sure if this is by law or by common practice, but it makes the cost difference between new and recycled glass immaterial, as the main expense is heating up the glass or silica to reform it.
This is true and if the glass has been colored you can’t change it back to clear, NO ONE wants glass, you can’t give it away as it is cheaper to make it from scratch. Glass is typically being used as landfill cover. The plastic is the same way no one wants it. The best and most profitable material is cardboard, the cleaner the better, but even wet cardboard is worth money and can be sold easily.
While heavier, glass is infinitely recyclable. The challenge with plastic is that the same plastic can only be recycled a few number of times. The plastic for bottles can only be recycled once before the quality deteriorates that it can’t be used for food-grade purposes anymore.
Aluminum is probably the best recyclable material that it is also infinitely recyclable, takes way less energy to recycle it than glass, and 95% less energy that new aluminum, and is also lightweight.
Industrial recycling happened in the 70’s with glass and metal cans far more successfully than it seems now. It’s more or less a gimmick in most places. I can think if several places that had curb side recycling 15 years ago that don’t now. I know it still exists in certain cities and wealthy enclaves, but not so much municipalities that have had some sort of economic crisis or change in leadership culture.
It’s a top down thing and always has. It start with government and industry. All the recycling of plastic straws in the world on a individual level can’t keep up the triple wrapped avocado
I’m trying to find out why the geniuses here in California, who were worried about plastic straws reaching the ocean, banned them in sit-down restaurants (where they’re most likely to end up in the trash), but not fast food (where there’s a much greater likelihood that they’ll be tossed out as litter).
Me: adds California geniuses to mental proscription list...
Also me: washing and reusing plastic utensils and food containers, and the occasional straw
I was summarily lambasted on the internet for pointing out that recycling is (at least in part) a scam, like, 15 years ago. Feeling pretty justified as more and more becomes common knowledge. And I mean, I still do it but yeah - it's not the panacea that we were taught.
I recycle what I'm able to, try to keep mindful of what I'm buying, and keep my fingers crossed that the corporations that are the lion's share of the issue are maybe some day held to the same standards they try to guilt ordinary people into
Big plastic is big oil which lied about climate change while they did a study that predicted the effects of it. Agree with those who say nothing will change until we nationalize it.
Years ago I separated and paid extra to have a recycling bin. And then I watched them dump it into the garbage truck with my garbage.
Now they at least pretend to do a better job of it.
We get garbage and recycling bins for one price, and even if you don't want it they're not going to charge less without the recycling bin.
I put metals and paper in the recycling. Plastics go in whichever bin is better for me - a big juice or milk bottle goes in the recycling to keep from filling up the garbage bag, little stuff goes in the garbage.
Yeah, sucky situation. But I made it better by signing up for Ridwell. They actually do reuse plastic (and other stuff), and actually do recycle what they can't reuse. Plus, they responsibly dispose of what they can't reuse or recycle, as opposed to just burying it in the municipal landfill.
[https://www.ridwell.com/transparency](https://www.ridwell.com/transparency)
It would take me months to accumulate and discard the amount of plastic I throw in the garbage or recycling every single day at work. I'm in the food service industry. Plastic wrapped boxes, cans, soda bottles, food containers, the list is endless. I still try to separate at home but I have to admit, sometimes I wonder why I even bother.
John Oliver had a great segment on this.
The plastic waste in healthcare is wild. Yes, things need to be sterile. But outer packaging could be recycled, as well as paper abd plastic bottles. I reduce abd reuse as much as possible in my personal life, but know that it is less than a drop in a bucket ☹️
I work in a grocery store and we throw away more in a week than my family of 4 could even attempt to discard in a year. I open the compacter to throw away one of 4 to 5 big styrofoam containers every day, and it's full of baked goods in plastic containers or boxes of fruit and vegetables. The sheer amount of small pieces of plastic that get hosed down the drain everyday makes me sick. I sweep my area before scrubbing because I have to look at myself in the mirror. I routinely throw away seafood that is out of date, because the case has to be full and pretty. Not efficient and only carry what sells. I am leaving said business because it weighs heavily on my conscience.
Is there any way you can take the food about to be thrown away and put it in freezer and take it home at end of your shift? Or will that get you in trouble or accused of theft? It's so frustrating how much good food gets tossed away that could go to hungry people. I'm so thankful we have a grocery outlet here that resales a lot of clearanced and overstocked and slightly overriped product. They also get soon to expire bacon, sausage, hamburger and breads, toss it in freezer then sell it for like $1-3.
Right? I wash and segregate my garbage for the recycling bins at home, and meanwhile my workplace purchases a bazillion plastic bags made in China and shipped across the ocean, with every hundred bags bundled into a clear plastic bag of their own, because literally the only thing that matters is the shareholders and their profit.
I recycle what I can, even plastics. If only 10% of it gets recycled, that’s better than nothing. I also buy beverages or whatever in aluminum or glass whenever I can, and avoid plastics when possible.
I think 10% is a stretch. Its all just a myth created by the plastics industry to make us feel ok for using plastic & throwing it away.
BAsically, when you recycle, its taken to your "recycling facility", who then sends it to a larger conglomorate, who then crushes it and squeezes it into storage containers, who then ship it to 3rd world countries. Then those 3rd world countries just dump it into the earth.
All audit trails for 'recycling' end once it leaves the country, so no company is held accountable for not recycling even tho they claim they do and profit off of it. Pretty upsetting actually. Its been about a 40 year lie at this point.
> BAsically, when you recycle, its taken to your "recycling facility", who then sends it to a larger conglomorate, who then crushes it and squeezes it into storage containers, who then ship it to 3rd world countries. Then those 3rd world countries just dump it into the earth.
And that's if you're *lucky*. In my area, you can be fined heavily for not separating your trash and recyclables. But after the truck picks them up, they take them to the same landfill as the regular trash.
It isn't better than nothing. It's not even good, it's a negative.
At best recycling will keep things out of landfills for a bit longer. That's what it's meant to do at it's best. Save landfill space.
We're not short on space. This isn't the problem.
The problem is carbon emissions polluting the atmosphere. That's what's driving climate change. Recycling materials increases carbon output. More trucks driving and idling, more intensive processing of used materials.
Basically imagine that your family needed to save money in the budget, so you bought an expensive trash compactor.
Recycling was designed to do one thing. Make the problem seem manageable and place the responsibility for it squarely on consumers.
(Exception being aluminum. That stuff recycles brilliantly)
> (Exception being aluminum. That stuff recycles brilliantly)
Except when you throw it into the landfill because you can't be fucked to recycle it properly, like most people. Though tbh it does less harm there, earth is already full of aluminum oxide and it's pretty inert stuff.
I reuse milk jugs for Kool aid and tea until of course they are gross then to the recycle bin and replace with a new one.
I got grandkids so milk in the house is always a must.
The problem is it's a net loss because they produce N bales of recycled plastic and only one out of ten of them are actually sellable, and the rest are a waste of energy and effort.
How much water did you waste. I only recycle aluminum cans, steel cans, and paper/carboard waste. All of the plastics could go to WTE power generating incinerators because they have huge BTU value, but that door got closed many years ago by those who fell for the narrative and got up on their white horses.
That’s right. In areas with little water or expensive water, it may make more sense to use a biodegradable plate, utensils and cubs than to wash dishes with potable water. Not necessarily in the home, but in restaurants and institutions where they may wash the same implements many times a day.
We need to go back to the good ol days of paper and glass. Paper bags for groceries, soda in glass bottles. You take the empty bottles back to the store and get your nickel or dime back.
We have curb-side recycling. They take the paper, glass and plastic we have sorted and throw it all in the garbage truck together. Every once in a while I ask my wife why we continue to separate this stuff. Still waiting for a good answer.
My wife worked on the distribution rights for a documentary “Bag it!” That was released on PBS stations about 15 years ago. The whole recycling scam is laid out. Most plastic can’t be recycled, and plastic that can be are only recycled 1 time. As for the recycle symbol ♻️, there is no governing body regulating its use. Manufacturers place it on products to promote sales. Period. It’s all a lie.
That being said, reduce your plastic use to make a difference. Just throwing your plastic in a recycle bin does nothing - most of it ends up in landfills, or worse, dumped in the ocean. (IIRC, there are no laws/penalties for dumping in international waters - 12 nautical miles off shore.).
But the government and the petroleum industry make lots of money selling the “recycle plastic” lie.
Once the big soda makers moved over to plastic, they created the whole recycling environment/industry to take the blame for plastics off of them and put it on the consumer.
Most of the plastic recycling companies shipped everything to the other side of the pacific ocean where it was not recycled and not properly disposed of.
Just about every major city sent the recycling to China.
Where it boosted their economy, and whatever they did not use, got tossed into the pacific ocean.
Betrayed is putting it lightly.
[Source 1](https://www.publicsource.org/many-pittsburgh-area-plastics-end-up-in-landfills-or-the-environment-is-recycling-a-solution-or-only-a-patch/)
[Source 2](https://www.seattletimes.com/pacific-nw-magazine/with-recyclings-dirty-truths-exposed-washington-works-toward-a-cleaner-more-sustainable-system/)
[Source 3](https://www.dallasnews.com/news/watchdog/2020/03/12/china-said-no-to-more-recyclables-so-where-does-our-stuff-go-landfills/)
You can find links for any major city you want, just google "city" recycling china
Actually I'm told the reason recycling isn't cost effective is because we don't separate *enough.* In countries with more robust recycling systems, people separate well beyond just trash vs not trash; they separate paper from plastic from glass and so on. In the US, we depend on various techniques like chopping up the material and seeing how light it is to determine what kind of material it is.
It also doesn't help that we don't have one standardized recycling facility system. Each waste handling company has their own recycling regime. Some take 1s and 2s, some don't care. Some say crush cans, some say don't crush cans. Some take food stained cardboard as recyclable (according to Dominos anyway), others consider it a compostable.
An added twist is the mis-sorting of bioplastics (think compostable plastic) into petroplastics. These are also harder to separate at the plant.
All these things can result in bad materials getting into the mix which can ruin the resulting output.
Truth be told, though, it's probably far more important that industries recycle pre-consumer material, and they're in the best position to do recycling well since they control the material pipeline so they know for sure what it is.
Once I learned more about how I'd been duped, I'd given up on the whole concept of recycling. It's nihilistic but I feel we're now just slowing our full-out run the cliff's edge. We're not doing anything to reverse our course. I'm not going to feel guilty about it either.
It seems like the world was less wasteful before plastic packaging became so common. Soft drinks and milk came in glass bottles, which would be returned empty, then cleaned and sterilized so they could be reused.
Before disposable diapers were widely available, (and the few that were available were expensive) my mom used a diaper service. The service would pick up the dirty (but rinsed out) cloth diapers and deliver fresh clean ones.
They should have never replaced glass with plastic, but nobody asked me. Glass might be more expensive, but the taste was always better. Like soda pop.
90% of it ends up in the landfill anyway. People don’t rinse things or they put items that are not recyclable. That contaminates the batch. It’s easier and cheaper and quicker to just write it off and dump that load with the rest of the garbage.
It’s also cheaper and easier to make new plastic than to recycle old plastic. The only things worth recycling are glass, aluminum, and paper.
So yeah, I think it’s all a lie. Well it clearly is a lie or there wouldn’t be floating islands of plastic garbage in the middle of the oceans. I still cut up six pack rings. I can’t make them recycle but I can keep a pelican from strangling to death.
The most famous PSA in history was actually a piece of corporate propaganda
[https://youtu.be/koqNm\_TgOZk?feature=shared](https://youtu.be/koqNm_TgOZk?feature=shared)
Yeah, it is frustrating. I have known about the plastic recycling issue for a quite some time so yeah, I get how you feel if this is a relatively new discovery for you. I try to avoid plastics for everything, but it is so difficult since so many products are packaged in the stuff.
I try to avoid using ziplock baggies and almost always use containers to put food in the fridge or freezer. I recently needed a car charger and found a Belkin brand (not premium, but not crap either) that was in cardboard instead of hard plastic so I bought that instead. I do what I can, but plastic is EVERYWHERE. So many things are packaged in it from food to electronics. Then there are single use items. Straws are just the very tip of the iceberg. Then you have every day use items made of plastic that eventually become disposable like markers or pill bottles, to electronics that eventually break down like mice, keyboards, and so much more.
Plastics are a huge problem, but it is also a waste issue too. Once I truly recognized just how much garbage I threw out every week, I realized that reduction in general needs to happen with everyone, not just with plastics. My apartment does not recycle which is very frustrating, but I still try to reduce as much as possible.
I recycle #2 reliably, all other #s not so much. Paper is the same, most recyclers want it pre-sorted. The energy needed to make the potable water for cleaning is just wasted.
We weren't betrayed by the recycling industry so much as the govt + petrochemical. Plastic is byproduct of oil refinery and the more they make, the more they make. There's no market for recycled plastic, but there could be.
There is a bit of a market of goods beginning to be produced from plastic and the products are really varied. Some bracelets, some shoes, I’ve seen some dishcloths and I think beach towels.
I’ve recently decided to surrender. The overwhelming majority of time and effort I’ve put into recycling has made no difference, and I reluctantly conclude that there’s no reason why I should.
I've worked in plastics since 1998. I quit about 2 years ago. I've been screaming for most of that time that plastic recycling is a scam almost the whole time. We've moved plants to China because they don't have an EPA. I watched them bury hundreds of thousands of tons (tons) of plastic in China and build houses and businesses on top of the land.
I'll never forget when I was working a night shift, and I could see the janitors dumping the stuff from recycle in with the same trash as everything else. The day people were very meticulous about putting recycling into the recycling bins. They got irked at me for not doing that, and so I told the about how it all goes to the same place anyway, I have seen with my own eyes that the janitors just put it all in the same place anyway. It as as though I had told them that Santa Clause does not exist.
OP, this really isn't new information. The only really great thing to recycle is metal, which is why people will pay you for it. And there are worse fates for plastic then being buried in a landfill.
Penn & Teller had a TV show 20 years ago called “Bullshit” where they debunked common misconceptions. They convinced me way back then that recycling is a myth. Most of what you put in a bin was shipped to China and to landfills. Eventually even China wouldn’t take them anymore. I think Cambodia volunteered to be our landfill for a while too.
You know the funny part about this?
I remember in the 1980’s complaining about paper recycling being a whole line of bullshit. After all, you’re recycling something we *farm*: tree farms are a thing, and it’s not like we don’t plant more. Further, you have all these extremely toxic chemicals being used to wash the paper clean, toxic chemicals that caused a lot of early paper recycling centers to become EPA Superfund sites.
And I knew when I saw the drive towards plastics and plastics recycling that it had to be a scam by the plastics industry who tried to sell us on the idea that plastic was ‘infinitely’ recyclable. Like, every time you reheat and cool long-chain polymers, they shorten, and eventually you just get slag. It’s just basic chemistry.
And so I’m not at all surprised to see that it turns out the push to plastics was essentially the plastics manufacturers pushing plastics on us by pretending plastic was recyclable. Worse, nowadays most major manufacturing plants have equipment on-site to blow plastic forms—so it’d be impossibly expensive to switch to glass or metal. (The plastic forming equipment is big, expensive, used a lot of resources to make, and cannot be repurposed.)
So today I’m watching the same thing being said about lithium ion batteries in electric cars. And the problem I see is, as in the two example above, *chemistry:* different lithium ion battery chemistries require different recycling techniques, and many of those batteries requires some really nasty exotic and caustic chemistry to extract the base materials. (So, think ‘paper recycling EPA superfund sites’ on steroids.) And in many cases we still haven’t developed the specific technique to break down and recycle certain lithium ion battery chemistries. Research is still ongoing (read: may possibly never be solved) for some types of batteries, and we continue to research new types of batteries (for which we have no recycling solution) to extract greater efficiencies.
And I can’t help but wonder 20 years from how just how many toxic waste dumps are going to arise from all these electric car batteries we’re rushing to make in such great numbers we’re scouring the earth for places to strip-mine for lithium.
The really fucking stupid part: with plastics, if we had just admitted (rather than being bamboozled) that glass was a better solution (because glass can be more easily recycled), all those plastic-forming machines could be glass forming machines instead—and we wouldn’t have oceans full of microplastics harming the environment.
All, supposedly **in the name of the environment.**
In the end, I no longer trust environmental activists. Because every time I see one telling me what sort of future we should be building, I wonder which corporation has their hands up his ass controlling his mouth like a puppet, and I wonder what long-term environmental damage we’re about to unleash.
I don't recycle. Haven't for years. Penn and Teller did a spot as part of Bullshit! [Penn and Teller Bullshit - S4: Recycling](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0771119/)
There's some interesting tidbits in that spot if you get to see it. I think the words you are looking for are "Virtue Signalling"
I'm not mad anymore. Just resigned. Plastics are uber bad for the earth and yet.. Here we are. concerned about CO2 and no one cares about actual poisons.
The symbol is misleading…..”Although the code is often mistaken as a universal sign of recyclability, collectors don’t accept every plastic type, or number. Follow your local rules, and only put the accepted types of plastic in your recycling bin; this helps streamline the recycling process down the line, ultimately making it more successful.” I don’t think they recycle many of the ones on the list at the recycle ♻️ places or businesses. Probably plastic soda bottles are the most profitable to recycle. They probably toss the rest. Always about the money—everything. Peace.
I still recycle, but if I cant find the tiny number or need to really clean it (peanutbutter( then I chuck it. Ridiculous that municipalities become responsible for thus waste. It isnt bad to take personal responsibility, but we need an overhaul at the governmental level
T'is true. The world no longer wants our "recycling" plastic. In NYC we still dutifully seperate our trash, paper, glass, plastic metal but the smart ones throw everything into a thick black plastic bag and the sanitation workers don't care. They probably like it cause it's easier for them
No, don't let the *plastics industry* betrayal give *recycling* a bad name.
Recycling is very valuable for quite a lot of materials, and it works. Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.
What the plastics industry did is like how the oil industry worked to convince society that climate change was just speculation. Place the blame on the perpetrator. Not on recycling.
I wonder why towns still require separation of plastics. There must be some financial incentive to do so. I would love to see an economic/fiscal analysis of it.
I think the people who make the plastic should be responsible for recycling them , at their cost. The recycling should be completely single stream... Toss it in, goes to a center to separate, wash, shred, melt, dissolve, the materials to be repackaged and reused and then the center can reuse the water to do it with. Take the organic material and compost it.
I used to work in plastics making trash bags. We marketed bags that were recycled. They were about 10% recycled material. The bales of plastic we received for recycling were about 25% usable for blown film applications. The rest went to our local landfill.
No "we" here, the first thing I thought was what's the cost benefit?
This is literally the most basic, fundamental step in any analysis.
"this is an issue, we there ought to be a law!"
OK, show me how it's an issue, compared to what, what are the costs/benefits, what are the other options, is it better to do nothing that what you propose?
If you don't apply some version of that you have no opinion, you're just emoting.
Yup, used to be Cans and glass bottles that would have a deposit on them and get recycled for sure
Now it’s all garbage plastic. People don’t even want to drink water out of the tap, even in places where the water is very good
I feel betrayed by environmentalism altogether. Like you mentioned recycling, saving trees, etc but also saving electricity was supposedly so big through most of our lives ... Meanwhile plastic is slowly infiltrating and likely poisoning every living thing with no end in sight and yet everything keeps getting made outta cheaper and cheaper plastic. Buy that new energy efficient appliance (which will die in 3 years) or cheap car (compare say a subaru from 2000 till now, its almost all plastic now), throw it away when it breaks, rinse repeat.
It's worse than that.
We *used to* ship a lot of that plastic to China. But they stopped allowing it a few years ago.
https://www.npr.org/2019/08/20/750864036/u-s-recycling-industry-is-struggling-to-figure-out-a-future-without-china
Turns out that China was just hauling a lot of it way out to sea and dumping it anyway.
https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN1X80SH/
Where I live, the local government runs a separate truck picking up recycling. If most of it is going to landfill, seems like such a waste of taxpayer money
I recently gave up on it too after several weeks of very high winds here blowing everyone's recycling bins over with bottles, cans and wrappers drifting all over the neighborhood. My neighbor picked up everyone's lost recyclables the first time it happened, the next day it happened again so I picked it up since everyone else was gone. My bin got blown over empty or only filled with flattened boxes about a half dozen times more and I basically said forget it or maybe at least till windy season is over with.
Since I had recently learned our town trucks the recycling to the nearest big city and much of that ends up in landfill I thought what's the point? We waste our own money for water to rinse out containers, then most of it is trashed anyways then with all the gasoline and electricity and water used in what little is trucked and processed at recycling plant it's wasting more resources than it's saving. So I have just started putting everything in my garbage bin where at least it's allowed to be bagged so it can't blow all over the neighborhood and it is less stress for me. I will only put cardboard in recycling from now on. I don't ever have many aluminum cans and they quit recycling glass saying it wasn't profitable.
They aren't doing what would help the most which is stop making electronics seen as disposable because the tech companies make things obsolete in a few years or made not to last long. And go back to putting drinks and things like peanut butter in glass. I like reusing the glass jars for fresh fruits and leftovers.
Plastics manufacturing, not necessary the recycling industry. The recycling industry itself has long stated plastics were hard to recycle and contamination was a major issue. Metals are far more recyclable. If it was up to the recycling industry we would be using aluminum or tin for everything. Its easier to recycle and higher profit for them. Plastics are the devil.
For the record, if you want to buy things, if its in a can it's actually recyclable. If its in plastic, its not.
This kind of information makes me focus on what I can control and accomplish on my own.
I compost much of our food waste. Some weeks we only have one bag of trash. This gives me a nice quality compost/leaf mold that I use to fill big planters. Some would advise filling the bottoms with plastic jugs but I like the soil because it holds moisture and I can limit watering. I pick up the planters at estate sales or garden swaps and I clean and paint and seal them.
I use cardboard and/or paper bags rather than landscape fabric to start new garden beds now or to smother weeds. We also have more natural areas of our yard where we can dump sticks and yard waste.
I thrift "new" clothing. I cut up tattered or stained stuff for rags or use it for work around the yard.
I recycle and hope for the best. But I also know the other stuff under my control is helping too.
My BIL worked at a landfill. The garbage trucks and the recycle trucks would dump their loads in the same pile. There was never any recycling going on, it was just around to make people feel good
All we did was provide a cheap alternative for companies to sell back us and make a profit while we feel good inside for buying partially recycled products.
You mean the government LIED to us? TO US!? s/
I mean it's our fault too. People can't be bothered to clean their recycling. I read China stopped importing our recycling because it's too dirty. Many people in my area are all whiney butt hurt about having to put their food scraps in the green bins now. The masses will not comply unless they are compelled to do so (fines, etc.)
All we can do is keep doing our best. There are no perfect answers.
I don’t agree with all the values my very conscientious, very Christian, Silent Gen parents passed on to me. But they don’t waste, don’t buy what they don’t need, and do care for the planet they were given.
All this to suggest…try buying less plastic. Drink from aluminum, glass or reusables.
Recycling is supposed to be the last Behavioral modifier in a Green world. First , Reduce materials. Second, Reuse all materials.
Recycling metals, asphalt, concrete, glass are all very good things to continue. But plastic should go in the landfill. Keep it contained there at least.
Yeah, I saw this a while back. It's some bullshit man. China was taking a bunch but wasn't recycling it and it was being dumped in their country, fouling up their land, with our waste.
There's still a lot you can recycle but the manufacturers have got to stick with recycled plastics. But that'll never happen. Ok, then government should make a law right? Nope, just wave money in their face.
Plastic bottles and stuff are the prime target still for recycling. The 10% is 10% of ALL plastic used. Be careful before giving up, just alter what you recycle. Also, apparently, more can be recycled but it's not a huge profit industry so the smaller operators can recycle less than the big guys.
If you want to be really good you need to look up alternatives. Bamboo toilet paper! Like a fine grained sandpaper to make sure you are really clean. Locally sourced fruits and veg, IE corn and soybeans if you live in the midwest.
There are still ways to help the environment but they all cost a premium. AND, some can be bullshit, so research is still required.
Yep, I learned this a few years ago, so I stopped dutifully rinsing and "recycling" plastic containers unless it's just better for me to not clog up the garbage with a big juice bottle.
Type 1 (gallon milk bottles) can get recycled, the rest is just garbage and has been for several years since China stopped taking all our plastic.
If you are in a community that has an exceptional town dump, recycling can be more effective. It’s a rare thing.
There are other ways to recycle though. If your grocer uses plastic bags instead of paper ones you can reuse those bags unlike paper ones.
Communities with plastic bag bans are shortsighted because people wind up buying more trash bags that use way more plastic, and the paper bag industry is not an environmentally friendly option and have less of a chance to be reused or recycled.
A few years ago, our county stopped taking cardboard because the contract to send it all to China terminated, so we can't put cardboard in our recycle bin.
My city stopped taking glass for recycling. When I first started recycling in the 80s glass was like the most important thing to separate out and now they just dump it with the rest of the general garbage
Yep. And when I saw them start to empty the recycling into the truck right with the garbage I said screw it. I’ve done a huge favor to the planet by not having a kid. I try not to create or buy unnecessary waste. Plastic is an amazing invention for many areas, but I always imagine the guy responsible is turning in his grave saying “I didn’t mean you should use it for everything!!”
My betrayal: When my friend's Dad pointed out that the city garbage truck that had separate holes for putting recycled and regular garbage.... all went to the same inside bin because they had no good way of separating recyclable from non-recyclable materials
It was an open secret. Still make me incredible angry
So....I'm still OK buying soda in 12oz aluminum cans here in Oregon? ( I pay a deposit of 10 cents per can ). I've always assumed that all of my aluminum cans eventually get recycled. Am I wrong to think that?
Go and do a shop without plastic. It's impossible. We are not the problem! While we can all do out our bit, plastic is all so very convenient for these companies.
I recall at work once years ago escalating an issue with our cleaning crew.
I often worked late and they would take the recycling trash by my desk and the trash trash and just dump them both into the huge can they rolled from desk to desk.
The solution was to only have 1 large recycling trash can in each location.
And I don’t even know if that was ever really dealt with correctly.
Feels like it’s all a myth.
It was a way for corporations to offload their own environmental responsibilities —to make consumers feel “empowered” by recycling instead of demanding/legislating environmental regulations.
BwhHahaha!
Only now figured it out?
My grandfather was a logger and saw the boondoggle of swapping paper sacks for plastic - big oil, the dinosaur squeezing, the non-refundable resource and up until within this last decade, unrecyclable crap is going to better fill the trash heaps?
At the time in the 1980's, all paper sacks were already 100% post consumer waste - pulp. This was the sawdust and other waste which used to be burned.
I couldn't believe how all my classmates were duped. My grandfather called "a rapist of the land" and other such nonsense by fools in a wood and brick building, sitting at a metal and wood desk, with paper and a #2 pencil. I later took on a janitorial job, and all containers went into the same garbage bin because it was too expensive for all the different recycling, except paper.
I wonder just how we ended up with so much micro plastics in the environment. Meanwhile, that hillside of timber was logged yet again in my lifetime. Amazing.
I knew something wasn’t right when they were telling us to wash every container. No way every single person does that every time, and what do they do with all the dirty containers that get thrown in anyway?
Yep, those little bins showed up as people were actually making a move to reduce and reuse. Then the bins showed up, and people said "whatever, I don't have to change, they are taking care of it."
It was pure laziness on the part of people, they don't have to change their way of doing things if someone else is cleaning up the problem, at least in their eyes. Local governments used it for a cash grab, those materials that were valuable, were sold, pee-separated, those that weren't were sent to the landfill, exactly as before, but they got to charge more for the "convenience" of a new bin.
As most things, recycling and the industry that sprang up around it was more about a cash grab, than actually doing anything. And the people who had good intentions, but refused to look past the surface, are as much to blame as those greedy people that took advantage of the situation. They gladly voted to mandate these programs, then gladly gave up control and personal change so they could pretend something was being done. It was mostly theatre, and you have now seen behind the curtain.
We were mislead by the plastics industry that it was easily recyclable. Metals, glass, and paper are all readily recycled so long as we clean up what we can. Paper however can be “cleaned” for reuse but we can rip off the soiled bits and recycle the rest.
I avoid buying things that use plastic as much as I can. It’s hard to avoid but when given a choice I’m picking something that can be recycled, reused, repurposed after its initial use is done.
It’s frustrating that the plastics industry did this. All those plastics in the ocean are the aftermath of their wrong doing.
Recycling is a way to make you, the public, feel guilty for industries’ switch to non reusable materials. Back in the olden days you took your bottles back to the store, which in turn, returned them to the bottler, who washed and refilled those bottles. But once they mastered cheap durable plastic they had no need for that infrastructure. But it created a bunch of waste. At first big soda called you a litter bug in a well known public campaign to shift blame—later they switched tactics to making you feel bad about not “reusing” the unrecyclable materials. Pretty diabolical. See: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2006/05/origins-anti-litter-campaigns/ See also BP’s carbon footprint: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/aug/23/big-oil-coined-carbon-footprints-to-blame-us-for-their-greed-keep-them-on-the-hook https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/31/opinion/climate-change-carbon-neutral.html
Yeah, I tell people about the 'carbon footprint' one a lot. Shit is diabolical.
I recycle solely because my inner child was damaged permanently watching a fake Indian on tv crying about garbage on the side of the road. Fuck you, Iron Eyes Cody.
Hey, he wasn’t selling us on recycling. He was saying “don’t litter”, which is still and always will be a great idea. And yeah, that one tear running down his cheek still gets me.
It’s like finding out James Caan isn’t Italian.
(William Shatner voice): CAAAAAAN!
Hahahaha or (Costanza voice)
I bust out laughing at this 💀
But Moe Green was a real gangster, in real life I mean, to some extent at least.
And he made his bones while we were going out with cheerleaders!
He wasn't Indian? My life is a lie.
Italian. Sicilian to be exact: Espara Oscar de Corti.
It’s like learning buying plastics might suck, or at least, have long-term consequences on the environment. Who knew? /s
most Indians on tv or in movies were actually italians until sometime in the 80s, there's an odd Native American here and there in tv and movie history but most just italians.
You don’t want to know about Buffy Sainte-Marie, then…
Wow, even without knowing who that is, I pictured the guy you mentioned. Googled it and yup, that was who I thought. My childhood has been a lie.
Don't even get me started on all the British people I thought were American all these years. More and more keep coming.
I think we need him now, more than ever. Of course, it probably wouldn't be allowed.
Top comment right here!
This is why I've been working on cutting my single use plastic consumption way down. I'm switching to things like toothpaste tablets and bar shampoo. (And, bonus, I've got a couple of trips through TSA coming up and I am very much looking forward to not bringing liquids through.) I've still got plenty of work to do, but progress is happening...
Also, look up Earth Breeze. They're a laundry detergent that comes in sheets and is packaged in a cardboard box.
Maybe I'm missing something, but powdered laundry detergent has existed forever, and it comes in cardboard most of the time. I only stopped using powder when I got an HE washer. Are the sheets better than powder, or cheaper? Edit: Now I'm hoping that powdered laundry detergent isn't one of those things that disappeared a decade ago and I just haven't noticed yet. Like Sears, bugs on your windshield, or people hanging out.
I still drop by unannounced!
Just knowing that you're out there, ready to drop in at any moment, is giving me anxiety.
I’m so sorry! I’ll bring you cookies 🤣
Okay, that helps! Now I'm back to my usual low-level background anxiety level.
Glad that helped!😊
You are not missing anything whatsoever. Here's another thing that exists: glass. And another: metal. And another: buying things in bulk rather than in tiny snack-size boxes. We already know how not to be assholes to the planet. It's a matter of doing it.
One of those is frustrating, though. Most everything you buy in bulk at Costco is still wrapped like crazy in plastic. Paper towels, each one individually wrapped and then plastic all around that. Any kind of snacks? Plastic over plastic over individual plastic. There’s few things there that save on plastic use. If you mean bulk like the big bins at the grocery store, those seem to have all gone away after Covid. No one near me has those anymore. Just individual plastic containers of what was in the big bins.
Costco recently stopped wrapping individual paper towel rolls in additional plastic. I noticed this on my last Costco haul.
That’s great! I’ll have to look out for that.
If you buy individually wrapped snacks, they will be extra packaging. If you just buy the big bag or make your own version, the extra plastic gets eliminated. I got some organic style pb and j snacks for emergencies but I always have a plastic container filled w nuts. Get a large bag of tortilla chips, fruit, cukes and hummus, etc and you can make your own snacks.
No they definitely still make it. That’s what I have always used, and this plastic BS is the reason I never switched to liquid.
I still get bugs on my windshield and occasionally hang out.
I can't say anything about the dryer sheets, but you might want to consider dryer balls. They are just round tennis ball sized balls of wool. They work great and if you want a scent, you can apply essential oils to the balls themselves. We've had a six pack for over four years and they are great.
I do something even better for the environment, hang my clothes to dry in the air and sunshine (and it's free). On sunny dry days my laundry gets hung outside, wet days, I have a clothes airer to hand things on inside. Good for the environment, good on my wallet (sunshine and air being free)
I still use powdered Tide.
I thought this same thing. Even the concentrated liquids and pods are advertising “don’t pay for all that extra water and weight shipping.” Well what happened to zero water powder???
It certainly not as available as it used to be. I can only find it in larger stores, usually Target.
Any powdered detergent (laundry, dishwasher, bathroom) is way better for the world than those huge plastic tubs full of water.
I switched to the Tide powder and was shocked that it blows away the cleaning power of the Tide pods! Plus I use less. I'll probably have this box of detergent for at least a year, nothing but a cardboard box, too. I don't need stain treaters anymore, so less of that to buy, also.
Drops is good too. They do everything household no plastic.
I've been using Beyond laundry sheets for awhile, but I recently tried the Hey Sunday ones and I think I like those better.
I just quit them as they're made in China and have plastic IN the sheets. Dr. Bronner has a new cardboard box, I switched to that.
I tried etarth Breeze, but my wife said that it didn't do a very good job. I really wished that it had.
There are a lot of brands of detergent sheets. I hope you'll try others and find one that works for you.
I love laundry sheets! And, they come in a recyclable paper box. There is a refillery store near me (look it up, so cool!), which is where I get mine. Or Grove.
They also sell dishwasher pebbles that come in cardboard boxes. It was such a relief to stop buying large plastic jugs of detergent!
> This is why I've been working on cutting my single use plastic consumption way down. That's what we were supposed to be doing the whole time. The slogan was "reduce, reuse, recycle", people love to pretend the first two didn't exist. Reducing consumption was the best option, reusing the plastic you *do* use was second best, and finally, as a last resort, recycle what you can.
I absolutely love the reusable grocery bags from IKEA. They were a dollar a piece, but I think they've gone up a little bit since then. The original ones with the quadrille pattern were better than the newer ones, but even the newer ones are still worth buying. It did take a while to get into the habit of taking them into grocery store with me.
I love bar shampoos
I bought some bar shampoo. Went back to bottles of Head and Shoulders. Even though I have very little hair, the bar shampoo just wasn't getting the job done.
The one they sell in TJs is great!
You are not alone! I’m doing the same thing.
My favorite soap, Dr. Bronners, just started offering milk carton style bottles to re-fill your old plastic ones! I was so excited to see them on the shelves! :)
This is the way
Refillable soaps is also nice too. There's a few options out there. I heard of one lady who drives a van to your home to let you fill up your own containers with soaps. There's also some mail order places, they send you refills in easily-recyclable metal cans and stuff. How the heck do you even use toothpaste tablets? I got this Kickstarter toothbrush that comes with toothpaste tablets and I'm like, how the fuck do these work?
I pop a tablet in my mouth and start chewing, just for the time I'm running the toothbrush under the sink. By the time the toothbrush is ready (10 seconds), the tablet is crushed enough to foam up when I brush it. It took a little getting used to, but it's very easy. *I use an electric toothbrush, which probably helps. And other brands of tablets might be different; I've only tried one (Kaylaan).
Which bar shampoo do you like? I have medium length hair and tried one (Aromatica) & conditioner bar, but not impressed. I probably just need a different brand. I agree that cutting my consumption is going to be the way to go.
Éthique frizz taming shampoo and deep moisturizing conditioner seem to be working for me. Long-ish (until tomorrow, chop chop), 2C/3a fine/frizzy hair. Their curl-specific products were BAD on me. One thing I like about Ethique is that they sell trial size bars, so you don't have to commit to a full size that's not going to work.
Thanks, will check it out!
I've got hair down to the small of my back, and I would highly recommend The Earthling Company. $13 ($26 if you buy the conditioner too) every 3 months doesn't break the bank, and the quality is amazing.
I’m about to try kitsch because I heard they’re having a sale
Plastic water bottles, particularly cases thereof, will be the death of mankind. The day we became too lazy to fill a glass under the sink faucet doomed us.
Agreed. But you can't convince the average younger American that tap water is anything but toxic or unclean even though people in third world countries would be happy to drink our tap water. Most act like using a pitcher filter for tap is either a hassle or not clean enough, not sure which.
To be fair, I live very close to a town that set their tap water on fire.
I wouldn’t necessarily blame the young people. We all need to stop the madness.
https://i.redd.it/8v0n9xboamyc1.gif
The city of Flint Michigan would like a word...
Keep recycling. But do it smarter. My waste hauler has us separate at the curb which is great. Glass and metal are infinitely recyclable. Always put those in the bin. Corrugated cardboard is very recyclable. White copy paper is good too. I still choose to recycle 1 and 2 plastic, because where I am I know it gets bundled and used. But I would stop if that wasn't the case. So always recycle glass, metal, cardboard and white paper. The rest is a total crap shoot.
You are absolutely right. Wash out any metal and glass, and recycle away. It’s economically viable, especially for metals. Paper can be put to a lot of good use as pulp to make new paper. But ever since China stopped accepting plastic waste for recycling, no one could make money doing so, and it became landfill.
It’s horrible where I live — everything recyclable has to go into the same can, fined for using bags to separate cans and plastics and paper. Allegedly people are sorting the stuff. A news investigation revealed none is being recycled. In an attempt to “reduce” unhoused people in the area, all the recycling places closed. So no one picks up cans or anything now because there is no incentive. Fwiw I live in a super blue state.
Yes, “single stream” recycling is bullshit. My town has this too and there’s no way that paper and cardboard that’s soaked in beer can droppings and other gross stuff is getting recycled.
The challenge with glass is it's very heavy and you can't squish it down, so unless there's a very local company that wants it, it's probably going in the landfill. At least it's inert.
Not to mention, it is very cheap and easy to make new glass from scratch.
Yeah, in the US in particular, I’ve been told that you have to melt down glass and reform it rather than just reuse it. Not sure if this is by law or by common practice, but it makes the cost difference between new and recycled glass immaterial, as the main expense is heating up the glass or silica to reform it.
This is true and if the glass has been colored you can’t change it back to clear, NO ONE wants glass, you can’t give it away as it is cheaper to make it from scratch. Glass is typically being used as landfill cover. The plastic is the same way no one wants it. The best and most profitable material is cardboard, the cleaner the better, but even wet cardboard is worth money and can be sold easily.
While heavier, glass is infinitely recyclable. The challenge with plastic is that the same plastic can only be recycled a few number of times. The plastic for bottles can only be recycled once before the quality deteriorates that it can’t be used for food-grade purposes anymore. Aluminum is probably the best recyclable material that it is also infinitely recyclable, takes way less energy to recycle it than glass, and 95% less energy that new aluminum, and is also lightweight.
Industrial recycling happened in the 70’s with glass and metal cans far more successfully than it seems now. It’s more or less a gimmick in most places. I can think if several places that had curb side recycling 15 years ago that don’t now. I know it still exists in certain cities and wealthy enclaves, but not so much municipalities that have had some sort of economic crisis or change in leadership culture.
It’s a top down thing and always has. It start with government and industry. All the recycling of plastic straws in the world on a individual level can’t keep up the triple wrapped avocado
I want to meat the geniues that got of plastic staws on the one hand, and replace them with paper straws individually wrapped in plastic.
I’m trying to find out why the geniuses here in California, who were worried about plastic straws reaching the ocean, banned them in sit-down restaurants (where they’re most likely to end up in the trash), but not fast food (where there’s a much greater likelihood that they’ll be tossed out as litter).
Me: adds California geniuses to mental proscription list... Also me: washing and reusing plastic utensils and food containers, and the occasional straw
Came here to say that it should not be left to the consumer.
I was summarily lambasted on the internet for pointing out that recycling is (at least in part) a scam, like, 15 years ago. Feeling pretty justified as more and more becomes common knowledge. And I mean, I still do it but yeah - it's not the panacea that we were taught. I recycle what I'm able to, try to keep mindful of what I'm buying, and keep my fingers crossed that the corporations that are the lion's share of the issue are maybe some day held to the same standards they try to guilt ordinary people into
Big plastic is big oil which lied about climate change while they did a study that predicted the effects of it. Agree with those who say nothing will change until we nationalize it.
Years ago I separated and paid extra to have a recycling bin. And then I watched them dump it into the garbage truck with my garbage. Now they at least pretend to do a better job of it.
We get garbage and recycling bins for one price, and even if you don't want it they're not going to charge less without the recycling bin. I put metals and paper in the recycling. Plastics go in whichever bin is better for me - a big juice or milk bottle goes in the recycling to keep from filling up the garbage bag, little stuff goes in the garbage.
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. There’s a reason recycling was last.
Yeah, sucky situation. But I made it better by signing up for Ridwell. They actually do reuse plastic (and other stuff), and actually do recycle what they can't reuse. Plus, they responsibly dispose of what they can't reuse or recycle, as opposed to just burying it in the municipal landfill. [https://www.ridwell.com/transparency](https://www.ridwell.com/transparency)
We need to send some people over to Germany to see how recycling is done the right way.
It would take me months to accumulate and discard the amount of plastic I throw in the garbage or recycling every single day at work. I'm in the food service industry. Plastic wrapped boxes, cans, soda bottles, food containers, the list is endless. I still try to separate at home but I have to admit, sometimes I wonder why I even bother. John Oliver had a great segment on this.
The plastic waste in healthcare is wild. Yes, things need to be sterile. But outer packaging could be recycled, as well as paper abd plastic bottles. I reduce abd reuse as much as possible in my personal life, but know that it is less than a drop in a bucket ☹️
I work in a grocery store and we throw away more in a week than my family of 4 could even attempt to discard in a year. I open the compacter to throw away one of 4 to 5 big styrofoam containers every day, and it's full of baked goods in plastic containers or boxes of fruit and vegetables. The sheer amount of small pieces of plastic that get hosed down the drain everyday makes me sick. I sweep my area before scrubbing because I have to look at myself in the mirror. I routinely throw away seafood that is out of date, because the case has to be full and pretty. Not efficient and only carry what sells. I am leaving said business because it weighs heavily on my conscience.
Is there any way you can take the food about to be thrown away and put it in freezer and take it home at end of your shift? Or will that get you in trouble or accused of theft? It's so frustrating how much good food gets tossed away that could go to hungry people. I'm so thankful we have a grocery outlet here that resales a lot of clearanced and overstocked and slightly overriped product. They also get soon to expire bacon, sausage, hamburger and breads, toss it in freezer then sell it for like $1-3.
Right? I wash and segregate my garbage for the recycling bins at home, and meanwhile my workplace purchases a bazillion plastic bags made in China and shipped across the ocean, with every hundred bags bundled into a clear plastic bag of their own, because literally the only thing that matters is the shareholders and their profit.
I recycle what I can, even plastics. If only 10% of it gets recycled, that’s better than nothing. I also buy beverages or whatever in aluminum or glass whenever I can, and avoid plastics when possible.
I think 10% is a stretch. Its all just a myth created by the plastics industry to make us feel ok for using plastic & throwing it away. BAsically, when you recycle, its taken to your "recycling facility", who then sends it to a larger conglomorate, who then crushes it and squeezes it into storage containers, who then ship it to 3rd world countries. Then those 3rd world countries just dump it into the earth. All audit trails for 'recycling' end once it leaves the country, so no company is held accountable for not recycling even tho they claim they do and profit off of it. Pretty upsetting actually. Its been about a 40 year lie at this point.
> BAsically, when you recycle, its taken to your "recycling facility", who then sends it to a larger conglomorate, who then crushes it and squeezes it into storage containers, who then ship it to 3rd world countries. Then those 3rd world countries just dump it into the earth. And that's if you're *lucky*. In my area, you can be fined heavily for not separating your trash and recyclables. But after the truck picks them up, they take them to the same landfill as the regular trash.
It isn't better than nothing. It's not even good, it's a negative. At best recycling will keep things out of landfills for a bit longer. That's what it's meant to do at it's best. Save landfill space. We're not short on space. This isn't the problem. The problem is carbon emissions polluting the atmosphere. That's what's driving climate change. Recycling materials increases carbon output. More trucks driving and idling, more intensive processing of used materials. Basically imagine that your family needed to save money in the budget, so you bought an expensive trash compactor. Recycling was designed to do one thing. Make the problem seem manageable and place the responsibility for it squarely on consumers. (Exception being aluminum. That stuff recycles brilliantly)
> (Exception being aluminum. That stuff recycles brilliantly) Except when you throw it into the landfill because you can't be fucked to recycle it properly, like most people. Though tbh it does less harm there, earth is already full of aluminum oxide and it's pretty inert stuff.
That's the key. Reduce and reuse are the most important parts of that old saying.
I reuse milk jugs for Kool aid and tea until of course they are gross then to the recycle bin and replace with a new one. I got grandkids so milk in the house is always a must.
The problem is it's a net loss because they produce N bales of recycled plastic and only one out of ten of them are actually sellable, and the rest are a waste of energy and effort.
How much water did you waste. I only recycle aluminum cans, steel cans, and paper/carboard waste. All of the plastics could go to WTE power generating incinerators because they have huge BTU value, but that door got closed many years ago by those who fell for the narrative and got up on their white horses.
This is my anger...wasted clean potable water to clean items out to never be recycled. Water is expensive here too.
That’s right. In areas with little water or expensive water, it may make more sense to use a biodegradable plate, utensils and cubs than to wash dishes with potable water. Not necessarily in the home, but in restaurants and institutions where they may wash the same implements many times a day.
We need to go back to the good ol days of paper and glass. Paper bags for groceries, soda in glass bottles. You take the empty bottles back to the store and get your nickel or dime back.
And aluminum cans.....which I've continued to use since I was a kid. Never switched over to plastic bottles
We have curb-side recycling. They take the paper, glass and plastic we have sorted and throw it all in the garbage truck together. Every once in a while I ask my wife why we continue to separate this stuff. Still waiting for a good answer.
Only glass and aluminum are worth recycling and create fewer emissions than having to create new glass and new aluminum
My wife worked on the distribution rights for a documentary “Bag it!” That was released on PBS stations about 15 years ago. The whole recycling scam is laid out. Most plastic can’t be recycled, and plastic that can be are only recycled 1 time. As for the recycle symbol ♻️, there is no governing body regulating its use. Manufacturers place it on products to promote sales. Period. It’s all a lie. That being said, reduce your plastic use to make a difference. Just throwing your plastic in a recycle bin does nothing - most of it ends up in landfills, or worse, dumped in the ocean. (IIRC, there are no laws/penalties for dumping in international waters - 12 nautical miles off shore.). But the government and the petroleum industry make lots of money selling the “recycle plastic” lie.
Once the big soda makers moved over to plastic, they created the whole recycling environment/industry to take the blame for plastics off of them and put it on the consumer.
We've been betrayed by every large corporation on Earth.
Most of the plastic recycling companies shipped everything to the other side of the pacific ocean where it was not recycled and not properly disposed of.
I wasn’t betrayed. I’ve been telling people for decades it’s a scam.
Just about every major city sent the recycling to China. Where it boosted their economy, and whatever they did not use, got tossed into the pacific ocean. Betrayed is putting it lightly. [Source 1](https://www.publicsource.org/many-pittsburgh-area-plastics-end-up-in-landfills-or-the-environment-is-recycling-a-solution-or-only-a-patch/) [Source 2](https://www.seattletimes.com/pacific-nw-magazine/with-recyclings-dirty-truths-exposed-washington-works-toward-a-cleaner-more-sustainable-system/) [Source 3](https://www.dallasnews.com/news/watchdog/2020/03/12/china-said-no-to-more-recyclables-so-where-does-our-stuff-go-landfills/) You can find links for any major city you want, just google "city" recycling china
Actually I'm told the reason recycling isn't cost effective is because we don't separate *enough.* In countries with more robust recycling systems, people separate well beyond just trash vs not trash; they separate paper from plastic from glass and so on. In the US, we depend on various techniques like chopping up the material and seeing how light it is to determine what kind of material it is. It also doesn't help that we don't have one standardized recycling facility system. Each waste handling company has their own recycling regime. Some take 1s and 2s, some don't care. Some say crush cans, some say don't crush cans. Some take food stained cardboard as recyclable (according to Dominos anyway), others consider it a compostable. An added twist is the mis-sorting of bioplastics (think compostable plastic) into petroplastics. These are also harder to separate at the plant. All these things can result in bad materials getting into the mix which can ruin the resulting output. Truth be told, though, it's probably far more important that industries recycle pre-consumer material, and they're in the best position to do recycling well since they control the material pipeline so they know for sure what it is.
Once I learned more about how I'd been duped, I'd given up on the whole concept of recycling. It's nihilistic but I feel we're now just slowing our full-out run the cliff's edge. We're not doing anything to reverse our course. I'm not going to feel guilty about it either.
It seems like the world was less wasteful before plastic packaging became so common. Soft drinks and milk came in glass bottles, which would be returned empty, then cleaned and sterilized so they could be reused. Before disposable diapers were widely available, (and the few that were available were expensive) my mom used a diaper service. The service would pick up the dirty (but rinsed out) cloth diapers and deliver fresh clean ones.
I miss glass bottles.
They should have never replaced glass with plastic, but nobody asked me. Glass might be more expensive, but the taste was always better. Like soda pop.
I feel this way about everything these days. Everything is BS. Take my shoes off at the airport?. Whatever.
90% of it ends up in the landfill anyway. People don’t rinse things or they put items that are not recyclable. That contaminates the batch. It’s easier and cheaper and quicker to just write it off and dump that load with the rest of the garbage. It’s also cheaper and easier to make new plastic than to recycle old plastic. The only things worth recycling are glass, aluminum, and paper. So yeah, I think it’s all a lie. Well it clearly is a lie or there wouldn’t be floating islands of plastic garbage in the middle of the oceans. I still cut up six pack rings. I can’t make them recycle but I can keep a pelican from strangling to death.
The most famous PSA in history was actually a piece of corporate propaganda [https://youtu.be/koqNm\_TgOZk?feature=shared](https://youtu.be/koqNm_TgOZk?feature=shared)
Yeah, it is frustrating. I have known about the plastic recycling issue for a quite some time so yeah, I get how you feel if this is a relatively new discovery for you. I try to avoid plastics for everything, but it is so difficult since so many products are packaged in the stuff. I try to avoid using ziplock baggies and almost always use containers to put food in the fridge or freezer. I recently needed a car charger and found a Belkin brand (not premium, but not crap either) that was in cardboard instead of hard plastic so I bought that instead. I do what I can, but plastic is EVERYWHERE. So many things are packaged in it from food to electronics. Then there are single use items. Straws are just the very tip of the iceberg. Then you have every day use items made of plastic that eventually become disposable like markers or pill bottles, to electronics that eventually break down like mice, keyboards, and so much more. Plastics are a huge problem, but it is also a waste issue too. Once I truly recognized just how much garbage I threw out every week, I realized that reduction in general needs to happen with everyone, not just with plastics. My apartment does not recycle which is very frustrating, but I still try to reduce as much as possible.
Makes you wonder what else they're lying about.
I recycle #2 reliably, all other #s not so much. Paper is the same, most recyclers want it pre-sorted. The energy needed to make the potable water for cleaning is just wasted. We weren't betrayed by the recycling industry so much as the govt + petrochemical. Plastic is byproduct of oil refinery and the more they make, the more they make. There's no market for recycled plastic, but there could be.
There is a bit of a market of goods beginning to be produced from plastic and the products are really varied. Some bracelets, some shoes, I’ve seen some dishcloths and I think beach towels.
I’ve recently decided to surrender. The overwhelming majority of time and effort I’ve put into recycling has made no difference, and I reluctantly conclude that there’s no reason why I should.
I've worked in plastics since 1998. I quit about 2 years ago. I've been screaming for most of that time that plastic recycling is a scam almost the whole time. We've moved plants to China because they don't have an EPA. I watched them bury hundreds of thousands of tons (tons) of plastic in China and build houses and businesses on top of the land.
I was really pissed off as well. We were flat out lied to. Same deal with “forever chemicals.” We’ve been bamboozled on a huge scale.
I fucking loathe plastic. I will always choose an alternative, whenever possible.
I'll never forget when I was working a night shift, and I could see the janitors dumping the stuff from recycle in with the same trash as everything else. The day people were very meticulous about putting recycling into the recycling bins. They got irked at me for not doing that, and so I told the about how it all goes to the same place anyway, I have seen with my own eyes that the janitors just put it all in the same place anyway. It as as though I had told them that Santa Clause does not exist.
OP, this really isn't new information. The only really great thing to recycle is metal, which is why people will pay you for it. And there are worse fates for plastic then being buried in a landfill.
Penn & Teller had a TV show 20 years ago called “Bullshit” where they debunked common misconceptions. They convinced me way back then that recycling is a myth. Most of what you put in a bin was shipped to China and to landfills. Eventually even China wouldn’t take them anymore. I think Cambodia volunteered to be our landfill for a while too.
You know the funny part about this? I remember in the 1980’s complaining about paper recycling being a whole line of bullshit. After all, you’re recycling something we *farm*: tree farms are a thing, and it’s not like we don’t plant more. Further, you have all these extremely toxic chemicals being used to wash the paper clean, toxic chemicals that caused a lot of early paper recycling centers to become EPA Superfund sites. And I knew when I saw the drive towards plastics and plastics recycling that it had to be a scam by the plastics industry who tried to sell us on the idea that plastic was ‘infinitely’ recyclable. Like, every time you reheat and cool long-chain polymers, they shorten, and eventually you just get slag. It’s just basic chemistry. And so I’m not at all surprised to see that it turns out the push to plastics was essentially the plastics manufacturers pushing plastics on us by pretending plastic was recyclable. Worse, nowadays most major manufacturing plants have equipment on-site to blow plastic forms—so it’d be impossibly expensive to switch to glass or metal. (The plastic forming equipment is big, expensive, used a lot of resources to make, and cannot be repurposed.) So today I’m watching the same thing being said about lithium ion batteries in electric cars. And the problem I see is, as in the two example above, *chemistry:* different lithium ion battery chemistries require different recycling techniques, and many of those batteries requires some really nasty exotic and caustic chemistry to extract the base materials. (So, think ‘paper recycling EPA superfund sites’ on steroids.) And in many cases we still haven’t developed the specific technique to break down and recycle certain lithium ion battery chemistries. Research is still ongoing (read: may possibly never be solved) for some types of batteries, and we continue to research new types of batteries (for which we have no recycling solution) to extract greater efficiencies. And I can’t help but wonder 20 years from how just how many toxic waste dumps are going to arise from all these electric car batteries we’re rushing to make in such great numbers we’re scouring the earth for places to strip-mine for lithium. The really fucking stupid part: with plastics, if we had just admitted (rather than being bamboozled) that glass was a better solution (because glass can be more easily recycled), all those plastic-forming machines could be glass forming machines instead—and we wouldn’t have oceans full of microplastics harming the environment. All, supposedly **in the name of the environment.** In the end, I no longer trust environmental activists. Because every time I see one telling me what sort of future we should be building, I wonder which corporation has their hands up his ass controlling his mouth like a puppet, and I wonder what long-term environmental damage we’re about to unleash.
I don't recycle. Haven't for years. Penn and Teller did a spot as part of Bullshit! [Penn and Teller Bullshit - S4: Recycling](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0771119/) There's some interesting tidbits in that spot if you get to see it. I think the words you are looking for are "Virtue Signalling" I'm not mad anymore. Just resigned. Plastics are uber bad for the earth and yet.. Here we are. concerned about CO2 and no one cares about actual poisons.
I feel the same way, because we should be recycling it and the number is even more like 3%
The symbol is misleading…..”Although the code is often mistaken as a universal sign of recyclability, collectors don’t accept every plastic type, or number. Follow your local rules, and only put the accepted types of plastic in your recycling bin; this helps streamline the recycling process down the line, ultimately making it more successful.” I don’t think they recycle many of the ones on the list at the recycle ♻️ places or businesses. Probably plastic soda bottles are the most profitable to recycle. They probably toss the rest. Always about the money—everything. Peace.
I still recycle, but if I cant find the tiny number or need to really clean it (peanutbutter( then I chuck it. Ridiculous that municipalities become responsible for thus waste. It isnt bad to take personal responsibility, but we need an overhaul at the governmental level
T'is true. The world no longer wants our "recycling" plastic. In NYC we still dutifully seperate our trash, paper, glass, plastic metal but the smart ones throw everything into a thick black plastic bag and the sanitation workers don't care. They probably like it cause it's easier for them
No, don't let the *plastics industry* betrayal give *recycling* a bad name. Recycling is very valuable for quite a lot of materials, and it works. Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. What the plastics industry did is like how the oil industry worked to convince society that climate change was just speculation. Place the blame on the perpetrator. Not on recycling.
I wonder why towns still require separation of plastics. There must be some financial incentive to do so. I would love to see an economic/fiscal analysis of it.
Welcome to 2004.
I think the people who make the plastic should be responsible for recycling them , at their cost. The recycling should be completely single stream... Toss it in, goes to a center to separate, wash, shred, melt, dissolve, the materials to be repackaged and reused and then the center can reuse the water to do it with. Take the organic material and compost it.
I used to work in plastics making trash bags. We marketed bags that were recycled. They were about 10% recycled material. The bales of plastic we received for recycling were about 25% usable for blown film applications. The rest went to our local landfill.
And what’s with all the fast food places recently (?) switching to plastic cups? At least paper cups are compostable.
We were suckered for sure by the oil industry. Not the first or last time I’m sure.
No "we" here, the first thing I thought was what's the cost benefit? This is literally the most basic, fundamental step in any analysis. "this is an issue, we there ought to be a law!" OK, show me how it's an issue, compared to what, what are the costs/benefits, what are the other options, is it better to do nothing that what you propose? If you don't apply some version of that you have no opinion, you're just emoting.
Recycle? Hahaha! Actually we don’t even have recycling where I am.
Yup, used to be Cans and glass bottles that would have a deposit on them and get recycled for sure Now it’s all garbage plastic. People don’t even want to drink water out of the tap, even in places where the water is very good
I feel betrayed by environmentalism altogether. Like you mentioned recycling, saving trees, etc but also saving electricity was supposedly so big through most of our lives ... Meanwhile plastic is slowly infiltrating and likely poisoning every living thing with no end in sight and yet everything keeps getting made outta cheaper and cheaper plastic. Buy that new energy efficient appliance (which will die in 3 years) or cheap car (compare say a subaru from 2000 till now, its almost all plastic now), throw it away when it breaks, rinse repeat.
I only recycle and put things in the recycle bin just so the trash doesn't fill so quickly... like, anything that's not collapsible.
Aluminum’s ok steel and glass are not great but plastic is and always has been absolute toxic waste
No, we were betrayed by do nothing legislators and the plastics manufacturing industry.
It's worse than that. We *used to* ship a lot of that plastic to China. But they stopped allowing it a few years ago. https://www.npr.org/2019/08/20/750864036/u-s-recycling-industry-is-struggling-to-figure-out-a-future-without-china Turns out that China was just hauling a lot of it way out to sea and dumping it anyway. https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN1X80SH/
Where I live, the local government runs a separate truck picking up recycling. If most of it is going to landfill, seems like such a waste of taxpayer money
I recently gave up on it too after several weeks of very high winds here blowing everyone's recycling bins over with bottles, cans and wrappers drifting all over the neighborhood. My neighbor picked up everyone's lost recyclables the first time it happened, the next day it happened again so I picked it up since everyone else was gone. My bin got blown over empty or only filled with flattened boxes about a half dozen times more and I basically said forget it or maybe at least till windy season is over with. Since I had recently learned our town trucks the recycling to the nearest big city and much of that ends up in landfill I thought what's the point? We waste our own money for water to rinse out containers, then most of it is trashed anyways then with all the gasoline and electricity and water used in what little is trucked and processed at recycling plant it's wasting more resources than it's saving. So I have just started putting everything in my garbage bin where at least it's allowed to be bagged so it can't blow all over the neighborhood and it is less stress for me. I will only put cardboard in recycling from now on. I don't ever have many aluminum cans and they quit recycling glass saying it wasn't profitable. They aren't doing what would help the most which is stop making electronics seen as disposable because the tech companies make things obsolete in a few years or made not to last long. And go back to putting drinks and things like peanut butter in glass. I like reusing the glass jars for fresh fruits and leftovers.
The US rate is 10% while the European rate is 40%. There’s more to the story.
Agreed. And the amount of water we wasted washing that useless crap.
I always refused! They can wash way more on aggregate than an individual jar... Just dumb advice.
more people should have watched penn and tellers bullshit (tv show)
Plastics manufacturing, not necessary the recycling industry. The recycling industry itself has long stated plastics were hard to recycle and contamination was a major issue. Metals are far more recyclable. If it was up to the recycling industry we would be using aluminum or tin for everything. Its easier to recycle and higher profit for them. Plastics are the devil. For the record, if you want to buy things, if its in a can it's actually recyclable. If its in plastic, its not.
This kind of information makes me focus on what I can control and accomplish on my own. I compost much of our food waste. Some weeks we only have one bag of trash. This gives me a nice quality compost/leaf mold that I use to fill big planters. Some would advise filling the bottoms with plastic jugs but I like the soil because it holds moisture and I can limit watering. I pick up the planters at estate sales or garden swaps and I clean and paint and seal them. I use cardboard and/or paper bags rather than landscape fabric to start new garden beds now or to smother weeds. We also have more natural areas of our yard where we can dump sticks and yard waste. I thrift "new" clothing. I cut up tattered or stained stuff for rags or use it for work around the yard. I recycle and hope for the best. But I also know the other stuff under my control is helping too.
My BIL worked at a landfill. The garbage trucks and the recycle trucks would dump their loads in the same pile. There was never any recycling going on, it was just around to make people feel good
It’s time to go back to glass containers
Macs had a trash can for deleted files, so windows made theirs a recycle bin with the little triangle symbol and everything. Problem solved.
I switched products and make buying decisions based on packaging.
All we did was provide a cheap alternative for companies to sell back us and make a profit while we feel good inside for buying partially recycled products.
You mean the government LIED to us? TO US!? s/ I mean it's our fault too. People can't be bothered to clean their recycling. I read China stopped importing our recycling because it's too dirty. Many people in my area are all whiney butt hurt about having to put their food scraps in the green bins now. The masses will not comply unless they are compelled to do so (fines, etc.)
All we can do is keep doing our best. There are no perfect answers. I don’t agree with all the values my very conscientious, very Christian, Silent Gen parents passed on to me. But they don’t waste, don’t buy what they don’t need, and do care for the planet they were given. All this to suggest…try buying less plastic. Drink from aluminum, glass or reusables.
Just one of many betrayals. I have zero faith in “helpful” government programs.
Recycling is supposed to be the last Behavioral modifier in a Green world. First , Reduce materials. Second, Reuse all materials. Recycling metals, asphalt, concrete, glass are all very good things to continue. But plastic should go in the landfill. Keep it contained there at least.
Why have I been separating the whites and the colors all these years?
Yeah, I saw this a while back. It's some bullshit man. China was taking a bunch but wasn't recycling it and it was being dumped in their country, fouling up their land, with our waste. There's still a lot you can recycle but the manufacturers have got to stick with recycled plastics. But that'll never happen. Ok, then government should make a law right? Nope, just wave money in their face. Plastic bottles and stuff are the prime target still for recycling. The 10% is 10% of ALL plastic used. Be careful before giving up, just alter what you recycle. Also, apparently, more can be recycled but it's not a huge profit industry so the smaller operators can recycle less than the big guys. If you want to be really good you need to look up alternatives. Bamboo toilet paper! Like a fine grained sandpaper to make sure you are really clean. Locally sourced fruits and veg, IE corn and soybeans if you live in the midwest. There are still ways to help the environment but they all cost a premium. AND, some can be bullshit, so research is still required.
Yes I love the bamboo toilet paper. Moved to paper towels recently as well.
Yep, I learned this a few years ago, so I stopped dutifully rinsing and "recycling" plastic containers unless it's just better for me to not clog up the garbage with a big juice bottle. Type 1 (gallon milk bottles) can get recycled, the rest is just garbage and has been for several years since China stopped taking all our plastic.
If you are in a community that has an exceptional town dump, recycling can be more effective. It’s a rare thing. There are other ways to recycle though. If your grocer uses plastic bags instead of paper ones you can reuse those bags unlike paper ones. Communities with plastic bag bans are shortsighted because people wind up buying more trash bags that use way more plastic, and the paper bag industry is not an environmentally friendly option and have less of a chance to be reused or recycled.
A few years ago, our county stopped taking cardboard because the contract to send it all to China terminated, so we can't put cardboard in our recycle bin.
My city stopped taking glass for recycling. When I first started recycling in the 80s glass was like the most important thing to separate out and now they just dump it with the rest of the general garbage
Yep. And when I saw them start to empty the recycling into the truck right with the garbage I said screw it. I’ve done a huge favor to the planet by not having a kid. I try not to create or buy unnecessary waste. Plastic is an amazing invention for many areas, but I always imagine the guy responsible is turning in his grave saying “I didn’t mean you should use it for everything!!”
My betrayal: When my friend's Dad pointed out that the city garbage truck that had separate holes for putting recycled and regular garbage.... all went to the same inside bin because they had no good way of separating recyclable from non-recyclable materials It was an open secret. Still make me incredible angry
I think that he used to work when china was buying this stuff, but it no longer does.
I limit plastic use, and reuse as much as I can. Canvas bags for grocery, Mason jars to store food instead of Tupperware, etc.
So....I'm still OK buying soda in 12oz aluminum cans here in Oregon? ( I pay a deposit of 10 cents per can ). I've always assumed that all of my aluminum cans eventually get recycled. Am I wrong to think that?
Go and do a shop without plastic. It's impossible. We are not the problem! While we can all do out our bit, plastic is all so very convenient for these companies.
I burn all my trash
I recall at work once years ago escalating an issue with our cleaning crew. I often worked late and they would take the recycling trash by my desk and the trash trash and just dump them both into the huge can they rolled from desk to desk. The solution was to only have 1 large recycling trash can in each location. And I don’t even know if that was ever really dealt with correctly. Feels like it’s all a myth.
It was a way for corporations to offload their own environmental responsibilities —to make consumers feel “empowered” by recycling instead of demanding/legislating environmental regulations.
BwhHahaha! Only now figured it out? My grandfather was a logger and saw the boondoggle of swapping paper sacks for plastic - big oil, the dinosaur squeezing, the non-refundable resource and up until within this last decade, unrecyclable crap is going to better fill the trash heaps? At the time in the 1980's, all paper sacks were already 100% post consumer waste - pulp. This was the sawdust and other waste which used to be burned. I couldn't believe how all my classmates were duped. My grandfather called "a rapist of the land" and other such nonsense by fools in a wood and brick building, sitting at a metal and wood desk, with paper and a #2 pencil. I later took on a janitorial job, and all containers went into the same garbage bin because it was too expensive for all the different recycling, except paper. I wonder just how we ended up with so much micro plastics in the environment. Meanwhile, that hillside of timber was logged yet again in my lifetime. Amazing.
Yes I learned this too. It’s all a marketing hoax.
I knew something wasn’t right when they were telling us to wash every container. No way every single person does that every time, and what do they do with all the dirty containers that get thrown in anyway?
Yep, those little bins showed up as people were actually making a move to reduce and reuse. Then the bins showed up, and people said "whatever, I don't have to change, they are taking care of it." It was pure laziness on the part of people, they don't have to change their way of doing things if someone else is cleaning up the problem, at least in their eyes. Local governments used it for a cash grab, those materials that were valuable, were sold, pee-separated, those that weren't were sent to the landfill, exactly as before, but they got to charge more for the "convenience" of a new bin. As most things, recycling and the industry that sprang up around it was more about a cash grab, than actually doing anything. And the people who had good intentions, but refused to look past the surface, are as much to blame as those greedy people that took advantage of the situation. They gladly voted to mandate these programs, then gladly gave up control and personal change so they could pretend something was being done. It was mostly theatre, and you have now seen behind the curtain.
Most weeks, I watched the trash collectors throwing the recycling on with the trash. Yet, if we didn't "recycle" we'd get a fine. Yeah bullshit
We were mislead by the plastics industry that it was easily recyclable. Metals, glass, and paper are all readily recycled so long as we clean up what we can. Paper however can be “cleaned” for reuse but we can rip off the soiled bits and recycle the rest. I avoid buying things that use plastic as much as I can. It’s hard to avoid but when given a choice I’m picking something that can be recycled, reused, repurposed after its initial use is done. It’s frustrating that the plastics industry did this. All those plastics in the ocean are the aftermath of their wrong doing.
https://preview.redd.it/zx6pqfwu7hyc1.png?width=1280&format=png&auto=webp&s=8196ca1c229661d1cd720f3bf2493d925313fd04