Skip to main content

We are finally beginning to see mainstream outlets tell the truth:

Very little plastic is recyclable, or recycled.

The "chasing arrows" were put on the packaging and the lie that plastic is recyclable was pushed so municipalities in the 80's wouldn't ban plastic.

"In 1994 an Exxon executive told the staff of the plastics council that when it comes to recycling, "We are committed to the activities but not committed to the results.""

I agree with the statement in this article: plastic will never be recyclable, not in the traditional sense, unless it is broken down into constituent atoms and those are used in other things. The material is just not amenable to it.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/critics-call-out-plastics-industry-over-fraud-of-plastic-recycling/


Critics call out plastics industry over "fraud of plastic recycling"

Only 5 to 6% of plastic waste produced in the U.S. is actually recycled. A new report accuses the plastics industry of a decades-long campaign to "mislead" the public about the viability of recycling.
Ben Tracy (CBS News)

reshared this

in reply to Mx. Worldwide :therian:

🦋 :verifiedplural: The Beebz :fire_enby: :sparkles_pansexual:
🦋 :verifiedplural: The Beebz :fire_enby: :sparkles_pansexual:
• •
theres a bench outside of the y that claims to have been using over 1000 recycled plastic bags. One thing i was wondering was when it comes to hreaking down certain types of plastic, could The effort exerted possibly end up carbon negative?
in reply to 🦋 :verifiedplural: The Beebz :fire_enby: :sparkles_pansexual:

Mx. Worldwide :therian:
Mx. Worldwide :therian:
• •

@Beebz no, plastic is carbon-positive, always will be, recycling will not ever be carbon-negative, it uses fossil fuels and many plastics emit greenhouse gas upon exposure to UV.

That bench is probably just some plastic bags melted down, pelletised, and mixed in with the resin. That bench is likely no more than a percent recycled plastic. It's propaganda.

@🦋 :verifiedplural: The Beebz :fire_enby: :sparkles_pansexual:
in reply to Mx. Worldwide :therian:

Mx. Worldwide :therian:
Mx. Worldwide :therian:
• •
like if you break it down... cheap plastic bags are about 5 grams. That's 5kg of plastic for a bench that might easily weigh 100kg to be durable. That works out to be 5% of the bench's mass.
This entry was edited (2 weeks ago)
in reply to Mx. Worldwide :therian:

Neil E. Hodges
Neil E. Hodges
•
Also, the bench itself is made of plastic and this inherently has a short lifespan before needing to be thrown away.
in reply to Mx. Worldwide :therian:

Cy
Cy
• •

Yeah, the whole "recycling" campaign is propaganda. Companies get to produce more toxic waste, by guilt-tripping us for not recycling enough. Go ahead take all your plastic bottles and burn them in your front yard, and I could care less as long as companies aren't allowed to make me pay for their pollution.

https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/2019/5/28/18629833/climate-change-2019-green-new-deal

#guiltindustry


Climate change: I work in the environmental movement. I don’t care if you recycle.

Stop obsessing over your environmental “sins.” Fight the oil and gas industry instead.
Mary Annaise Heglar (Vox)

Neil E. Hodges reshared this.

in reply to Cy

feld
feld
• •

It's so much worse. Check out all the new data being revealed including how the marketing campaigns to brainwash the public

https://climateintegrity.org/uploads/media/Fraud-of-Plastic-Recycling-2024.pdf

Neil E. Hodges reshared this.

in reply to feld

Cy
Cy
• •

https://climateintegrity.org/uploads/media/Fraud-of-Plastic-Recycling-2024.pdf

That's an amazing article, and yeah I don't think there are words for how cooking these people alive would be too merciful to them. It brings up an excellent example in the 50's where 80 children suffocated in plastic dry cleaner bags, and the industry said the parents were to blame for trying to reuse the dryer bags. So like:

Parent: You sold me a new dryer bag and my child just died horribly suffocating on it while I struggled to save them.
The Society of the Plastics Industry: Well, you should have known to throw away the bag. Really we're the victims here.

in reply to Mx. Worldwide :therian:

Dave Heinemann 🇦🇺
Dave Heinemann 🇦🇺
• •

Here in Australia, the major grocery store partnered with soft plastic recycling company REDcycle, and collected soft plastics on their behalf.

REDcycle seems to have been successful for most of its lifetime. However, it recently emerged that REDcycle began stockpiling the soft plastics in warehouses - a massive fire hazard - after recycling them became unprofitable.

Sadly, recycling plastic isn't very economical.

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/apr/10/more-stockpiles-of-soft-plastics-from-failed-redcycle-recycling-scheme-uncovered

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2024/jan/30/redcycles-collapse-and-the-hard-truths-on-recycling-soft-plastics-in-australia


REDcycle’s collapse and the hard truths on recycling soft plastics in Australia

Shoppers are still being incorrectly told they can return food packaging to supermarkets a year after the program ended. So is any soft plastic being recycled?
Daisy Dumas (The Guardian)

Mx. Worldwide :therian: reshared this.

in reply to Mx. Worldwide :therian:

SkipfordJ
SkipfordJ
• •
This article makes me want to start recycling plastic at a small/hobby scale, purely out of spite.
⇧