Companies knew for decades recycling was not viable but promoted it regardless, Center for Climate Integrity study finds

Plastic producers have known for more than 30 years that recycling is not an economically or technically feasible plastic waste management solution. That has not stopped them from promoting it, according to a new report.

“The companies lied,” said Richard Wiles, president of fossil-fuel accountability advocacy group the Center for Climate Integrity (CCI), which published the report. “It’s time to hold them accountable for the damage they’ve caused.”

  • deo@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
    5·
    9 months ago

    I certainly wasn’t intending to imply your work is not worthwhile, and I apologize if i came off as combative or dismissive. Plastic recycling is such a scam, I do think burning it makes sense in the short term (especially with the scrubbers you talked about, those sound cool and will at least help with the microplastic problem). I guess it’s just that the marketing push to conflate “clean” with “green” has been bothering me recently, and, while perfect should not be the enemy of the good, we’re running out of time (or possible have already run out of time, depending on how depressed i am when you ask me) for incremental change to be sufficient. But, you are right. We can only do what we can to make the world we’re currently in better, not simply will it into perfection overnight (despite how much I hate not being able to do that…).

    • afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.worldEnglish
      21·
      9 months ago

      No worries. I would like to point out that plastic broken down still has uses. Example we have been using it in sewage plants for the past few years with polishing ponds. Basically increases the surface area and gives the bacteria a place to hide out when there is a die off. The rough texture of shredded plastic pieces has a high surface to volume ratio. Decreasing the time it takes to process more poop. Part of the many reasons why modern wastewater treatment plants don’t smell as bad as they used to.

      Yeah if you want to know about wet scrubbers just ask. Basically imagine a smokestack with nozzles. A liquid rains down as the gas goes up. The liquid picks up stuff from the gas. Then the liquid is processed. Devil is with the details with this stuff but the concept is over a century old.

      For that plant I worked on the plastic was heated up with waste heat from another plant (cogeneration) in a low oxygen environment producing syngas. The syngas is scrubbed and then burned for fuel. Long term the plan for places like that is to convert the gas into liquid fuel.

      Now I agree we use way too much plastic I would however like to point out that the same process we used to burn it could be used for pretty much all C-H stuff. Paper, wood, food waste, etc. the vast majority of household waste. According to the EPA IF garbage plants are run well they have the least environmental impact. It is is a big if granted.

      Basically give me a trillion dollars and garbage will be solved. You do have a trillion dollars right?