Zero Waste Diet Refuse!… Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

Where does recycled plastic go?

Recently I began researching where the plastics go that my family recycles.  I quickly found that I had a lot of misunderstandings on where my curb side contents ends up.

Misunderstanding #1: The belief that the various milk carton and paper products get made into new milk cartons and paper products in inaccurate. In fact, none of the recovered plastic containers are being made into containers again but into secondary products such as textiles, parking lot bumpers, or plastic lumber - all unrecyclable products. This does not reduce the use of virgin materials in plastic packaging. Curb "recycling" merely means "collected," not reprocessed or converted into useful products.

Misunderstanding #2:  Since I was a child I had the understanding that curbside collection will reduce the amount of plastic in landfills. Not necessarily.  When in reality only a fraction of certain types of plastic could realistically be captured by a curbside program. Ultimately, since most plastic reprocessing leads to secondary products that are not themselves recycled, this material is only temporarily diverted from landfills.

Misunderstanding #3: The chasing arrows on plastic products means it can be recycled. Wrong. It is basically just a green public relations deception.  The arrows are meaningless. Almost every plastic container is marked with the chasing arrowing symbol. The only information is the number inside the arrows, which indicates the general class of resin used to make the container.  These numbers are all set forth by the American Plastics Council.

Misunderstandings #4: Using plastic containers conserves energy. When the equation includes the energy used to synthesize the plastic resin, making plastic containers uses as much energy as making glass containers from virgin materials, and much more than making glass containers from recycled materials. Using refillables is the most energy conservative.

My choice is not limited to recycling or wasting.  Source reduction is preferred for many types of plastic and isn't difficult.  Opportunities include using refillable containers (which I am currently switching to), buying in bulk, buying things that don't need much packaging, and buying things in recyclable and recycled packages.

One point the book, Death by Rubber Duck, clearly drives home is  using plastic packaging has economic, health, and environmental costs associated. While offering advantages such as flexibility and light weight, it creates problems including: consumption of fossil resources; pollution; high energy use in manufacturing; accumulation of wasted plastic in the environment (pacific garbage patch); and most importantly, migration of polymers and additives into foods.

Six Strategies to Reduce the Environmental Impact of Plastics

1. Refuse products
Life bombards us with plastics in all aspects of life and the only way to change how much we produce is to use our every day decision and refuse to accept plastic.  We have to be proactive in telling others we do not want plastic in our gifts, packaging, to go meals, etc.  We first refuse, refuse, refuse.  Simply put, if we refuse enough there will be less production.

2. Reduce the use
Select packaging material that are recycled into new packaging - such as glass and paper. If people refuse plastic as packaging material, the industry will decrease production for that purpose, and the associated problems such as energy use, pollution, and adverse health effects will diminish.

3. Reuse containers
"Design for service" differs sharply from "design for disposal."  Since refillable plastic containers can be reused 20+ times, container reuse can lead to a substantial reduction int the demand for disposable plastics, and reduced use of materials and energy, with the consequent reduced environmental impacts.  Container designers will take into account the fate of the container beyond the point of sale and consider the service the container provides.

4. Require producers to take back resins
Get plastic manufacturers directly involved with plastic disposal and closing the material loop, which can stimulate them to consider the product’s life cycle from cradle to grave. Make reprocessing easier by limiting the number of container types and shapes, using only one type of resin in each container, making collapsible containers, eliminating pigments, using water-dispersible adhesives for labels, and phasing out associated metals such as aluminum seals. Container and resin makers can help develop the reprocessing infrastructure by taking back plastic from consumers.

5. Legislatively require recycled content
Requiring that all containers be composed of a percentage of post-consumer material reduces the amount of virgin material consumed.

6. Standardize labeling and inform the public
The chasing arrows symbol on plastics is an example of an ambiguous and misleading label. Significantly different standardized labels for "recycled," "recyclable," and "made of plastic type X" must be developed.

Book: Death By Rubber Duck
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