Why can't we recycle plastic wrapping? (You can now)

kneemos · 29-09-2019 12:59am

According to this report only 9% of plastic ever produced has been recycled. With 79% ending up in landfill or discarded.

https://www.recyclingtoday.com/article/plastics-production-use-disposal-study/

StupidLikeAFox · 29-09-2019 1:20am

I think you are all talking rubbish

faceman · 29-09-2019 1:59am

Biodegradable wrote: »

Where did you read that?

Numerous sources plus at an academic conference in Dublin recently. It’s a generally accepted fact and waste statistics are available for most regions.

Alf Veedersane · 29-09-2019 7:51am

faceman wrote: »

Biodegradable wrote: »

Where did you read that?

Numerous sources plus at an academic conference in Dublin recently. It’s a generally accepted fact and waste statistics are available for most regions.

Afaik, the figure of just under 80% of all plastics ever made have been land filled or ended up in the ocean. That's not that surprising when you consider the timeframe.e that covers.

But it's not the same as saying that 80% of what we put in recycling now ends up in landfill or the ocean.

However, there is a significant level of contamination in recycling bins that means what should be recyclable ends up with general waste. The reason we're told to wash all containers going into the recycling is because if food is left in it, it will end up in general waste.

Not sure if the level of contamination in recycling bins has gone up since pay by weight came in but I suspect it has.

So it's not just about materials that can be theoretically by recycled but whether we put them in our bins in a way that facilitates that.

Biodegradable · 29-09-2019 9:39am

faceman wrote: »

Numerous sources plus at an academic conference in Dublin recently. It’s a generally accepted fact and waste statistics are available for most regions.

If 80% of what we recycle ends up in landfill or the ocean, then how can it be that the below statement is true?

kneemos wrote: »

According to this report only 9% of plastic ever produced has been recycled. With 79% ending up in landfill or discarded.

https://www.recyclingtoday.com/article/plastics-production-use-disposal-study/

Bear in mind that recycling only came in relatively recently. It most certainly does not ad up.

Biodegradable · 15-11-2019 8:26pm

jimbobaloobob wrote: »

If you stuffed the bottle with soft plastics there would remove it from the recycling and it would go to general waste.

No they would not. Think about it. They'd have to stop the entire conveyor just for one item and go poking around for 30 seconds or more. And that's if they'd even see it inside the bottle.

Who told you that anyway? Don't believe everything you hear.

Biodegradable · 15-11-2019 8:33pm

Padre_Pio wrote: »

There's dozens of plastics, but unlike metal, plastics of different types can have near identical weighs, densities, and colours, melting points, magnetic properties, spectral absorbsion etc

Yeah, but seeing as they're so similar in properties isn't that all the more reason to just melt why them all down together and reuse??

Padre_Pio wrote: »

Films are very difficult to sort.

By the sound of it they're not anymore difficult to sort than solid plastics!!! It's still a mystery to me!

Alf Veedersane · 15-11-2019 9:22pm

Biodegradable wrote: »

Can it not just be melted down into like rigid plastic. It's not like it's made from a different polymer!

I mean what if I were to shove a load of plastic wrapping from biscuits into a milk bottle. They'd never know. Would they?

No. LDPE, for example, cannot be turned into HDPE by being melted down.

freshpopcorn · 15-11-2019 9:26pm

Mod noteMoved from After Hours to Recycling & Domestic Waste Disposal please follow local guidelines

Biodegradable · 15-11-2019 9:35pm

Alf Veedersane wrote: »

No. LDPE, for example, cannot be turned into HDPE by being melted down.

But if they've the same melting point, and are the same colour, could they not just be melted down?

Alf Veedersane · 15-11-2019 9:49pm

Biodegradable wrote: »

But if they've the same melting point, and are the same colour, could they not just be melted down?

They can be melted down. That won't make them have the same structures. One has a crystalline structure. The other doesn't. Melting doesn't change that.

Biodegradable · 15-11-2019 9:54pm

Alf Veedersane wrote: »

They can be melted down. That won't make them have the same structures. One has a crystalline structure. The other doesn't. Melting doesn't change that.

But who'd know?

Alf Veedersane · 15-11-2019 10:30pm

Biodegradable wrote: »

But who'd know?

Jesus.

Also science.

Biodegradable · 15-11-2019 10:40pm

Alf Veedersane wrote: »

Jesus.

Also science.

Okay then, who'd care? Who'd care if the piece of disposable plastic you buy was once made from two pieces of disposable plastic.

Harry Palmr · 15-11-2019 10:57pm

As ever when it comes to plastics the best thing to do is not use it. Buy plastic wrap free food if at all possible.

Alf Veedersane · 15-11-2019 11:19pm

Biodegradable wrote: »

Okay then, who'd care? Who'd care if the piece of disposable plastic you buy was once made from two pieces of disposable plastic.

Science/chemistry doesn't really care about who does or doesn't care.

Padre_Pio · 16-11-2019 10:02am

Biodegradable wrote: »

Okay then, who'd care? Who'd care if the piece of disposable plastic you buy was once made from two pieces of disposable plastic.

It's not the same plastic. Melting point is one of a dozen important characteristics of plastics.

You're saying, sure water and oil are a liquid at the same temperature, why not mix them. Who'd know?
Why don't you out diesel or kerosene into a petrol car? It's all fuel at the end of the day. Who'd care?

cj maxx · 17-11-2019 1:00pm

I watched a bbc report on plastics and other "recycled" stuff shipped to Indonesia.
Huge landfills and huge fires. Containers full of stuff
from Europe and elsewhere.
People are getting sick from it and its poisoning the food chain.
It makes a mockery of the whole 'recycling ' thing.

Padre_Pio · 17-11-2019 2:44pm

cjmc wrote: »

I watched a bbc report on plastics and other "recycled" stuff shipped to Indonesia.
Huge landfills and huge fires. Containers full of stuff
from Europe and elsewhere.
People are getting sick from it and its poisoning the food chain.
It makes a mockery of the whole 'recycling ' thing.

Yup. The only cost effective way to dispose of plastics is to dump it or burn it.
It's just not worth the money to dispose of properly.

The West has been shipping it to China for incineration until they stopped taking it, now it's going to other south east Asian countries.

The irony is that they'll dump it, it'll go into a river and find its way back to us with the ocean currents.

decky1 · 17-11-2019 2:52pm

jimbobaloobob wrote: »

I think it's because most people don't wash them properly.
If you stuffed the bottle with soft plastics there would remove it from the recycling and it would go to general waste.

washing your bottles to save the planet, Don't think so.:rolleyes:

Padre_Pio · 17-11-2019 3:22pm

decky1 wrote: »

washing your bottles to save the planet, Don't think so.:rolleyes:

I'm a big fan of the Ocean Cleanup, who are aiming to remove ocean plastic in the next decade.

I can't see what they do with recovered plastic though. Most of it is a sodden, bleached mess of various plastics. I assume it's going for incineration.

Harry Palmr · 17-11-2019 3:29pm

When did the public demand tomatoes wrapped in plastic? I must have missed that outcry.

zeebre12 · 17-11-2019 3:52pm

What I don't understand is in my local recycling centre they accept all plastic, soft and hard and they are all put in the same container? Also you hear how you are meant to have your paper/plastic/cardboard dry before you put it into the recycling bin yet in the recycling centre there isnt even anything covering the cardboard/paper so they get all wet?
Also in the local recycling centre you can put all the foil wrappings from say a bar of chocolate in with the food cans yet I've heard that they cannot be recycled at all?

bmc58 · 17-11-2019 4:01pm

Biodegradable wrote: »

Can it not just be melted down into like rigid plastic. It's not like it's made from a different polymer!

I mean what if I were to shove a load of plastic wrapping from biscuits into a milk bottle. They'd never know. Would they?

But who would do that?It's not allowed,anyone with a bit of cop on wouldn't do such a thing as it may contaminate the whole batch of rubbish.It's like putting babies nappies in the recycling bins.No civic minded person would do such a thing.If you know i'ts wrong don't do it.

Harry Palmr · 17-11-2019 4:02pm

You'll find that tightly packed bundles of card don't get that soaked I reckon - they'll lose a few layers to damp. Maybe only one if it's that glossy stuff on the top.

Alf Veedersane · 17-11-2019 4:34pm

Harry Palmr wrote: »

When did the public demand tomatoes wrapped in plastic? I must have missed that outcry.

Was in a hotel for a meeting a while back. Coffee was served and a bowl of individually wrapped sugar cubes presented. It was then I knew packaging had gone full retard.

decky1 · 18-11-2019 10:28pm

The Nanny State has us by the short and curlies people are afraid to go against it 'You can't put that in the bin yet it seems by the talk here that it all ends up in the same place anyway, I'm with a bin company and i put glass in the recycling bin yet my daughter is with the same company [only starting] yet they told her 'No Glass' in recycling bin.she lives in another estate and both bins are collected the same day, where do you go from there? makes no sense at all.

Wanderer78 · 19-11-2019 6:32am

decky1 wrote:

The Nanny State has us by the short and curlies people are afraid to go against it 'You can't put that in the bin yet it seems by the talk here that it all ends up in the same place anyway, I'm with a bin company and i put glass in the recycling bin yet my daughter is with the same company [only starting] yet they told her 'No Glass' in recycling bin.she lives in another estate and both bins are collected the same day, where do you go from there? makes no sense at all.

We don't actually have a nanny state, particularly in relation to environmental matters, we in fact have almost the opposite, a strong political system is actually required to deal with our environmental issues, but our governments have been gradually depowered over time, leading to our current serious and growing environmental problems. the State has had in fact very little power in enforcing acts to protect our environment, hence our current predicament, leaving these issues to the market to solve has failed, and continues to fail.

Alf Veedersane · 19-11-2019 7:38am

decky1 wrote: »

The Nanny State has us by the short and curlies people are afraid to go against it 'You can't put that in the bin yet it seems by the talk here that it all ends up in the same place anyway, I'm with a bin company and i put glass in the recycling bin yet my daughter is with the same company [only starting] yet they told her 'No Glass' in recycling bin.she lives in another estate and both bins are collected the same day, where do you go from there? makes no sense at all.

Glass doesn't go in the recycling bin.

https://www.mywaste.ie/what-to-do-with/glass-bottles-jars/

That website tells you what to do with anything you're unsure of.

It doesn't all end up in the same place.

cnocbui · 19-11-2019 9:41am

Wanderer78 wrote: »

We don't actually have a nanny state, particularly in relation to environmental matters, we in fact have almost the opposite, a strong political system is actually required to deal with our environmental issues, but our governments have been gradually depowered over time, leading to our current serious and growing environmental problems. the State has had in fact very little power in enforcing acts to protect our environment, hence our current predicament, leaving these issues to the market to solve has failed, and continues to fail.

Could you explain by what mechanism the government has been "depowered"?

Wanderer78 · 19-11-2019 11:09am

cnocbui wrote:

Could you explain by what mechanism the government has been "depowered"?

This is actually extremely complex, not exactly transparent and obvious, but our political institutions and systems aren't exactly behaving in a democratic manner, it's also extremely difficult to explain this, at least I certainly struggle to.

We ve unleashed a beast in which we commonly call 'the market', under certain ideologies, particularly libertarian ideologies, it is depicted as all knowing, and absolutely capable of providing all of our needs, in my opinion, this is untrue, and I believe we have sufficient evidence to support this view now, the issue is, we actually haven't truly accepted this truth, and our political institutions, and their accompanied systems and processes are defaulting to, 'the market knows best'. This is evident in some of our most critical issues such as housing, health care and in this forums case, environmental matters.

Plutocratic elements of our societies have a lot to answer for here, for example, and in the case of environmental issues, some of the main causes of environmental damage are in fact large wealthy corporations and institutions, but some how, and again as depicted by some libertarian ideologies, these issues are largely the cause of the individual, and we re gonna some how pay for it. This of course is partly true, but upon research, you will find, largely untrue.

I personally do believe our political institutions are largely plutocratic in nature, but are operating under the guise of democracy. Joe Stiglitz regularly uses the term, 'one dollar, one vote', in describing the American political system, I think it can also be used to describe our global political systems in the modern age.

cnocbui · 19-11-2019 1:19pm

You are entitled to your views, but i think they are a load of nonsense. I've been around long enough to have formed the view that governments interfere in the lives of people and try to micromanage far more than they did in the past.

Apart from more government than ever, the other two major changes I think there have been is the 'G' syndrome, where government leaders go off to swan about with their peers at G8, 10, 'Gee, the climate', type gatherings and end up formulating policies which they think will boost their 'cred' with their peers. They have become a detached elite who like to see themselves collectively as the people who really matter in the world - the movers and shakers club, and who consider the democratic process and realities of their electorates as inconvenient.

The other is that globalisation has seen far too great an empowerment of US based multinationals. They pay almost no tax and yet seemingly have more political influence than taxpayers who pay through the nose. I think governments don't want to take action to reign them in in because of the ease with which they can move jobs about and because they are scared of angering the US. That isn't that much different from the past. In the past western governments had to kow-tow to the US and enact stupid war on drugs legislation.

MrMusician18 · 19-11-2019 1:27pm

Recycling isn't the solution to mixed plastics, it's getting producers to stop using it.

When I look at our bin, there is rarely anything put in it that was every really wanted. It's almost all packaging that was provided for the manufacturers or retailers convenience.

BorneTobyWilde · 19-11-2019 1:38pm

What's in a recycling bin is picked at on a picking station either by machine or hand, rest is baled and wrapped and feeds a Waste to Energy Plant to make Electricity. Best you can hope for. It's pretty much how it works now.
The trouble is in these countries like Malaysia, or China that want to take the mixed baled waste, as they get paid to take it.
50 euro a ton for 20 ton Shipping container load is 1000 euro, so they will gladly take 100 container loads get paid 100,000k for it and dump it in Malaysia in illegal ''recycling facilities''
The exporters here are to blame, they should not be offloading waste to people when they don't know where it's going.

BorneTobyWilde · 19-11-2019 1:42pm

No waste should be exported from Ireland unless its segregated, ie baled cardboard, Newsprint, Office Paper, Aluminium Cans, Steel Cans so on.
Mixed plastic waste is a fuel and it should be producing all the electricity for Ireland, the government should be building more waste to energy plants and they should be state run.

zeebre12 · 19-11-2019 2:34pm

BorneTobyWilde wrote: »

No waste should be exported from Ireland unless its segregated, ie baled cardboard, Newsprint, Office Paper, Aluminium Cans, Steel Cans so on.
Mixed plastic waste is a fuel and it should be producing all the electricity for Ireland, the government should be building more waste to energy plants and they should be state run.

What I don't understand is they are closing the peat power plants yet they have a newly built incinarator in Dublin to burn waste. Are all these fumes not going into the atmosphere? A waste burning incinerator seems very backward.

cnocbui · 19-11-2019 2:58pm

High temperature incineration is about 3 steps forward and is the opposite of backward. Opposing HTI is backward.

decky1 · 19-11-2019 5:37pm

Alf Veedersane wrote: »

Glass doesn't go in the recycling bin.

https://www.mywaste.ie/what-to-do-with/glass-bottles-jars/

That website tells you what to do with anything you're unsure of.

It doesn't all end up in the same place.

never heard anything from them about glass, picked up every 2 weeks maybe with 25% glass content.

Alf Veedersane · 19-11-2019 6:57pm

decky1 wrote: »

never heard anything from them about glass, picked up every 2 weeks maybe with 25% glass content.

They don't know what's in there when they empty. Some may use a rule of thumb based on the weight of the bin when its loaded. One company takes photos of waste to catch people contaminating the green bin. Because it costs them money to have a smaller proportion of recyclables.

Padre_Pio · 19-11-2019 7:06pm

zeebre12 wrote: »

What I don't understand is they are closing the peat power plants yet they have a newly built incinarator in Dublin to burn waste. Are all these fumes not going into the atmosphere? A waste burning incinerator seems very backward.

Fumes? What fumes?

Compared to the fumes from decomposing waste? Or the fumes from burning smokey peat?

In Actuality · 07-12-2021 10:30am

So since this thread was started, we can now recycle (non rigid) plastic wrapping. I'm so used to tearing off the wrapping from the tray and putting it in the regular bin. Are we to separate them or not?

crossmolinalad · 14-01-2022 1:35pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118282875#Comment_118282875

I seperate everything Paper off the dogfoodtins Wrapping off the bottles Plastic ball out of the beer can and so on

BorneTobyWilde · 14-01-2022 4:01pm

It's now a commodity, all plastics mentioned are shredded and burn in Cement Kilns . ... which is recycling ''the action or process of converting waste into reusable material.''

No need to separate, it's a brutal process, not one with finesse , metal tins, newspaper, cardboard, plastic drinks bottles PET, harder plastics HDPE all the valuables go round and round are are truly recycled, the rest is shredded and recycled into fuel, as in burnt.

AlexDoll · 07-03-2022 11:58am

I avoid plastic packaging altogether

I prefer glass and paper

Why can't we recycle plastic wrapping? (You can now)

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