It would be interesting to see if recycling by use would be any different.
My knowledge of the process is wildly limited, ut my understanding is that recycled plastic is melted/ fabbed back down into beads that can then be sold as raw stock for use in myriad new products, whether that be bottles, watering cans, etc…
Would there be a way to recycle by grade? This stuff isn’t going to be melted into beads that can be used for new food containers, but maybe it can be extruded for use in cordage, for example?
There may be no difference in process, or increased efficiency for doing so, but it would be nice.
I’m not a tree hugger, but I do get annoyed by trash on the side of the road, by the trail, at the river, etc… Those bottles aren’t going to degrade anytime soon. I applaud those that have the drive and ability to spearhead mass cleanup operations like the Pacific garbage patch.
So there are grades of plastics already, which day which ones can be recycled problem is sorting it out is incredibly inefficient so almost all of it gets tossed since it’s simply not economically viable at most levels.
The biggest plastic solution is in fact going back in time to the old way of glass bottles and deposits. Same with moving back to paper bags or durable reusable ones.
Does it work 100%, not at all or somewhere in between?!
Hmmm…good questions. From the humorous video @LoRezz posted , there is some real
good info in there, even if it may be a few years old.
Looks liked at best we recycle less than 10% of the number 1 and 2 type plastics. The rest is pretty
much unrecyclable.
The microplastics could be huge health risk as they are consumed by the lower tiers of the food chain.
There was a posting not too long ago about the development of microbes that break down plastics.
Hopefully that becomes the long term solutions.