Good read by on the plastic waste discourse. Something about this topic brings out the most disingenuous kinds of commentary by activists. Possibly because it’s aesthetics clickbait. Kinda like Retvrn trads going on about ugly architecture.
Conversation
Plastic has plenty of issues, but the vague bs attempt to connect it to climate is especially bad. Plastic mailer packaging for instance is generally far lower carbon than more aesthetic paper/cardboard that the EU in particular loves.
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(referring here to the kind of mailer you get e-commerce items in, grocery bags are similar but separate case, industrial is separate etc etc)
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Things people have poor intuitions about:
- mass/density of materials
- embodied carbon
- invisible breakage/loss cost prevented by good packaging
- number of reuses required to make a reusable item beat single uses
- gap between visibility and actuality
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It’s kinda like how people routinely overestimate the number of immigrants they’re hostile to
Overindexing on aesthetics is the root cause of a lot of shaky conclusions
Replying to
Probably the biggest concerning issue with plastics is microplastics endocrine disruption. It’s unrelated to climate impact where it’s somewhere between a rounding error negative and probably net positive through breakage/loss prevention.
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Article goes deep, but the headline takeaway is: you want to design plastics for recyclability by minimizing mix-ins, labels, dyes, adhesives, etc, keep them consistent and pure for easier separability into high-grade feedstock. Beyond that, chemical recycling techniques.
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The Column also has a good issue today that showcases the complexities of the plastic cycle: speciality plastic for protecting pineapples. With additives for more up resistance and reusabiloty for more harvests.
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* UV resistance
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