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Why such scary rates? Partly because some of the changes that were supposed to simplify recycling eventually made it almost impossible.
Jenna Jambeck, an engineering professor at the University of Georgia, said that in fact, China is now refusing to transform American and European plastics. people were throwing waste into the wrong bin, making it difficult or impossible to recycle a contaminated mixture.
In an article published last week in Science Advances, she and her colleagues calculated that by 2030, 111 million tons of recyclable plastic will be diverted from Chinese factories to landfills.
million. Jambeck said China has a habit of making a profit by importing products from US and European recycling bins and turning them into useful materials. But while other countries were trying to simplify things for consumers with "single-stream" recycling – think of a big blue bin for paper, plastic, metal and glass – hardware coming to China became too contaminated with non-recyclable items. The instructions to put everything in one bin seemed attractive, but made recycling much more difficult.
Plastic matters because it takes centuries to degrade, and there are many. Jambeck estimated that the world has produced more than 8 billion tonnes since the 1950s. To help capture this amount, paleontologist Jan Zalasiewicz felt that this was enough to wrap our entire planet in plastic wrap. Others have calculated that it would make four mountains the size of Everest.
A study conducted by Jambeck in 2015 calculated that about 8 million tons of plastic waste is added each year to our already polluted oceans, killing seabirds, turtles, marine mammals and other animals. other creatures. Some break down into particles that infuse fish and seafood.
How did things go so bad? I asked the question at Princeton University historian Edward Tenner, author of the new book "The Efficiency Paradox", as well as a classic about the unintended consequences, "Why Things Bite Back. " He replied that single flow recycling has put a heavy burden on us:
"This very morning, I finally discovered how to treat a carton of milk with a plastic spout. Tubes of toothpaste? Only after your post I paid attention to the Wikipedia article on resin codes – and me, like you, I am a science and technology writer! "
Yes, the waste has become complicated in cans now in cardboard and plastic combinations, and then there is the complexity of draining the yogurt tubs – one of the items, as well as the containers to take away sales, that the New York Times said that Americans recycle improperly.I have put on my reading glasses and have studied a carton of Greek yogurt.I have discovered all kinds of symbols mysterious, which may have something to do with the lack of GMO or gluten.
There were explicit instructions not to put this product in your freezer, which I could have guessed, but not a lot of help with the disposal of the containers.A tiny code of hardly noticeable resin was printed on the bottom.This was a 5, I think, which means that it would is polypropylene, and is accepted as recyclable in some communities and not others.
"Making effective systems work can be surprisingly inefficient for the human mind, at least for mine." "It's easy to do the right thing only to find out that you've made it more difficult to protect the environment." It is not just a few of us who forget: Remember that 111 million tons of plastic are heading to Chinese landfills.
Well-meaning rebrands are probably not the worst offenders; A Waste Management official quoted in The Times said that he had seen "everything from Christmas lights to animal carcasses to artillery shells."
Although there should be a fine for carcasses and Christmas lights, the answer Contaminated recycling streams should not continue to reprimand consumers for getting the wrong resin code 5, but to s & # 39; To commit to advancing clean plastic technology. Even if consumer participation in recycling was 100%, we would not be close to recycling 100% of the material, said chemical engineer Megan Robertson, who co-wrote an article in Science last November on the subject. Future of plastics recycling. Many consumer wastes are simply not recyclable, often because they combine materials.
Given what scientists already know how to do, the future could bring a greener and more foolproof system. Right now, she said, she and other scientists are starting to develop ways to recycle plastic blends – hard work because a lot of plastics repel like oil and water. One of the reasons why China was importing recycling was that it was possible to hire a cheap workforce to sort the different types of plastic by hand. (Note: During the same period when recycling flows became more contaminated, work in China became scarcer and more expensive.)
Another problem is that almost all "recyclable" plastics today may not return to the package but take a second life as a purse or garden chair before you settle in the landfills as their last resting place. They are not really recycled as much as "recycled". The other author of the scientific journal, Jamie Garcia of IBM Research, has invented a new type of plastic that can be reused hundreds of times in the same types of containers. The adoption of such equipment would require a new approach in recycling facilities and, in the short term, could cost more.
The treatment of the plastic problem is very similar to the fight against cancer. Even if everyone stopped smoking, there would still be cancer. And while we all know if our municipalities accept yogurt containers, plastic waste will still pollute the environment. Compliance will not be a cure until lab innovations put us in place for success.
Author Information:
Faye Flam is a columnist at Bloomberg Opinion. She has written for The Economist, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Psychology Today, Science and other publications. She has a degree in geophysics from the California Institute of Technology.
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