Companies knew for decades recycling was not viable but promoted it regardless, Center for Climate Integrity study finds

Plastic producers have known for more than 30 years that recycling is not an economically or technically feasible plastic waste management solution. That has not stopped them from promoting it, according to a new report.

“The companies lied,” said Richard Wiles, president of fossil-fuel accountability advocacy group the Center for Climate Integrity (CCI), which published the report. “It’s time to hold them accountable for the damage they’ve caused.”

  • 🇰 🌀 🇱 🇦 🇳 🇦 🇰 ℹ️@yiffit.netEnglish
    0·
    10 months ago

    I don’t think it’s so much that anyone lied about anything, it’s that people have ignored two really huge contributing factors to the entire recycling cycle. Remember the three R’s?

    Reduce consumption. Reuse things that aren’t damaged. Recycle when it becomes unusable.

    Plastic containers don’t need to be melted down and remade into anything; they can be cleaned and reused. But we just throw them away, or send them to be recycled immediately, and still consume more; completely ignoring the first two R’s.

    All these containers could be, and maybe should be, going back to the manufacturer they came from to be washed and reused. And we consumers could try and consume less things that come in such packaging or containers since that’s the only way they will make fewer things in them, though that’s easier said than done.

    • Neato@ttrpg.networkEnglish
      0·
      10 months ago

      Plastic, which is made from oil and gas, is notoriously difficult to recycle. Doing so requires meticulous sorting, since most of the thousands of chemically distinct varieties of plastic cannot be recycled together. That renders an already pricey process even more expensive. Another challenge: the material degrades each time it is reused, meaning it can generally only be reused once or twice.

      The industry has known for decades about these existential challenges, but obscured that information in its marketing campaigns, the report shows.

      Nope, they just lied. It wasn’t just that people weren’t re-using, people ARE reusing plastic products. But industry lied about the viability and cost to recycle the material.

      At a 1956 industry conference, the Society of the Plastics Industry, a trade group, told producers to focus on “low cost, big volume” and “expendability” and to aim for materials to end up “in the garbage wagon”.

      Then they pushed non-reusability.

      An internal 1986 report from the trade association the Vinyl Institute noted that “recycling cannot be considered a permanent solid waste solution [to plastics], as it merely prolongs the time until an item is disposed of”.

      Despite this knowledge, the Society of the Plastics Industry established the Plastics Recycling Foundation in 1984, bringing together petrochemical companies and bottlers, and launched a campaign focused on the sector’s commitment to recycling.

      They’ve always known recycling to be a short term solution but hid that to get around the inevitable legislation against plastics.

      • Alexstarfire@lemmy.worldEnglish
        0·
        10 months ago

        Problem is that reducing on an individual level is difficult to impossible because I don’t control how things are given to me, i.e. takeout or how produce is packaged.

        • Neato@ttrpg.networkEnglish
          0·
          10 months ago

          Agreed. Individual conservation will never have the impact legislation can. For an example look at reusable grocery bags. Only a small minority of people used them when it was optional. But when localities banned disposable bags everyone had to.

          • buzz86us@lemmy.worldEnglish
            1·
            10 months ago

            Recently though faux reported that banning plastic bags increased plastic waste because people are too lazy to keep track of these reusable bags. I’ve kept on top of things, but I seriously doubt others have.