July 2011 - Plastic Waste Solutions
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Rise in recycling rates?
Posted on July 25, 2011 by DrRossH in Plastic Waste NewsInside Waste Weekly reported last week that the government’s announcement of a carbon price plan might well lead to a rise in recycling rates for high embodied energy materials such as aluminium and plastics, but could also bring challenges such...
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Brisbane Australia to Open Landfill Gas Facility
Posted on July 15, 2011 by DrRossH in Plastic Waste NewsBrisbane will commence a landfill gas operation to turn the city's waste into electricity. Brisbane Lord Mayor Graham Quirk announced that Landfill Gas Industries would build the plant at a remediated landfill site at Willawong in the city's south...
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Why should plastics degrade in landfills?
Posted on July 13, 2011 by DrRossH in Plastic Waste NewsWhy should plastics degrade in landfills? Is that useful? Is it just landfill space? It seems that our eagerness to produce degradable plastics is short sighted and possibly irresponsible Reply from Teresa Clarke of Enso. It seems the question...
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Methane Emissions Concerns for Compostable Plastics?
Posted on July 7, 2011 by DrRossH in Plastic Waste NewsResearch and articles about biodegradable plastics releasing methane too quickly in landfills have been taking over the internet this past June. An alarming title to draw readers in, splashed on a article/blog written with bits of information that have trickled...
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How many people today grab a takeaway coffee cup from the local cafe to drink on the go? We don’t know, but the number must be enormous.. Most every one of the above have a plastic top that will last 100s of years. Some cafes still use plastic cups that last a similar time. Is 10 minutes of coffee worth 100s of years of trash?
These items can be seen littering our gutters and on our streets all over the place. If they were all cardboard, they would still be littered, but they would, at least, be gone in a short time.
They do not need to be made of plastic.
On the way home from the gym last week, a distance of about 1 km (1/2 mile), I counted the items of plastic litter on the curb as I walked. In that short distance I counted 63 pieces of plastic litter. Plastic drink bottles, bottle tops, candy wrappers, plastic film, polystyrene fragments etc. That seemed to be a lot to me. I guess it is a generational thing. Our parents would have been horrified to see that amount, whereas it seems to go unnoticed by our youth of today. In another 20 years how many pieces will there be on this stretch, -- 200? What will today’s youth think of that new amount then when they are older? Will their children be so readily accepting of a higher amount of litter?