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? Are compostable coffee cups actually any better for the environment? – Australia
Posted on May 26, 2024 by DrRossH in BioPlasticsSold and marketed as environmentally friendly, compostable food packaging has been exploding in popularity in Australia. But is it any better than the plastic it’s replaced?
Source: Are compostable coffee cups actually any better for the environment? – ABC News
Coffee cups are just one product that can be looked at.
Binliners from compostable materials also have a raft of issues. To that point that fogo bin bin liners are now being banned too in some places.
Green bin compostable packaging policy, by state and territory
- NSW: Banned
- Victoria: Proposed ban
- South Australia: Accepted
- Queensland: Not recommended
- Western Australia: Not recommended
- Tasmania: Accepted in some councils
- ACT: Banned
*The Northern Territory does not have any active FOGO facilities
So, should we be using compostable packaging at all?
It depends who you ask.
The head of the Waste Management and Resource Recovery Association of Australia, which represents all the industries that deal with waste and recycling says compostable packaging could be useful if we had a system set up around it to ensure it is safe and actually ends up in compost.
She says manufacturers should take responsibility for making sure that happens, but for now, compostable packaging isn’t something we should be encouraging more of.
“It’s a good idea in theory, but in practice, we don’t have the system for them at scale,” she says.
Which is what the UN confirmed at the Kenya talks in 2023.
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