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? 
APR Plastics finds solution for soft plastics recycling challenge – Australia
Posted on November 20, 2024 by DrRossH in Plastic RecyclingDarren Thorpe and the team at APR Plastics is pioneering recycling technology in Australia that will give soft plastics a second life.
Source: APR Plastics finds solution for soft plastics recycling challenge – Waste Management Review
Most soft plastics, such as chip packets and chocolate wrappers, are multilayered. The outside is polypropylene, but the inside is barrier film that protects the integrity of the food. Traditional mechanical recycling processes cannot separate the layers, so soft plastics have been considered a contaminant.
APR’s process will separate the polypropylene from the barrier film. The polypropylene will be turned into a vapour and then condensed into an oil which will be sent to a refinery to be further processed so it can be reused in food-grade plastic products.
The facility will receive material from the new sorting line and process up to 10 tonnes of polypropylene material a day, seven days a week.
Good luck to these guys. There are some waste stream issues here that are not mentioned however. Plus the energy being consumed to do this.
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