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? Voices of caution for bringing chemical recycling to developing countries
Posted on July 2, 2024 by DrRossH in GeneralDiplomats and others at a U.N. forum on chemical recycling called for caution in bringing the technology to developing countries with poor waste management capacity.
Source: Voices of caution for bringing chemical recycling to developing countries | Plastics News
A technical adviser to the International Pollutants Elimination Network, however, argued that the technology should not be used either in developing or developed countries, because of hazardous waste production and low yields of useful material.
IPEN adviser Lee Bell said that putting chemical recycling plants in developing countries could increase the export of plastic waste.
“There’s a high risk of driving plastic waste exports to developing countries, which have poorer regulation, which may lead to emissions impacts and hazardous waste risks to public health,” Bell said. “If you set up these facilities in developing countries, there will be the argument that you can export under different aspects of the Basel Convention for recycling.”
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