Nanoplastics breaching the blood-brain barrier and causing early-onset dementia at the level of society could in fact be our great filter. Seeing as how they're contaminating crops worldwide through rainfall.
That and, you know, self-destructive, utterly delusional hubris ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
We can't get past our own greed, as long as plastic is so cheap and it's precursor chemicals are so readily available to the point where we have more than we need I don't see it changing.
Note: this could be a WEIRD thing but since most of research on human behavior has been done by Westerners (the W in WEIRD) this can't be scientifically proven.
Moreso compressed, cooked and processed plant and bacteria goop. Just like today, the vast majority of the biomass of past eras was made up of plants and single cell organisms, not fauna.
Ive always imagined the dudes working in oil refineries spent their shifts hucking velociraptors into augurs or tossing triceratops on the grill to make oil for our cars.
And it’s one of those very profitable bi products of petroleum production, meaning there is virtually no way to stop the manufacture. we already know this group DGAF about the planet
Lead, mercury, asbestos, plastics, petrolium, cfcs... We keep poisoning ourselves in part because these materials are genuinely very good at certain things and the consequences don't show up until long after we've already gotten hooked on the benefits.
How has plastic made our lives healthier or longer?? Better how??
Aluminum is light and quickly recycles. Glass is forever and it’s clean. Plastic’s convenience is at what cost? No studies on that one by the oil industry, the FDA, DHHS, EPA, AMA.
Today I passed a sign in front of a tree (by a respected university)that quantified the tree’s value to the community for the year as, like, $46.85! I don’t get it. As if.
A few types of plastics are useful for their sanitary applications, as well as isolating substances to reduce exposure and contamination. I think there are good arguments for the use of certain durable plastics in specific applications. But definitely, definitely not most single-use "disposable" consumer products. There is no "away" into which things can be thrown. It's just over there, and with our becoming a planetary species, there is no longer an over there, either.
Really? The material that doesn't degrade in nature for like hundreds of years if not longer? That is used for almost everything? Not trying to be a dick here, it's just baffling to me that anyone might have thought plastic was even neutral in terms of environmental impact. Even when I was a young child we were learning about how plastic trash is infesting the ocean and killing wild life.
“Perhaps Mother Earth created humans simply because she wanted plastic but couldn't make it herself, needed us to create it for her, and now that we've done our job…”
its not plastics beeing the worst thing ever. its the people who dont know how to use it properly. a dumb zombie overpopulation getting its hands on this nice thing? what could go wrong.
powers come with responsibilities, its just in the wrong hands and or uneducated hands
go on and give two 10 year olds real light sabers
cant wait for most of humanity to get these powers taken from them
It's a tired argument when used to shift any and all responsibility away from the individual. I have friends who fly often for vacation, back home, 3 day trips. If anyone bring this up the argument is "billionaires" and "muh Taylor Swift" - I agree with both, I just disagree with it being used as an argument stopper. In this example, carbon emissions from airplanes is a massive contributor. I'm all for banning private jets and not having people amassing crazy wealth but I'm also recognising that some lifestyle changes are necessary.
They make you feel like your choice doesn't matter at all which is a very fatalistic view. You can be in favour of taxing the rich etc while also actively avoiding harmful industries and trying to buy locally (within your means ofc, it's not always possible)
Where I am we have to pay a fee on electronics to 'prepay' the disposal cost. If we priced in lifetime cleanup costs on plastics we would make a fast switch to something more sustainable.
We actually do that where I live ! (Belgium) Selling plastic packaging in the country requires a company to "handle" the recycling of the resulting waste. I put handle in quotes because in practice they give money to a third party (Fost Plus) that handles the recycling for them. As a result we have one of the highest recycling rates in the world !
Plastics shouldn’t be used at all. In straight recycling we’re talking one or two times max. Otherwise it’s almost always buried or “converted into energy”. Plastic recycling is largely a myth, because without new inputs (fresh plastics/oil) and a bunch more energy they don’t “recycle” (meaning back into plastic).
Edit: I’m not saying not to recycle btw. I’m just saying it would be better if we never used the plastics in the first place. Plastic clothes are even worse. Check your label, pretty much anything that isn’t natural (cotton, linen (hemp), wool, silk, leather, etc) is plastic. Most clothes that “give” and stretch are plastic.
I agree we should reduce plastics use as much as possible, but saying it can't be recycled is just plain wrong. This kind of policy incentivizes using less plastic, and finding other uses for it after its main utilization. Polyester clothing can be very durable, the only reason it often isn't is because it's associated with fast fashion... That's a separate issue.
But yeah, we need to keep pushing these policies further (which we do in the EU with PPWR) to massively reduce plastics consumption.
Eh, I mean useful plastics can only be recycled once or twice. This is a byproduct of chemistry.
And textiles are very very very very very hard to recycle, sorry. Your polyester clothing is never a mono-material, from zips to buttons to even the thread used to put the clothes together: they must be taken apart and separated. Even with machine learning and robots, this is super duper hard. Then the plastics you make from that thread are far inferior to the original.
If by recycle you mean a processes like HTL then maybe. But the EU doesn’t even count that as recycling. Material back to the same material with plastics just doesn’t make sense. Down cycling or material transformation, but straight recycling is a lie the oil companies tell.
I mean it's not just oil, paper is also of lower quality when recycled, so I wouldn't go all conspiracy theory unless you think big paper is also in on it :p
I take your point though, but I'm just using recycling to mean putting the material back to use, which is how most people use the word even if it's not fully accurate.
First off: it’s not a conspiracy theory, it is an actual proven conspiracy by oil and gas companies: https://www.npr.org/2020/09/11/897692090/how-big-oil-misled-the-public-into-believing-plastic-would-be-recycled
To your point on paper: sure but that byproduct (depending on glues used, etc) is essentially compost, not plastic slop. And paper can be recycled more times (5-10).
Finally, you should look into what the EU allows to be recycle, it’s not much. Less plastic is the real answer.
Of course big oil did PR around recycling, everybody and their mother knows that. But that doesn't mean recycling/downcycling is entirely bullshit. The world ain't black and white. You almost sound like you want people to just throw everything in the trash and we shouldn't even try to reuse the materials... I don't know what to tell you man. Personally I'm in favour of reducing waste, fuck me right ?
Not sure what you mean with your last sentence. There's more and more recycled/plastic-free/reusable/compostable packaging thanks to these kinds of policies.
If you're against it and just want to complain about plastic not being banned yet, alright, you do you, but it's not very productive.
I’m sorry to be the “actually” person, but PET, if properly separated, can be recycled 100% (and it already is). Depending on the country you’re in, bottles like Coca Cola started to have a grey-ish haze and that’s from recycled PET.
Of course bottle reduction would be beneficial for everyone, but that goes for cans (they have a plastic lining inside anyway) and glass (if empty bottles are reused, they are transported back and forth twice)
ABS for cars cannot be recycled, at least not at the same grade of products from which you start.
Its more complicated than that even. It really depends on the polymer on how many times it can be recycled like you said, but eventually the polymer chains do get broken into shorter and shorter segments. Even PET will exhibit that over time, if we want true recyclability we need a way to deconstruct the product without disrupting the chains which is it's own set of headaches.
That's also excluding all the wacky modifiers, copolymers, plasticizers, and functional groups plastics manufacturers can tack on to the chain or mix in that just complicate things.
There's not really a world where plastics of any kind don't shed microplastics. Mechanical abrasion and other forms of degradation will always make more, but one time use garbage really needs to be eliminated for the general use
From my understanding of the issue, for PET there is currently no known upper limit for the number of times it can be recycled. They’re adding some stuff to help re-lengthen the chains and of course it really depends on the PET grade the preform manufacturers are using (aka how “well” it was separated and recycled). 100% rPET needs some tricks during injection, and it has some trade-offs compared to virgin (not as transparent, AA accepted levels are different, etc), but it can be done. What’s tricky, at the moment, is the supply chain for it, easier in some countries and more complicated in others.
I am an environmentalist I believe in climate change and I think we need to do something about it actively.
That said, in defensive plastics, they are a very sanitary packaging material and are largely responsible for reducing preventable deaths due to foodborne illness.
It is 100% on the people as leaders, shareholders, billionaires are held in place by our consumption. We have to choose to vote with our dollar if the change is to happen but all I see is finger point to the aforementioned group. They are not going to change.
Lol. Just like child labor, civil rights, lead in gas, it's the people who made the change. It wasn't government mandates or lawmakers changing thjngs.
They built the culture of consumption, you want to vote with your dollar? They already have 99.99% of the wealth and control the entire global financial industry, you're trying to leverage a fixed system that can and has changed the rules any time they wanted.
I'm not certain what you mean by "decentralized alternatives."
Because if that's any part of the Global Financial Infrastructure and Central Banks, all of that is one giant connected spider web that Epstein was only a small fraction of, because the whole thing is a part of that vile filth.
Allow me to give an example. If we all jumped on let’s say Lemmy the decentralized Reddit, Reddit and its billionaire would cease to exist as they would not survive the financial chaos. same if we all jumped to the countless decentralized alternatives for pretty much every digital service. The only issue with the decentralized alternatives is they have so few users that they lack the depth of content of their centralized counterparts. We choose to fund the billionaires by staying on their platform. I use decentralized alternatives everyday as my first stop the centralized ones until more make the transition. I tried full time on decentralized and there is really just not enough content, but I keep my poker in the fire as I want to be the change in the world and hope others will do the same as it would hit a tipping point.
Like a bunch of advancements we could be making, the boomer c suites need to load up before retirement so any short term pain long term gain to stock price is not appreciated
On a global scale, this warming effect is still relatively small. But over ocean regions with high concentrations of plastic, such as the North Pacific Garbage Patch, it can exceed that of black carbon by nearly a factor of 5.
Another reminder of how interconnected everything is. Plastic pollution isn’t just an ocean or wildlife issue anymore. Has this been factored into current climate models, or is this a new variable they’re adding?
The fact that it’s comparable to 16% of black carbon’s warming effect is pretty significant. Great find ,thanks for sharing. I’m curious how much of this is from single-use plastics vs. more durable sources
In a few millennia the r/plasticage sub will be showing definitive plastic layers in the sediment and they will ponder at how we nearly encapsulated the planet in a substance of our own creation that nearly wiped us out.
“[..]colored micro- and nanoplastics suspended in the atmosphere may contribute to global warming at a level equal to 16% of that caused by black carbon, or soot.”
Because the article doesn't clarify, black carbon itself contributes roughly 15-30% of overall global warming (with carbon dioxide being the biggest contributor), so this seems to be saying plastics contribute somewhere in the 2-5% range.
Colored microplastics and nanoplastics are refracting light in a way that increases global warming, pretty crazy:
“The findings, published Monday in Nature Climate Change, show that colored micro- and nanoplastics suspended in the atmosphere may contribute to global warming at a level equal to 16% of that caused by black carbon, or soot. The study adds to mounting evidence that plastic pollution doesn’t just degrade terrestrial and marine ecosystems—it can also influence Earth’s climate.”
I don't know whether to laugh or cry about the fact that there's even microplastics in the air we breathe, I once had a girlfriend who was obsessed with avoiding plastics, I can't even imagine how she would react if she found out about this.
It's a cold comfort, but something that helps me...
If it were my choice, and I could work my will, I would have us making those decomposing, plant-based plastics, and using them instead. But I can't do that.
We're very limited in what we can do. We can do some things, but it is limited.
I'd like to think the desire to do good is a solid start.
A lot of people share that will and sentiment, and have for awhile. We’ve been derailed by misinformation and greed, but the world can see no other choice- a few egos are the only limiting factor. So very few individual sick egos when the global decimation is considered for scale.
Reminds me of the Good Place episode where everyone was going to hell because they couldn't do anything nice without a bunch of unintended consequences. Want to buy flowers for your mom? You just contributed to killing bees and child slavery
Petroleum is an aggregate mineral substance, there's a theory it might actually be produced over hundreds of millions of years of accumulated waste (feces) of nematodes. But no, it's not from dinosaurs or plants. Rockefeller and Global Finance and Banking Hierarchies paid good money to promote that falsehood, all so they could claim it was a scarce "limited" resource in order justify establishing it as a controlled market and to charge exhorbitant prices for it, all in order to maintain the global status quo the Finance industry has been presiding over since feudal times.
Okay, very serious article and all, but I read "and it's everywhere" as a lyric from Spın̈al Tap's song The Majesty of Rock. So I immediately followed it with the next line, "It's in the mud and it's in your blood," which was unsurprisingly accurate.
30_Under_The_40 | a day ago
I never thought plastic would turn out to be the worst thing ever, but here we are
miklayn | a day ago
Plastics are pretty much the hardened residues of oil production. They are one and the same industry.
(Yes I know the chemistry is more complex than this)
BigTomBombadil | a day ago
It’s not that much more complex. Plastics are just hydrocarbon-based polymers. Absolutely part of the fossil fuel industry.
One one hand, the goal isn’t to actively burn them (like oil or gas), so less pollution in that regard. On the other hand…. Everything else.
miklayn | a day ago
Nanoplastics breaching the blood-brain barrier and causing early-onset dementia at the level of society could in fact be our great filter. Seeing as how they're contaminating crops worldwide through rainfall.
That and, you know, self-destructive, utterly delusional hubris ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
fuccguppy | a day ago
We can't get past our own greed, as long as plastic is so cheap and it's precursor chemicals are so readily available to the point where we have more than we need I don't see it changing.
TheArcticFox444 | 21 hours ago
>We can't get past our own greed
Reduce further...we can't get past our own egos.
Note: this could be a WEIRD thing but since most of research on human behavior has been done by Westerners (the W in WEIRD) this can't be scientifically proven.
SquidTheRidiculous | 22 hours ago
But on the plus side, a bunch of pedophiles made bank off of it.
That's going to be our legacy as a species. Monkeys that could not stop following the orders of predators even as their planet boiled.
Spekingur | a day ago
Plastic is just repurposed dinosaur goop
miklayn | a day ago
Moreso compressed, cooked and processed plant and bacteria goop. Just like today, the vast majority of the biomass of past eras was made up of plants and single cell organisms, not fauna.
Spekingur | a day ago
Sssh let me have this
miklayn | a day ago
♥️🙏🏻🌸
diablosinmusica | a day ago
I mean, it is a Science sub.
Spekingur | a day ago
Doesn’t mean you can’t have fun 😁
diablosinmusica | a day ago
Yeah, you shouldn't complain if you're called out, though.
Spekingur | a day ago
Sir, this is Reddit.
Alert-Ad9197 | a day ago
I am a self-certified goopologist, and I can assure you that it is mostly dinosaur in my opinion.
Grutenfreenooder | a day ago
Ive always imagined the dudes working in oil refineries spent their shifts hucking velociraptors into augurs or tossing triceratops on the grill to make oil for our cars.
Nisseliten | a day ago
They should really make another episode of the flintstones where their ancestors do that and complain about work.
DiesByOxSnot | a day ago
Mineral oil is repurposed dinosaur goop, created as a byproduct of oil refinement
txroller | a day ago
And it’s one of those very profitable bi products of petroleum production, meaning there is virtually no way to stop the manufacture. we already know this group DGAF about the planet
Dry_Instruction8254 | a day ago
Come on. Like 2% of all plastic ever made has been recycled. That's not good enough for you?
Recycling plastic is such a scam.
miklayn | a day ago
Plus the fact that recycling processes themselves also produce unfathomable amounts of micro and nanoplastics.
BigSkeleWizard | a day ago
Byproducts
DiesByOxSnot | a day ago
Let him cook the bisexual products, big skele wizard
Due-Measurement-3315 | 23 hours ago
There is a way to stop it but we all have to decide we're fed up first.
lidsville76 | a day ago
It's so fucked up. Plastic has made our lives better, healthier and longer, while simultaneously making us sicker, worse off and shortening our lives.
victimofcynicism | a day ago
Plastic…the cause of and solution to all life’s problems!
AstronomerRadiant219 | a day ago
If only I could eat it and the magic would become part of me!!
imaginedaydream | a day ago
Or u can pay someone to install it in your body!
AstronomerRadiant219 | a day ago
I was thinking of just plasti-dipping my body. Good on the inside means good on the outside!
Bloo212 | a day ago
I mean, we can and do eat it… but we shouldn’t.
xeddyb | a day ago
Wonder if people once said the same thing about lead
manystripes | a day ago
Lead, mercury, asbestos, plastics, petrolium, cfcs... We keep poisoning ourselves in part because these materials are genuinely very good at certain things and the consequences don't show up until long after we've already gotten hooked on the benefits.
Sh0wMeUrKitties | a day ago
I think that we should have definitely not have decided it is a good one-time use, disposable material.
Dapper_Apricot9034 | a day ago
It wouldn't be so bad if it was more tightly regulated on use, AKA only for things which "require" it.
Probably a bit extreme, but so are wet-bulb temps so fuck if I know.
BogdanPradatu | a day ago
How did plastic make our lives healthier?
gurgelblaster | 23 hours ago
> Plastic has made our lives better, healthier and longer,
Has it?
AcknowledgeUs | a day ago
How has plastic made our lives healthier or longer?? Better how??
Aluminum is light and quickly recycles. Glass is forever and it’s clean. Plastic’s convenience is at what cost? No studies on that one by the oil industry, the FDA, DHHS, EPA, AMA.
Today I passed a sign in front of a tree (by a respected university)that quantified the tree’s value to the community for the year as, like, $46.85! I don’t get it. As if.
Xeorm124 | a day ago
Helps a lot with medicine and the packaging with it. Cheap material and easy to keep clean. Works great in that regard.
miklayn | a day ago
A few types of plastics are useful for their sanitary applications, as well as isolating substances to reduce exposure and contamination. I think there are good arguments for the use of certain durable plastics in specific applications. But definitely, definitely not most single-use "disposable" consumer products. There is no "away" into which things can be thrown. It's just over there, and with our becoming a planetary species, there is no longer an over there, either.
aculady | a day ago
Ask anyone with a Dacron artery replacement.
beachbum818 | a day ago
IV bags, syringes, prosthetics, contacts, dialysis, artificial valves, vials, tubing,
Ogen-Funguspumpkin | a day ago
condoms
No-Suggestion8536 | a day ago
Artificial valves are NOT made of plastic
beachbum818 | a day ago
Never said entirely. They do consist of polymers though....which is a higher end more fancy form of plastic. How about Dacron artery replacements?
Forsterite90 | a day ago
It is literally accumulating in our brains and we don't know what the effects will be.
PossibleAlienFrom | a day ago
Well, we have large cults in the US. That could possibly be one of the effects.
AcknowledgeUs | a day ago
I so agree! Maybe their susceptibility to damage is a virus, but there’s definitely evidence of damage.
grapescherries | a day ago
I think it was pretty predictable.
Due-Measurement-3315 | 23 hours ago
Really? The material that doesn't degrade in nature for like hundreds of years if not longer? That is used for almost everything? Not trying to be a dick here, it's just baffling to me that anyone might have thought plastic was even neutral in terms of environmental impact. Even when I was a young child we were learning about how plastic trash is infesting the ocean and killing wild life.
siqiniq | a day ago
“Perhaps Mother Earth created humans simply because she wanted plastic but couldn't make it herself, needed us to create it for her, and now that we've done our job…”
Hot-Equivalent9189 | a day ago
Just like lead.
livingbeeing | a day ago
its not plastics beeing the worst thing ever. its the people who dont know how to use it properly. a dumb zombie overpopulation getting its hands on this nice thing? what could go wrong.
powers come with responsibilities, its just in the wrong hands and or uneducated hands
go on and give two 10 year olds real light sabers
cant wait for most of humanity to get these powers taken from them
KyurMeTV | a day ago
Is it billionaires? It should be billionaires.
PhoenixGate69 | a day ago
At this point it's getting embarrassing to see news try to blame anything else.
hellzyeah2 | a day ago
It’s almost like the billionaires literally own all the media outlets.
SAHMultrA1981 | a day ago
Billionaires private jets..
Neuron-nomad | a day ago
Those aren't everywhere. It's only about 3000 people.
sagebrushrepair | a day ago
It is. They think they'll get away with it too!
almost_adequate | a day ago
Billionaires are the new millionaires
stoputa | a day ago
It's a tired argument when used to shift any and all responsibility away from the individual. I have friends who fly often for vacation, back home, 3 day trips. If anyone bring this up the argument is "billionaires" and "muh Taylor Swift" - I agree with both, I just disagree with it being used as an argument stopper. In this example, carbon emissions from airplanes is a massive contributor. I'm all for banning private jets and not having people amassing crazy wealth but I'm also recognising that some lifestyle changes are necessary.
They make you feel like your choice doesn't matter at all which is a very fatalistic view. You can be in favour of taxing the rich etc while also actively avoiding harmful industries and trying to buy locally (within your means ofc, it's not always possible)
Artifexa | a day ago
When are we gonna realize that plastics are crap and we need to go back to biodegradable materials?
Or, rather, since SHAREHOLDERS won't listen... How to make them profitable enough for shareholders so they decide to leave plastics?
--VitaminB-- | a day ago
Where I am we have to pay a fee on electronics to 'prepay' the disposal cost. If we priced in lifetime cleanup costs on plastics we would make a fast switch to something more sustainable.
CaptainShaky | a day ago
We actually do that where I live ! (Belgium) Selling plastic packaging in the country requires a company to "handle" the recycling of the resulting waste. I put handle in quotes because in practice they give money to a third party (Fost Plus) that handles the recycling for them. As a result we have one of the highest recycling rates in the world !
CTRexPope | a day ago
Plastics shouldn’t be used at all. In straight recycling we’re talking one or two times max. Otherwise it’s almost always buried or “converted into energy”. Plastic recycling is largely a myth, because without new inputs (fresh plastics/oil) and a bunch more energy they don’t “recycle” (meaning back into plastic).
Edit: I’m not saying not to recycle btw. I’m just saying it would be better if we never used the plastics in the first place. Plastic clothes are even worse. Check your label, pretty much anything that isn’t natural (cotton, linen (hemp), wool, silk, leather, etc) is plastic. Most clothes that “give” and stretch are plastic.
CaptainShaky | 18 hours ago
I agree we should reduce plastics use as much as possible, but saying it can't be recycled is just plain wrong. This kind of policy incentivizes using less plastic, and finding other uses for it after its main utilization. Polyester clothing can be very durable, the only reason it often isn't is because it's associated with fast fashion... That's a separate issue.
But yeah, we need to keep pushing these policies further (which we do in the EU with PPWR) to massively reduce plastics consumption.
CTRexPope | 18 hours ago
Eh, I mean useful plastics can only be recycled once or twice. This is a byproduct of chemistry.
And textiles are very very very very very hard to recycle, sorry. Your polyester clothing is never a mono-material, from zips to buttons to even the thread used to put the clothes together: they must be taken apart and separated. Even with machine learning and robots, this is super duper hard. Then the plastics you make from that thread are far inferior to the original.
If by recycle you mean a processes like HTL then maybe. But the EU doesn’t even count that as recycling. Material back to the same material with plastics just doesn’t make sense. Down cycling or material transformation, but straight recycling is a lie the oil companies tell.
CaptainShaky | 18 hours ago
I mean it's not just oil, paper is also of lower quality when recycled, so I wouldn't go all conspiracy theory unless you think big paper is also in on it :p
I take your point though, but I'm just using recycling to mean putting the material back to use, which is how most people use the word even if it's not fully accurate.
CTRexPope | 18 hours ago
First off: it’s not a conspiracy theory, it is an actual proven conspiracy by oil and gas companies: https://www.npr.org/2020/09/11/897692090/how-big-oil-misled-the-public-into-believing-plastic-would-be-recycled
To your point on paper: sure but that byproduct (depending on glues used, etc) is essentially compost, not plastic slop. And paper can be recycled more times (5-10).
Finally, you should look into what the EU allows to be recycle, it’s not much. Less plastic is the real answer.
CaptainShaky | 18 hours ago
Of course big oil did PR around recycling, everybody and their mother knows that. But that doesn't mean recycling/downcycling is entirely bullshit. The world ain't black and white. You almost sound like you want people to just throw everything in the trash and we shouldn't even try to reuse the materials... I don't know what to tell you man. Personally I'm in favour of reducing waste, fuck me right ?
Not sure what you mean with your last sentence. There's more and more recycled/plastic-free/reusable/compostable packaging thanks to these kinds of policies.
If you're against it and just want to complain about plastic not being banned yet, alright, you do you, but it's not very productive.
CTRexPope | 18 hours ago
I’m sorry you didn’t read or understand anything I said.
flop_plop | a day ago
Certain plastics have value. It’s the one time use and temporary plastics that need to go.
For example, plastics in a car that will be used for a decade or two… sure.
Your fucking Pepsi from 7-11, absolutely not
1028ad | a day ago
I’m sorry to be the “actually” person, but PET, if properly separated, can be recycled 100% (and it already is). Depending on the country you’re in, bottles like Coca Cola started to have a grey-ish haze and that’s from recycled PET.
Of course bottle reduction would be beneficial for everyone, but that goes for cans (they have a plastic lining inside anyway) and glass (if empty bottles are reused, they are transported back and forth twice)
ABS for cars cannot be recycled, at least not at the same grade of products from which you start.
99Prettyboy99 | 22 hours ago
Its more complicated than that even. It really depends on the polymer on how many times it can be recycled like you said, but eventually the polymer chains do get broken into shorter and shorter segments. Even PET will exhibit that over time, if we want true recyclability we need a way to deconstruct the product without disrupting the chains which is it's own set of headaches.
That's also excluding all the wacky modifiers, copolymers, plasticizers, and functional groups plastics manufacturers can tack on to the chain or mix in that just complicate things.
There's not really a world where plastics of any kind don't shed microplastics. Mechanical abrasion and other forms of degradation will always make more, but one time use garbage really needs to be eliminated for the general use
1028ad | 22 hours ago
From my understanding of the issue, for PET there is currently no known upper limit for the number of times it can be recycled. They’re adding some stuff to help re-lengthen the chains and of course it really depends on the PET grade the preform manufacturers are using (aka how “well” it was separated and recycled). 100% rPET needs some tricks during injection, and it has some trade-offs compared to virgin (not as transparent, AA accepted levels are different, etc), but it can be done. What’s tricky, at the moment, is the supply chain for it, easier in some countries and more complicated in others.
Myxine | a day ago
We need "shareholder" to become a type of person that doesn't exist anymore.
Ombortron | a day ago
There are a few companies experimenting with this. Not enough lol but it’s a start at least.
Aeon1508 | a day ago
I am an environmentalist I believe in climate change and I think we need to do something about it actively.
That said, in defensive plastics, they are a very sanitary packaging material and are largely responsible for reducing preventable deaths due to foodborne illness.
there's a reason it's everywhere.
immersive-matthew | a day ago
It is 100% on the people as leaders, shareholders, billionaires are held in place by our consumption. We have to choose to vote with our dollar if the change is to happen but all I see is finger point to the aforementioned group. They are not going to change.
diablosinmusica | a day ago
Lol. Just like child labor, civil rights, lead in gas, it's the people who made the change. It wasn't government mandates or lawmakers changing thjngs.
Pandemonium_Fallen | a day ago
They built the culture of consumption, you want to vote with your dollar? They already have 99.99% of the wealth and control the entire global financial industry, you're trying to leverage a fixed system that can and has changed the rules any time they wanted.
immersive-matthew | 19 hours ago
But they cannot control decentralized alternatives.
Pandemonium_Fallen | 19 hours ago
I'm not certain what you mean by "decentralized alternatives."
Because if that's any part of the Global Financial Infrastructure and Central Banks, all of that is one giant connected spider web that Epstein was only a small fraction of, because the whole thing is a part of that vile filth.
immersive-matthew | 10 hours ago
Allow me to give an example. If we all jumped on let’s say Lemmy the decentralized Reddit, Reddit and its billionaire would cease to exist as they would not survive the financial chaos. same if we all jumped to the countless decentralized alternatives for pretty much every digital service. The only issue with the decentralized alternatives is they have so few users that they lack the depth of content of their centralized counterparts. We choose to fund the billionaires by staying on their platform. I use decentralized alternatives everyday as my first stop the centralized ones until more make the transition. I tried full time on decentralized and there is really just not enough content, but I keep my poker in the fire as I want to be the change in the world and hope others will do the same as it would hit a tipping point.
Darling_Pinky | a day ago
Like a bunch of advancements we could be making, the boomer c suites need to load up before retirement so any short term pain long term gain to stock price is not appreciated
Pandemonium_Fallen | a day ago
It's not really about profit sadly, it's about ensuring the continuation of the status quo at all costs.
famousroadkill | a day ago
Oh my God, it's PEOPLE!!!
Rickshmitt | a day ago
Soylent green?!
AlienPet13 | a day ago
No thanks, I just had lunch.
UrinalCake777 | a day ago
Turns out its man!
slanderpanther | a day ago
Actually, it’s men.
shivaswrath | a day ago
Fawkkkkkkk:
On a global scale, this warming effect is still relatively small. But over ocean regions with high concentrations of plastic, such as the North Pacific Garbage Patch, it can exceed that of black carbon by nearly a factor of 5.
mulf_grandma_1 | a day ago
Another reminder of how interconnected everything is. Plastic pollution isn’t just an ocean or wildlife issue anymore. Has this been factored into current climate models, or is this a new variable they’re adding? The fact that it’s comparable to 16% of black carbon’s warming effect is pretty significant. Great find ,thanks for sharing. I’m curious how much of this is from single-use plastics vs. more durable sources
BDLT | a day ago
In a few millennia the r/plasticage sub will be showing definitive plastic layers in the sediment and they will ponder at how we nearly encapsulated the planet in a substance of our own creation that nearly wiped us out.
Thick_Bullfrog_3640 | a day ago
r/subsifellfor
qtcbelle | a day ago
You are very optimistic.
lemonaintsour | a day ago
Nearly?
codenamegizm0 | a day ago
Nearly wiped us out lol.
already-taken-wtf | a day ago
“[..]colored micro- and nanoplastics suspended in the atmosphere may contribute to global warming at a level equal to 16% of that caused by black carbon, or soot.”
HootingSloth | 23 hours ago
Because the article doesn't clarify, black carbon itself contributes roughly 15-30% of overall global warming (with carbon dioxide being the biggest contributor), so this seems to be saying plastics contribute somewhere in the 2-5% range.
Dchama86 | a day ago
So, still fossil fuels
matznerd | a day ago
Colored microplastics and nanoplastics are refracting light in a way that increases global warming, pretty crazy:
“The findings, published Monday in Nature Climate Change, show that colored micro- and nanoplastics suspended in the atmosphere may contribute to global warming at a level equal to 16% of that caused by black carbon, or soot. The study adds to mounting evidence that plastic pollution doesn’t just degrade terrestrial and marine ecosystems—it can also influence Earth’s climate.”
AndersDreth | a day ago
I don't know whether to laugh or cry about the fact that there's even microplastics in the air we breathe, I once had a girlfriend who was obsessed with avoiding plastics, I can't even imagine how she would react if she found out about this.
Kuyi | a day ago
Tell her please. Or let me do it.
Fun-atParties | 21 hours ago
sounds like she was ahead of her time
GoodWhoops | a day ago
This is giving, "Men only want one thing, and it's disgusting!"
TeranOrSolaran | a day ago
Microplastics
Feindish-OD | a day ago
"It's gonna be massive. It's gonna be brutal. Death will come from plastic. Death will come from people."
-King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard-
JimroidZeus | 23 hours ago
Fuck we are so dumb.
costafilh0 | a day ago
Thanks!
Always lovely to read how it is all my fault.
Imperialvirtue | a day ago
It's a cold comfort, but something that helps me...
If it were my choice, and I could work my will, I would have us making those decomposing, plant-based plastics, and using them instead. But I can't do that.
We're very limited in what we can do. We can do some things, but it is limited.
I'd like to think the desire to do good is a solid start.
AcknowledgeUs | a day ago
A lot of people share that will and sentiment, and have for awhile. We’ve been derailed by misinformation and greed, but the world can see no other choice- a few egos are the only limiting factor. So very few individual sick egos when the global decimation is considered for scale.
cdqmcp | a day ago
it's not your fault. remember, there is no ethical consumption under capitalism.
Fun-atParties | 21 hours ago
Reminds me of the Good Place episode where everyone was going to hell because they couldn't do anything nice without a bunch of unintended consequences. Want to buy flowers for your mom? You just contributed to killing bees and child slavery
Basicly-Inevitable | a day ago
The SUN!!?
gpenido | a day ago
Even more Beautiful
livingbeeing | 23 hours ago
ouuuh
Pandemonium_Fallen | a day ago
Petroleum is an aggregate mineral substance, there's a theory it might actually be produced over hundreds of millions of years of accumulated waste (feces) of nematodes. But no, it's not from dinosaurs or plants. Rockefeller and Global Finance and Banking Hierarchies paid good money to promote that falsehood, all so they could claim it was a scarce "limited" resource in order justify establishing it as a controlled market and to charge exhorbitant prices for it, all in order to maintain the global status quo the Finance industry has been presiding over since feudal times.
dettox1 | a day ago
increasingly concerned about the health problems that microplastics can cause, in the air and in water
JackJak95 | a day ago
Will always be a problem especially since car tires contribute so much to the amount. The bad news is there isn’t an alternative for them yet
waffle299 | a day ago
Stupidity?
Chaos_Theory1989 | a day ago
Is it Trump’s farts and poop diapers?
Kern2001Co | a day ago
The valcano that is about to erupt should help with global cooling.
The_MadMage_Halaster | a day ago
Okay, very serious article and all, but I read "and it's everywhere" as a lyric from Spın̈al Tap's song The Majesty of Rock. So I immediately followed it with the next line, "It's in the mud and it's in your blood," which was unsurprisingly accurate.
Kind-Distribution813 | a day ago
Mushroom Spores
SpicyOrangeReboot | 22 hours ago
The headline should really read as ‘why billionaires are the real threat to the Globe’.
pacten | 19 hours ago
This was very informative - why was it removed??