And they knew all along - https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/feb/15/recycling-plastics-producers-report
this post was submitted on 20 Feb 2024
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I would be really interested in seeing this broken down by nation. Are any countries doing this better than others. Can others learn from them?
Or... are we simply a complete failure as a species... destined to become [choose your post apocalyptic story]
I'd like to see this broken down by sector. This is consumer-shaming enough, when a good portion of it is probably industrial non-consumer use.
I reduce, I reuse. But completely avoiding plastics is near impossible and I just wish I could know if there's something I personally could actually do to actually make a difference. My government might be failing at ensuring recycling amounts to something, but perhaps there are other governments doing a better job? I can't tell you how much anxiety experience because of plastic use...
You're right, though, because this almost entirely resides on the various sectors producing the plastics in the first place.
This is also very frustrating. We are literally killing ourselves.
Recycling is a distraction. Always has been. It's a marketing and regulatory capture ploy by the plastics industry to avoid any responsibility for their colossal waste.
Sure, recycling before a tiny bit, in the margin, maybe, but imagine where we'd be if all the money and effort that went into recycling instead went into materials engineering to create biodegradable alternatives to one-tube-user plastics?
In fact, getting rid of recycling globally might actually help since it would highlight to people how much they're putting into the landfill. That might actually spark some political will to regulate plastics better, instead of just high-optics items like plastic bags and straws.