Jeff's latest new instance seems to be humanist.social
plastic recycling problems
Here are some of the widespread issues with plastic recycling, some well-known, others less so:
- The recycling process produces microplastics that end up in the environment
- That's because most plastic recycling processes require large amounts of water to clean the plastics; the only exception I know of is "dry-pressing", but that's useless for packaging, which is one of the biggest contributors to plastic waste
- Each recycling 'pass' reduces the polymer chain length, thereby making the plastic weaker, meaning it can only be recycled a finite amount of times
- 'Virgin' plastic (ie. produced from raw oil) is cheaper than recycled plastic to produce
- In some countries, the definition of "recycling" includes "burning it for power"
- A major bottleneck in the recycling process is the plastic type sorting stage; these machines are expensive and have limited capacity
- While soluble and metallic contaminants can often be automatically removed, others (such as fabrics) cannot, and require humans to pick it out
- Most sorting processes are optical, and just straight-up cannot sort black plastics because they cannot 'see' what type it is; all light is absorbed
- Sorting by plastic type is a hard requirement; not doing so means you will end up with uselessly weak plastics after recycling
- Only packaging plastics can be recycled in most recycling streams; non-packaging plastics typically have additives that interfere with the recycling process, or aren't even food-safe
- Plastic 'film' is notoriously difficult to recycle into anything useful; we're not just talking saran wrap here, but also for example plastic bags and the shrinkwrap around drinks bottles or cans! Basically anything you can fold without breaking it.
- Composite plastics (ie. things made from more than one plastic type) are essentially just unrecyclable; this often includes things like 'plastic tubs with aluminium lids glued to them'
- Did I mention that virgin plastic is cheaper? Plastic that's collected for "recycling", if not burned locally, is often just shipped to poorer countries to get rid of it, typically with large amounts of contaminants
So yeah, about that 'recycling'...
It will also have no buttons at all. Neither physical nor on the screen. The next generation of phone OSes will use AI to automatically show you exactly what you want*, so you can just look at your phone without having to touch it
*ads. It will only show you ads
Periodic reminder to descale your SiliconGraphics IRIS Indigo.
Don't wait for the L1 cache to clog up! #espressigo
EDIT: The Espressigo was a real product sold by SGI in Germany for 1790 Deutsche Mark! I didn't rip out the guts of an Indigo!!
@schratze I've lived in a few places where you need a rfid card from the municipality to unlock the garbage bins. Which wouldn't work in Germany, because you'd have to fax a Abfallbehälteröffnungsanforderingsdokument three months in advance of each time you want to throw something away.
Trying to figure something out... please boost for reach!
Do you have #ADHD, and have you been to the dentist at all *in the past year* (even if just for a check-up)?
In the process of moving to @joepie91. This account will stay active for the foreseeable future! But please also follow the other one.
Technical debt collector and general hype-hater. Early 30s, non-binary, ND, poly, relationship anarchist, generally queer.
- No alt text (request) = no boost.
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- Flirting welcome, but be explicit if you want something out of it!
- The devil doesn't need an advocate; no combative arguing in my mentions.
Sometimes horny on main (behind CW), very much into kink (bondage, freeuse, CNC, and other stuff), and believe it or not, very much a submissive bottom :p
My spoons are limited, so I may not always have the energy to respond to messages.
Strong views about abolishing oppression, hierarchy, agency, and self-governance - but I also trust people by default and give them room to grow, unless they give me reason not to. That all also applies to technology and how it's built.