Why aren't we recycling more?

[hatt]

Originally Posted by supton
Originally Posted by hatt
Originally Posted by supton
Interesting about aluminum. Few months ago I got curious about the can vs bottle argument, as I do like beer on occasion, and it seemed that the various green articles I came across indicated a tie. I wasn't so sure about it, but I couldn't argue either way. I thought melting glass took a lot more energy than melting aluminum, plus the extra shipping weight; but all the articles talked about the energy cost of making virgin aluminum. What I didn't know was that they coat the inside of aluminum cans with plastic, just a thin layer, to prevent interaction.

Our county doesn't recycle glass. So that angle is off the table.

Cans are the superior vessel for beer. Oxygen and light are beer killers. Bottles are also significantly heavier and more bulky than cans.

Eh, we drink more wine than beer. The good stuff comes in glass bottles, the box stuff has a ways to go.

Originally Posted by Shannow
https://www.aluminum.org/aluminum-can-advantage

Quick glance shows what I thought was true, but I'm not sure how unbiased "The Aluminum Association" is. Good link though, thanks.

Boxed wine just is what it is. The better stuff is going to come in bottles. If you drink the wine that comes in boxes the box will be just as good as the bottled version with the boxed version having advantages such as remaining drinkable for weeks after opening.

If you're talking about the same wine available in bottle or box I suggest a blind taste test. I doubt you'll notice much difference.

 

[supton]

I haven't come across the same in box vs bottle yet, but I would certainly be open to trying.

 

[KrisZ]

Seems recycling became much less profitable ever since China put a hold on accepting our garbage. Besides, how would we know what China did with the material anyways? Just because we put something in a separate bin doesn't mean it actually gets recycled. I would guess a lot of it is simply burned.
So what's next to extract money form the taxpayer? Weren't we promised that all these extra fees would build recycling centers here? Nah, it was easier to send the stuff to China and pocket the rest.

 

[StevieC]

Originally Posted by KrisZ
Seems recycling became much less profitable ever since China put a hold on accepting our garbage. Besides, how would we know what China did with the material anyways? Just because we put something in a separate bin doesn't mean it actually gets recycled. I would guess a lot of it is simply burned.
So what's next to extract money form the taxpayer? Weren't we promised that all these extra fees would build recycling centers here? Nah, it was easier to send the stuff to China and pocket the rest.

Yeah and a lot of good recycling did with all those container ships trucking that garbage across the ocean belching tons of diesel fumes into the air. Madness!

 

[SeaJay]

Originally Posted by Rmay635703
Originally Posted by PandaBear
I reuse as much as i can and rinse my recycle,

3) Cheap oil -> not cost effective to use recycled plastic after the contamination and quality concern

If they can burn plastic with no pollution, I'd gladly see that. The problem is burning plastic is also not that great of an idea due to pollution.


Why burn plastic when you can reform it into gasoline and diesel fuel without pollution for about $0.36 a gallon?

The process is so simple you can do it at home


If a reasonable investment could be made into a plant to manufacture diesel fuel for 36 cents a gallon from waste plastic, I have to believe it would have been done. That would be an incredible manufacturing margin and investors would be jumping at the chance to get an operation like that going.

There has to be more to it, perhaps the issue is the costs of scaling up from an in-home operation to a fully operational commercial facility that can manufacture diesel in very large bulk quantities.

 

[hatt]

Originally Posted by SeaJay
Originally Posted by Rmay635703
Originally Posted by PandaBear
I reuse as much as i can and rinse my recycle,

3) Cheap oil -> not cost effective to use recycled plastic after the contamination and quality concern

If they can burn plastic with no pollution, I'd gladly see that. The problem is burning plastic is also not that great of an idea due to pollution.


Why burn plastic when you can reform it into gasoline and diesel fuel without pollution for about $0.36 a gallon?

The process is so simple you can do it at home


If a reasonable investment could be made into a plant to manufacture diesel fuel for 36 cents a gallon from waste plastic, I have to believe it would have been done. That would be an incredible manufacturing margin and investors would be jumping at the chance to get an operation like that going.

There has to be more to it, perhaps the issue is the costs of scaling up from an in-home operation to a fully operational commercial facility that can manufacture diesel in very large bulk quantities.

The 100 mpg carb and water powered car killed the $.36/gal waste plastic fuel.

 

[emg]

Originally Posted by StevieC
Yeah and a lot of good recycling did with all those container ships trucking that garbage across the ocean belching tons of diesel fumes into the air. Madness!

'Recycling' has mostly been virtue-signalling ever since it began, because in most cases it's simply cheaper and more efficient to produce new materials than to recycle old ones. So governments would demand that the population separate out 'recyclables' into a different bin so they could be shipped to China and then tossed into a hole in the ground.

If 'recycling' actually made sense, there'd be no need to force people to do it, because companies would be eager to pay us for our junk.

 

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted by StevieC
Originally Posted by KrisZ
Seems recycling became much less profitable ever since China put a hold on accepting our garbage. Besides, how would we know what China did with the material anyways? Just because we put something in a separate bin doesn't mean it actually gets recycled. I would guess a lot of it is simply burned.
So what's next to extract money form the taxpayer? Weren't we promised that all these extra fees would build recycling centers here? Nah, it was easier to send the stuff to China and pocket the rest.

Yeah and a lot of good recycling did with all those container ships trucking that garbage across the ocean belching tons of diesel fumes into the air. Madness!

Burning Bunker C IIRC, which is worse than diesel.

 

[Jarlaxle]

The container ships are making the return trip anyway.

 

[Shannow]

Originally Posted by emg

'Recycling' has mostly been virtue-signalling ever since it began, because in most cases it's simply cheaper and more efficient to produce new materials than to recycle old ones.


Intersted in this as an engineer.

By what do you mean "efficiency" ?

In the use of resources on a finite planet ? Energy ?

And do you have case studies to back the premise that this efficiency is there ?

At what point of scarcity of (lets say Lithium, cobolt, vanadium, etc.) doe the pendulum swing ? and surely it was more important to conserve when it's available.

Conservative...should by definition conserve one would think

 

[bbhero]

Originally Posted by Reddy45
I'd rather we as society be less wasteful rather than focus on recycling. This means getting out of the mindset of a disposable consumer culture.



^^^^^^^

Really great point here...

And I feel this way.... Learn to be content with what you/I have already. Not desiring the "newest, bestest, greatest etc"...

The consumer culture has led to people living beyond their real means, having to work more because of it, and less time with family and friends.

 

[PandaBear]

Originally Posted by KrisZ
Seems recycling became much less profitable ever since China put a hold on accepting our garbage. Besides, how would we know what China did with the material anyways? Just because we put something in a separate bin doesn't mean it actually gets recycled. I would guess a lot of it is simply burned.
So what's next to extract money form the taxpayer? Weren't we promised that all these extra fees would build recycling centers here? Nah, it was easier to send the stuff to China and pocket the rest.


From what I heard, they use those low grade plastic to make low grade plastic, for the lower income consumers. Farmer with an annual income of $800 (assuming they grow enough to eat), is not going to be very picky about the disposable utensils and containers when they go sight seeing, and those places serving them spend accordingly.

The problem is also about health care cost. To recycle safely it cost money (protective gear, training, excessive amount of automated cleaning), those cheap Chinese recycle labors will turn into expensive medical bill 30 years down the road, when they becomes well off and middle class, don't want to die, vs the farmers that only make $800 a year.

 

[JHZR2]

Originally Posted by SeaJay
Originally Posted by Rmay635703
Originally Posted by PandaBear
I reuse as much as i can and rinse my recycle,

3) Cheap oil -> not cost effective to use recycled plastic after the contamination and quality concern

If they can burn plastic with no pollution, I'd gladly see that. The problem is burning plastic is also not that great of an idea due to pollution.


Why burn plastic when you can reform it into gasoline and diesel fuel without pollution for about $0.36 a gallon?

The process is so simple you can do it at home


If a reasonable investment could be made into a plant to manufacture diesel fuel for 36 cents a gallon from waste plastic, I have to believe it would have been done. That would be an incredible manufacturing margin and investors would be jumping at the chance to get an operation like that going.

There has to be more to it, perhaps the issue is the costs of scaling up from an in-home operation to a fully operational commercial facility that can manufacture diesel in very large bulk quantities.


You don't just reformto gasoline. You reform to synthesis gas, likely with a ton of impurities. To do it catalytically would be tough because of the material state. It would need to be ground super fine, potentially melted with superheated steam, etc. plasma reformation, especially thermal plasma might have promise, but the processing is still tough.

Once you have that gas, you have to synthesize. F-T synthesis results in a lot of wax, and is a thermal challenge as it is. From there you have product.

Not impossible, probably a better approach to use plastics than some.

Reformation to fuel cells, and also sewer gas to fuel cells, are also out there...

 

[JHZR2]

Originally Posted by y_p_w
Originally Posted by JHZR2
We were recently told that on the last re-compete for recycling, the prices went way up. I want to say from $5 to $50/ton?

The discussion was that there is no market for certain plastic types (#5, and a few others IIRC), and so only #1 and #2 plastics should be recycled.

If you have too much undesirable stuff (i.e. the wrong plastics, too much greasy paper in with good paper, etc), they will reject the recycling load to the landfill... At additional cost.

I thought that China basically banned the importation of plastics for recycling. A lot of mixed, unsorted recycling used to go there for processing.

https://news.nationalgeographic.com...cling-ban-solutions-science-environment/

I believe they were taking the bulk of this because they have access to the cheaper manual labor to sort through it, but it also creates certain unrecylable streams because the amount of materials that shouldn't have been mixed in.



That was discussed in the article I read, but I don't recall all the details. Thanks for the info.

Apparently there is still a domestic market for certain things.

 

[y_p_w]

Originally Posted by JHZR2
Originally Posted by y_p_w
Originally Posted by JHZR2
We were recently told that on the last re-compete for recycling, the prices went way up. I want to say from $5 to $50/ton?

The discussion was that there is no market for certain plastic types (#5, and a few others IIRC), and so only #1 and #2 plastics should be recycled.

If you have too much undesirable stuff (i.e. the wrong plastics, too much greasy paper in with good paper, etc), they will reject the recycling load to the landfill... At additional cost.

I thought that China basically banned the importation of plastics for recycling. A lot of mixed, unsorted recycling used to go there for processing.

https://news.nationalgeographic.com...cling-ban-solutions-science-environment/

I believe they were taking the bulk of this because they have access to the cheaper manual labor to sort through it, but it also creates certain unrecylable streams because the amount of materials that shouldn't have been mixed in.



That was discussed in the article I read, but I don't recall all the details. Thanks for the info.

Apparently there is still a domestic market for certain things.

I thought the big issue when they were accepting foreign waste in China was that the amount that they would pay for it depended on how well sorted it was for non-recyclable materials. The most valuable parts were already the aluminum and the PET plastics. I'm not sure if the aluminum is pulled out first since it's easy enough to recycle domestically. There were quite a few plastics that aren't easily recycled although there can be hodgepodge plastics that are combined from various materials. Steel is certainly recyclable.

I remember years ago there was a local recycling center owned by a city that would pay for assorted materials by the pound. Of course aluminum and PET had the highest prices. Newspaper was only fetching about 1.5 cents a pound.

There are local scrap recycling businesses that require that all the materials be sorted first. The thing about a mixed recycling system is that it costs a lot for that convenience, which is why it was sent off to other countries where the labor to do that was cheap.

 

[PandaBear]

My parent's neighborhood used to be sorted recycling, then the thieves come at night to steal all the cans and bottles for the CRV refunds. The waste company got nothing. So they switched to mixed recycling with the truck robotic arm, no more labor to pick up and dump smaller buckets too.

The "town gas" company in Hong Kong didn't just clean and pump the landfill gas to their customers, they use it as a heat source to refine the natural gas into "town gas". Yup, them British sold us their old stuff and now we are stuck wasting energy refining the natural gas into these old standard "town gas". Gas from recycled plastic would have to be clean like that too, and it may not be as cost effective as just burning them in an incinerator.

 

[Shannow]

Interesting article...
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-12...ves-recycling-industry-in-a-mess/9243184

China were buying it.
China restricted contamination to 0.5%
Chinese producers are feeling the pinch as well, losing materials.

 

[PimTac]

I just read a news article that those Amazon plastic envelopes with built in bubble wrap are a nuisance in the recycling stream. They jam up the equipment. I'd guess the same would hold true for any mixed material item like that. Amazon sends out millions of those envelopes every day and most get thrown into the recycle bins.

A lot of the problem is at the source where companies package items in packaging that cannot be recycled. There should be more focus at that end.

 

[JHZR2]

Originally Posted by PimTac
I just read a news article that those Amazon plastic envelopes with built in bubble wrap are a nuisance in the recycling stream. They jam up the equipment. I'd guess the same would hold true for any mixed material item like that. Amazon sends out millions of those envelopes every day and most get thrown into the recycle bins.

A lot of the problem is at the source where companies package items in packaging that cannot be recycled. There should be more focus at that end.


I was wondering about those. Would be great if they were compostible plastic, I'd throw them into our pile. I keep them for shipping stuff or for returns to Amazon.

 

[Rmay635703]

Originally Posted by JHZR2
Originally Posted by SeaJay
Originally Posted by Rmay635703
Originally Posted by PandaBear
I reuse as much as i can and rinse my recycle,

3) Cheap oil -> not cost effective to use recycled plastic after the contamination and quality concern

If they can burn plastic with no pollution, I'd gladly see that. The problem is burning plastic is also not that great of an idea due to pollution.


Why burn plastic when you can reform it into gasoline and diesel fuel without pollution for about $0.36 a gallon?

The process is so simple you can do it at home


If a reasonable investment could be made into a plant to manufacture diesel fuel for 36 cents a gallon from waste plastic, I have to believe it would have been done. That would be an incredible manufacturing margin and investors would be jumping at the chance to get an operation like that going.

There has to be more to it, perhaps the issue is the costs of scaling up from an in-home operation to a fully operational commercial facility that can manufacture diesel in very large bulk quantities.


You don't just reformto gasoline. You reform to synthesis gas, likely with a ton of impurities. To do it catalytically would be tough because of the material state. It would need to be ground super fine, potentially melted with superheated steam, etc. plasma reformation, especially thermal plasma might have promise, but the processing is still tough.

Once you have that gas, you have to synthesize. F-T synthesis results in a lot of wax, and is a thermal challenge as it is. From there you have product.

Not impossible, probably a better approach to use plastics than some.

Reformation to fuel cells, and also sewer gas to fuel cells, are also out there...


Yet there are hundreds of folks who make their own homemade reactor and fuel at home with none of the concerns you state.

http://www.energeticforum.com/renewable-energy/6248-converting-plastic-back-into-oil.html

JetiJS has been making his own fuel for nearly a decade out of very simple components , he even gave plans to duplicate with a BOM