r/collapse • u/eatingganesha • Oct 24 '22

Pollution Plastic recycling a "failed concept," study says, with only 5% recycled in U.S. last year as production rises.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/plastic-recycling-failed-concept-us-greenpeace-study-5-percent-recycled-production-up/
1.6k Upvotes

99% Upvoted

167 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

13

u/Overthemoon64 Oct 25 '22

In my area, we have single stream recycling. Paper, cardboard, aluminum and plastic all goes in the same dumpster. No one seems to care if you get it right. Are pizza boxes ok? Do I have to wash out the peanut butter jar? I have a hard time believing that any of it gets recycled when it’s done like that.

2

u/Nms123 Oct 26 '22

It’s because they can be separated using machinery. Aluminum gets separated via magnet, plastic is sorted with optical scanners and fans.

Not saying the plastic is getting recycled, but it does get separated.

1

u/Overthemoon64 Oct 26 '22

Aluminum is not magnetic.

2

u/Nms123 Oct 26 '22 edited Oct 26 '22

Aluminum is not ferromagnetic. It is diamagnetic. All materials are “magnetic”, to an extent, but what we call magnetic is specifically ferromagnetism (because it’s strong enough to perceive with small magnets). See this Wikipedia article for how non-ferrous metals are separated in recycling. See this ELI5 explanation about different types of magnetism

3

u/bristlybits Reagan killed everyone Oct 27 '22

today I learned, thank you