Some good developments with plastic recycling, production and cleanup

Seat made from recycled soft plastic

We all know what damage plastic waste is doing to the land and sea environment. However, the move away from environmentally damaging plastic has begun. Below are a few of the many developments.

1. In Australia, we can recycle most hard plastics in our recycling bins. As well as that, we can recycle clean soft plastics at participating supermarkets. You can find the recycling bins in discrete areas that are away from rubbish bins. This soft plastic is used to make seats like the one pictured above, school furniture and other useful items. It is called REDcycle, see: http://www.redcycle.net.au/ for details of what is (and is not) recyclable this way. N.B. biodegradable plastic are not recyclable. The recycled soft plastic goes to an Australian company, Repas, which is making Australian products.

Plant-based compostable plastic bags are sold at supermarkets.

2. In some Australian stores and supermarkets, you can now buy compostable plastic bags that are made from plant material, as shown above. The bags shown are only compostable in a commercial compost facility (Australian Standard 4736-2006) whereas those bags labelled home compostable (AS 5810-2010) are suitable to compost at home.

3. In Amsterdam, The Netherlands, there is supermarket chain that plans to have totally plastic-free aisles. In their first supermarket, the aisle has a range of biodegradable plastics made from plants, including hard plastic food containers. The other, non-plastic containers are the traditional ones of glass, metal and cardboard. See: Amsterdam now has the world’s first plastic-free supermarket aisle. Interesting Engineering, March 2, 2018.

4. Lego, in Denmark, is planning to make its plastic pieces from more sustainable materials. For a start, the toys will be made with a polyethylene produced with ethanol made from sugarcane. The polyethylene pieces will make up just 1% to 2% of the total amount of plastic elements produced by Lego but plans are afoot to improve that percentage. See: Lego goes green with sugarcane-based plastic. BBC News, March 2, 2018.

5. By choosing not to use plastic as much as possible and to recycle it, we can make a difference. See: Plastic bans worldwide will dent oil demand growth, says BP. The Guardian, February 21, 2018.

6. Meanwhile, waste plastic makes its way into rivers, lakes and the oceans. There have been several inventions to clean up plastic from waterways, such as:
This genius bucket sucks trash and oil right out of the sea. Huffington Post, May 13, 2016.
And The Ocean Cleanup with their North Sea prototype.

See also:
Turning prawn shells into plastic
Adidas is using ocean plastic to make sneakers