Just Bury Your Trash

tfourb

Meanwhile, New York exports its trash to the mid west and microplastics are found on the top of Mount Everest.

georgeecollins

This all makes tons of sense. Recycling metal works, other recycling may not. Cloth bags make sense if you have a few of them and use them hundreds of times. Reduce still makes sense so why not focus on reduce.

toomuchtodo

"I am once again asking you to consider plasma gasification." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_gasification InEnTec says its plasma technology effectively destroys PFAS - https://www.wastetodaymagazine.com/news/inentec-says-its-pla... - August 23rd, 2024 Production of high quality syngas from argon plasma gasification of plastic - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41623879 (September 2024) (0 comments) Plasma gasification versus incineration of plastic waste: Energy, economic and environmental analysis - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fuproc.2022.107470 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38994374 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38722984

ImHereToVote

If a country burns coal. It should burn trash first, before the coal.

axus

Hopefully energy used will become less important. CO2 emissions seem like the biggest threat to our long term health. Microplastics also matter, a bit. How much plastic is escaping into the environment from the recycling process vs. landfill? What are the CO2 output of landfill vs. recycling? I imagine burning would be the worst option for these. Not surprised that the market forces tended towards the most energy efficient waste disposal systems; glad we don't have mountains of trash or poor landfills.

duggan

I don't remember energy use being the problem with plastic bags? It was plastic bags being absolutely everywhere in the environment. Streets, parks, trees. Wrapped around anything sticking out of the ground. On your face on a windy day. Pollution is the problem with plastic. Probably health, too, now that microplastics are being recognized as an issue.

hank2000

I don’t understand how plastic bags for “100 years at current rates” is an argument FOR its longevity/being fine?

xd1936

The argument that is pro-polyethylene plastic bags over cotton completely ignores the source: Renewable plants that are grown and harvested, vs. finite fossil fuels extracted from the Earth and refined. > Instead of a simple blowing and sealing process, the cotton must be made into yarn, woven into fabric, prepared, dried, sized, dyed, and finished, which takes around 1,725 megajoules, around 3,050 times as much energy. That conveniently ignores the drilling, extracting, transporting, refining, and transporting again to make "polyethylene resin".

conorbergin

I think using a cotton bag 173 times to beat plastic bags and a mug 1,000 times to beat disposable cups sounds completely reasonable.

smcg

Not every place has space for landfills... which is why we often ship trash over to low-income countries.

lillecarl

Just burn your trash https://www.energimyndigheten.se/en/news/2025/from-waste-to-... My understanding is that biological decomposition of waste creates methane which is a worse greenhouse gas than CO2.

rapnie

In the Netherlands the cradle to cradle hype of some years ago has created a paper reality where waste is turned magically into building material and can thus be effectively dumped anywhere in the environment.

jschveibinz

Other papers/articles on this topic: Tierney: "The Reign of..." https://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/04/opinion/sunday/the-reign-... Kinnaman: "Is it Time to..." https://www.vox.com/2016/2/13/10972986/recycling Kinnaman, Thomas C. "Determining the Socially Optimal Recycling Rate." Resources, Conservation and Recycling, vol. 85, 2014, pp. 5–10, doi:10.1016/j.resconrec.2013.11.002.

cogman10

> A returnable milk bottle takes much more energy to produce and much more fuel to transport than a plastic carton, and has to make around ten or more trips to use less energy than a bottle made from polyethylene plastic. This seems like the weakest of presented arguments. Just 10 trips and it's more environmentally friendly? Yeah, seems like reusable milk bottles wins over plastic. That's what, ~10 weeks for payback?

dguest

These arguments tend to ignore that a reusable thing is often just a lot better at whatever it does. You can put a few liters of milk in a reusable bag without triple bagging it. You don't have to worry that it will split open and spill out on the ground. You can use the bag to pack for road trips, to store kid's snacks and toys, as a gym bag, etc. Groceries aren't the only thing anyone caries and people go further than between their boot and fridge. In Switzerland grocery stores have been promoting reusable (recycled plastic) bags for years, and people use them for everything: I saw someone in Interlaken carrying firewood with one. So: - To people promoting reuse: maybe go beyond the environmental impact and appeal to quality of life. Having bag or two in your boot all the time is a good idea. - To people promoting single use: others have pointed out that you need to address the other environmental problems beyond energy, but also acknowledge that you're asking people to find a replacement for their everyday tote bags as well.

Symmetry

The article mentions the energy benefits from recycling aluminium but fails to mention the also large (but not as large) savings from recycling glass. Please recycle your aluminium and glass even if it's probably wiser to throw out plastic in most localities.

joekrill

Penn & Teller have a Bullshit! episode about this (Season 2, Episode 5). Well, it's technically about recycling, but it makes the claim that landfills are not a bad thing, and much better than the current recycling situation, in most cases. That episode has always stuck with me, and I've always wondered how valid their argument is.

general_reveal

In an apartment, I’ve learned not to even have a garbage bin. If I have garbage I make a small bag and throw it out, or keep it in the freezer until I go out. Frozen trash doesn’t smell and doesn’t attract anything :) Of course, this requires you to have less trash , which is very easy if you simply take a few seconds to go outside and throw your food out after lunch/dinner. Everything else is just dry scraps usually. There’s always the fridge :) All in all, there is no concept of “garbage”, “garbage bin” , or any kind of “garbage accumulation” in my apartments. Oh, you can also just freaking flush small things down the toilet. Seriously, it’s like a little mini garbage. Only advise this for people with great water pressure (lucky you!). If I had a backyard, I’d be burning and burying garbage too, man. Last but not least, never ever buy expensive garbage bags. It’s literally going in the garbage, man.

dofm

"In total, Britain’s Environment Agency calculated that a conventional cotton bag needed to be reused 173 times to beat plastic. Denmark’s equivalent public body estimated a similar ratio." I think there's a thing about food shopping here. Americans just don't go shopping as frequently, so you're better off with paper bags in the back of your car. I am a Brit. I have a Lidl cotton bag that I've probably used sixty times already. It augments and will ultimately replace two reusable foldable/pocketable bags from Marks & Spencer that I have used for all of my shopping for at least thirteen years, perhaps more like sixteen. (Genuinely can't remember when I bought them but as early as 2010 seems possible) I shop on foot, about once every four or five days. I wil have used the two M&S bags on more than a thousand journeys. One of them is finally wearing thin. The other goes in my pocket more or less whenever I leave the house. They were themselves made from recycled material (rPET I guess, not cotton). I use two the majority of the time so I am confident I've avoided using at least 1800 plastic bags. (Weird timing, but I did end up needing one last night, annoyingly, because I had to shop in an emergency, but it is the first time in five years or so and it already has a reuse purpose) Reusable shopping bags are easy . A British shopper might even get to 173 uses in a single year.

elil17

Such a reductive title/framing. Yes, plastic recycling doesn't work very well. But that doesn't mean that getting rid of trash is simple/there aren't opportunities to reduce waste. Metal recycling, compost, glass bottle reuse, and proper management of landfills are all super important! Also: > In total, Britain’s Environment Agency calculated that a conventional cotton bag needed to be reused 173 times to beat plastic. They make it seem like this is a bad thing but surely the average cotton bag gets used more than 173 times. I've probably used some of my oldest reusable bags like ~1k times.