[HN Gopher] A plastic bag's 2000-mile journey
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       A plastic bag's 2000-mile journey
        
       Author : gorkemcetin
       Score  : 49 points
       Date   : 2022-04-20 21:53 UTC (1 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.bloomberg.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.bloomberg.com)
        
       | howlin wrote:
       | It seems like the only sane way to make use of refuse mixed
       | plastic is to incinerate it for energy. Perhaps as peaker plants
       | that can be brought online when there isn't sufficient renewable
       | energy to meet demand.
       | 
       | Burning plastic is clearly dirty, but with sufficient heat and
       | airborne pollutant scrubbers I doubt it's any worse than coal.
        
         | userbinator wrote:
         | _Burning plastic is clearly dirty, but with sufficient heat and
         | airborne pollutant scrubbers I doubt it 's any worse than
         | coal._
         | 
         | It depends on which plastic exactly (which is one of the
         | reasons the whole "plastic=bad" mentality irritates me in the
         | same way as stereotyping), but a regular plastic bag is going
         | to be almost pure polyethylene --- essentially a very long-
         | chain wax --- and combustion of that will definitely be cleaner
         | than coal. At the other end are the halogenated polymers like
         | PVC and PTFE whose combustion products are definitely much
         | worse than coal.
        
           | ars wrote:
           | PVC and PTFE are rarely found in trash, certainly not in the
           | volumes of the rest of the types.
           | 
           | With a properly made incinerator (which isn't hard to do)
           | burning plastic is cleaner than burning oil or coal. A bit of
           | filtration will catch the halogens in case they slip in.
        
             | bombcar wrote:
             | Weird. This comment says 15 minutes ago in the main view,
             | but 20 hours ago when I go to reply to it. I guess the
             | whole post got "pushed to the front" again.
        
             | exmadscientist wrote:
             | PTFE, no, not common at all. Its relatives are rather
             | common in food packaging (liners and seals), though.
             | 
             | PVC... man, PVC is in a lot of things. Surprisingly many
             | things. The monomer/polymer itself isn't that awful, but
             | some of the plasticizers truly scare me. And I'm often
             | favorably inclined towards the chemical industry!
        
               | ge96 wrote:
               | unrelated about chemical
               | 
               | I keep wondering if there is a way to make a "stomach"
               | that can dissolve plastic/make energy with it, whether
               | directly or as an electrolyte base (add zinc/copper)
               | 
               | I am aware of the bacteria that can eat plastic but too
               | slow
        
               | ars wrote:
               | PVC is in a lot of toys, pipes, things like that. But
               | it's not common in single use, or low use plastics.
        
         | rcMgD2BwE72F wrote:
         | Are we _really_ trying to substitute plastics with less
         | polluting /toxic materials?
         | 
         | Isn't plastic's source the byproduct of fossil fuel generation,
         | and therefore there are still economic incentive to use it
         | somehow, as long as we keep extracting oil?
        
       | [deleted]
        
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