• You are viewing the forum as a Guest, please login (you can use your Facebook, Twitter, Google or Microsoft account to login) or register using this link: Log in or Sign Up

Amazon and plastic packaging

There is more confusing about the recycling industry.. Few years back a small scandal surfaced with reporters monitoring a Trash burning oven for a while.
And they captured them burning large amounts of recycling materials.. Asking the proprietor/opperator what's going on and why they are burning recycleable materials. The answer was, we need to keep the ovens burning, if there is nothing else to burn we are obliged to burn anything we can find as long as it burns. We simply cannot stop fueling the oven, if the fire extinguishes than we have a huge financial problem to start it up again.

Bottom line it's a privatization again and burning trash is big bussiness where money comes first and before invironment if logistics don't meet up with the demand.

A freind of mine is truck driver, he worked a while transporting recycling glas containers. And said you don't want to know how often i'm ordered to empty them on the trash pile. Its again a demand thing, if the demand is lower than the production and they run out of storage. There is no other way than to dump it back into the invironment.
 
Last edited:
It's amazing that all the publicity education given to us about the environment is ignored or given short shrift . A recent visit we had to a museum while their were bins about and the cafe shop was doing good trade in soft drinks the bottles just went into general waste bins,when I inquired about bottle bin location was told there isn't any but what a"good idea" Mm and has anyone noticed how some firms get rid of cardboard waste ,they wrap it in yards of plastic sheeting ready for disposal .Think I better look for some of the good news!
 
dw1305 said:
Hi all, There are a couple of new incinerators that have been built locally to Bristol, it would be fair to say that they <"aren't universally popular">.
Click to expand...
The big incinerator here has been used to process the recycling at times 😱
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-40753649

This appears to have been picked up elsewhere too https://www.theguardian.com/technol...-fire-for-new-packaging-that-cant-be-recycled / https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/08/20/amazon-branded-reckless-new-non-recyclable-packaging/

Just a pity that Amazon have given a few soundbites and I suspect it will all blow over.
 
Unfortunately
“Recyclable” does not equal “Recycled”

Why isn’t Amazon involved in the actual (proven) recycling of their own massive plastic waste
- though there’s very little green about ♻️ other than the colour

Even after collection, vast amounts of plastics end up entering local Landfills (preferably some slightly distant rural town which agrees to take the Metro waste for a fee) or on a boat to “Nowhere”
(& in Canada’s OOPS case in which they were caught out, back home for incineration ... all the while protesting this was against policy/licensing and the unidentifiable - then not so suddenly identified - company was no longer in business (ie likely a government crony company that did a quick name change))

Of course this quote from Amazon has give UK customers at least, the right of return/complete refund - ie, product delivered not as advertised (the non-recyclable packaging 😉)

A spokesman for Amazon UK said: “Our mission is to deliver the very best customer experience. We work with manufacturers worldwide to continuously improve packaging design and introduce new, sustainable packaging that delights customers, eliminates waste, and ensures products arrive intact and undamaged for our customers.”
Click to expand...

I suspect if every UK customer returned/rejected all Amazon deliveries for 1 week - the next week’s deliveries would be packaged differently
 
Unfortunately this is just a Canadian City that got caught publicly

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/calgary-clamshell-recycling-problem-landfill-1.5253287

Several other major Cities have redirected even larger amounts of “Recycling” to not so local Landfills
And now they are getting out of the business and handing the contract off to private Waste Companies ... that are suddenly involved in “Recycling” ... can’t imagine how that is going to turn out 😵
 
alto said:
this is just a Canadian City that got caught publicly
Click to expand...
Yes, many cases even in Australia. I still do the right thing and sort it to the right place/bin. I can't save the whole world or change the system but I do my bit.
 
Problem is knowing what practice are and which are not recyclable... for example I've heard wrinkly food packaging plastic is not recyclable...
 
Matt @ ScapeEasy said:
I've heard wrinkly food packaging plastic is not recyclable
Click to expand...
Not using the usual services. It depends on locality.

These guys I linked to as above
https://www.redcycle.net.au/

recycle soft plastics.

Keen to learn more?
https://www.abc.net.au/tv/programs/war-on-waste/

If there is no local programme like the above, you should campaign to have one made for education of the public.

Believe it not, I learnt about recycling from my children when they got taught at school!
 
For example this town shows how unity can go a long way to achieve a common goal.


While we may not be able to do all of these things, it's good to learn from them.

For me, it's a lovely thing to do while sorting the trash. My family members don't care and stuff the waste all over the place. I use gloves and seperate it all out before throwing. I have created 4 categories - Compost, general (land fill), recycle, soft plastic. We have 4 bins. 🙂 So far I have managed to minimise the general waste. Sometimes you can gain pleasure from doing things that others don't want to do/don't care about/ think too hard to do. 🙂

 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top