#Circular_Claims #Fall_Flat Again.
#BOYCOTT! SINGLE CONTAINER USE. ALSO PICK UP ALL YOUR SINGLE USE CONTAINERS THAT YOU POLLUTED THE ENTIRE WORLD WITH --YOUR PLASTIC GARBABE.
ALL PAST SINGLE USE CONTAINERS MUST BE PICKED UP BY THE COMPANIES BELOW. CEO'S MUST HELP OR HELLS FURY COMING YOUR WAY!
#COKA COLA,
#PEPSICO,
#FANTA
#NESTLE
#DANONE
P&G
#Unilever
#Colgate_Palmolive
#MARS
A recent Organization for Economic Co-operation and
Development (OECD) report projects that global plastic
use and waste will nearly triple by 2060 with a meager
increase in plastic recycling, resulting in a doubling of
global plastic pollution.2
The United States Department
of Energy (U.S. DOE) estimated that the volume of plastic
waste in the U.S. rose to 44 million metric tons in 2019,3
which is about 295 lbs per person.4
The plastics and products industries have been
promoting plastic recycling as the solution to plastic waste
since the early 1990s.5
Some 30 years later, the vast majority of U.S. plastic waste is still not recyclable. The U.S. plastic recycling rate was estimated to have declined to about 5–6% in 2021, down from a high of 9.5% in 2014 and 8.7% in 2018, when the U.S. exported millions of tons of plastic waste to China and counted it as recycled even though much of it was burned or dumped.6
In February 2020, Greenpeace USA published a
comprehensive survey of plastic recycling in the U.S. titled “Circular Claims Fall Flat.”7
In that report we predicted
that “the economic driver for collecting, sorting and
reprocessing post-consumer plastic products is likely to
worsen as expansion of plastic production lowers the cost of new resin.”8
That prediction has proven true as the U.S.
plastic recycling rate has continued to decline.
Since 2020, an even greater barrier to plastic recycling
than poor economics has come into focus through scientific research and testing: the toxicity of recycled plastic.
According to a 2021 report published by the Canadian
Government, toxicity risks in recycled plastic prohibit “the
vast majority of plastic products and packaging produced” from being recycled into food-grade packaging.
2022 UPDATE TO 2020
COMPREHENSIVE SURVEY
The 2020 survey examined plastic products accepted
by the U.S.’s approximately 370 material recovery
facilities (MRFs), and U.S. domestic plastic waste
reprocessing capacity. The survey results revealed that
only some types of PET#1 and HDPE#2 plastic bottles
and jugs could be legitimately claimed as recyclable
and led to the conclusion that most types of plastic packaging were economically impossible to recycle at the time and would remain so in the future.
This 2022 update of the survey shows little change:
only PET#1 and HDPE#2 plastic bottles and jugs are widely accepted by the 375 MRFs in operation in the U.S. today.
This finding is consistent with the 2021 California Statewide
Recycling Commission’s determination that only PET#1
and HDPE#2 bottles and jugs are recyclable in California.10
https://www.greenpeace.org/usa/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/GPUS_FinalReport_2022.pdf
