Forums → WEPR → Do you think we should lessen our useage of plastic?

bah lets just ship all our garbage off to the sun.. just jettison the stuff and let gravity take its course..

Gee, much as we'd like to do that, just imagine how much more fuel we'd burn up trying to get rid of the trillions of tonnes of crap we chuck away! I reckon that we'd bump the fateful "running out of petroleum for real" crisis forward by a good ten years or something :P

Futurama dedicates an entire episode to the whole "how we dispose of waste comes back to haunt us!" theme actually.

But...as for running out of oil, there's a whole range of estimates. Just hop on to Google Scholar and search for &quoteak oil" and you'll get dozens of papers with various estimates on the issue.

I think there just might be room for the reconstitution of biological byproducts (as opposed to primary resources) as a major manufacturing resource. Though I'm not sure just how appealing writing on paper made from panda crap really is.

there's a pile of plastic at the pacific ocean,about two time the size of texas to be sent up to sun.

The fact is, there is nothing on Earth that is evolved to break down plastic.

so,recycling is the only alternative to lessen our useage?

recycling and/or finding an alternative... probably more an alt than recycling.. because people aren't going to be able to get rid of all plastic.

Plastic is made by chemically modifying oil so when oil runs out plastic runs out end of problem. But a beginning to lotsa new 1s

I personally, think that we don't need to ower of usage of plastic because I believe that Global Warmming is unreal and Al Gore is a fake.

First of all: depretis, stop listening to conservative bullcrap propaganda and those slanders on Gore and such. Just look at the well known and proven facts...

Anyways!

Plastics and their effect on our environment is the first thing that many people think of when listing "The ills of plastic use." But that is only the most visible problem.

Plastics, are as mentioned, made from fossil-fuels. But the given information is not really correct.

The main components of plastics are gathered from the by-products of fossil-fuel production. Which does not help the current fossil-fuel shortage we have. And where can someone clearly draw the line between "Gathering the by-products of fossil-fuel productions to make plastics" and "Processing fossil-fuels to gather the by-products and make plastics"?

We're not going to get rid of plastic, and most people don't even think once when opening the lid of their trash can and throwing away a plastic bottle, they think one thing;
'Trash...'.
Even when they should be thinking;
'Recycable...'.
While Global Warming, as deretis said, may be fake and unreal to many, I do believe in it, and I say this, it's happening, it's natural, but it's being, sped up, by mankind. However, many people don't share the same thoughts, and thay could be either a downfall, or salvation, as it is human nature to be against what the majority of 'those other people', think.
However this is NOT, a Global Warming discussion, so far, and I don't intend to start one, therefore, I will say this, Plastic is a recycable, there's no denying that, and there's a lot of it in use right now, there's no denying htat either, however, what people can deny, is the question of this, 'Are we using to much?'. I say we are, like many other resources at our disposal. It is unessacary for plastic CD and DVD/Game covers to be plastic, as they are now finally changing, it is unreasonable for us to have giant containers that hold electronics and most of it is taken up by nothing. Just like those little tiny 'Brunch' Chip Bags, you buy it for 75 C, and when you open it, what do you see? A half full bag, most of the bag you are holding is AIR!!! same story for most items in plastic containers! Therefore, I say that we are using too much, and it's increadibly unreasonable to use so much plastic!

that is my statement lol

Plastic is a very good servant,i must say,but excessive causes trouble.

plastic doesn't even rot.

wat i feel now that is we should try to modify plastic into other types of objects,maybe reversing it,to fossil fuel*if it's possible.

And like wat Raptor has said,potato chips only fill half of the plastic bag,which is true.therefore,i feel that if w should reduce the use of plastic,we should start with the food industry,before going to the public.

look around you and you'll find that almost all,if not all snack pakaging are packed in plastics.maybe we should encourage them to sell the items in mini stores in supermarket,using glass as an alternative to plastic bottles,using tin-bottles ,like those swiss brands

and yes,it is very,very unreasonable to use big packets of plastic bags and such to fill littlefood inside.

btw,there's this brand called"Royal Gold" tissues,i like the motto they give,Buy Tissues Not Air,or something like that.

throguh this,i can see the they will be reducing the plastic use,if not maximising the plastic in each packaging,unlike most tissues that fill air in the packaging,obviously wasting the plastic.

plastic is just like something in which when it loses it's usefulness,it becomes something that cannot be obliterated,therefore we must reduce,or maximise the use of it now.

Maximise,in which in means to reuse and reduce.not to increase useage..

Everyone says that plastic is completely non-biodegradable, however I believe you to be wrong; for example, the plastic wrap my newspaper comes in says it will degenerate into a biodegradable form within 5 years, but emphasizes recycling anyway.

yeah but 5 years is a long time.. think of the amount of plastic that is.. thats 1826 plastic wraps.. thats a lot..

My guess is that it was not the traditional plastic we all think of.

They have actually made plastics mainly from corn starches, which decompose very quickly. Sadly, plastics like these are not used my most of the companies out there. I think I have only seen one or two very small water bottling companies use it.

Like I may have mentioned before, I hope such 'biodegradable plastics' are a temporary solution- they tend to be a bigger drain on other resources and as I've experienced personally, the decline in quality is so great that it effectively becomes a tokenistic exercise in self-defeat.