Article Plastic experts say recycling is a scam. Should we even do it anymore?

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Plastic experts say recycling is a scam. Should we even do it anymore?
https://www.salon.com/2024/02/23/plastic...t-anymore/

INTRO: When the Center for Climate Integrity released its report about plastic recycling, one might have expected the environmentalist non-profit to encourage the practice. Anyone raised in the late-20th and early-21st century knows that the term "recycle" is often synonymous with "environmentalist causes."

"Plastic is not designed to be recycled — despite industries and governments telling the public that we should recycle plastic."

Yet the title of Center for Climate Integrity's report — "The Fraud of Plastic Recycling" — reveals a very different point-of-view. What if plastic recycling in fact does little to help the environment, and instead serves the interests of the same Big Oil interest groups destroying Earth's ecosystems?

"Through new and existing research, 'The Fraud of Plastic Recycling' shows how Big Oil and the plastics industry have deceptively promoted recycling as a solution to plastic waste management for more than 50 years, despite their long-standing knowledge that plastic recycling is not technically or economically viable at scale," the authors of the report proclaim. "Now it’s time for accountability."

The Center for Climate Integrity is not alone in characterizing plastic recycling as a false crusade. Erica Cirino, communications manager at the Plastic Pollution Coalition and author of "Thicker Than Water: The Quest for Solutions to the Plastic Crisis," pointed to data that clearly shows we do very little recycling anyway, despite the overwhelming emphasis on it... (MORE - details)

[Syne]

Plastic recycling was broadly pushed in the 80s with the promise that it would lower the cost of plastic goods and containers for the consumer. That savings never materialized. So it was fairly clear that plastic recycling was a scam from the start.