Eli5: Why can’t we burn plastic and use it as fuel since it’s flamable?

Question

Sorry if this was asked before, but is the only problem that it has a bigger carbon footprint to burn than gas?

In: Chemistry

Answer 1

compared to regular gas or coal, it doesn’t output as much energy. approximately it creates 25% of the heat that coal would. burning plastic is also very toxic, so it would be better idea to just recycle it instead of burning it as an efficient fuel source.