Wouldn’t it be better to bury as much of it deep underground as possible and seal it off?
edit – I should add that I do reuse and recycle, and I use as little plastic as I can afford to in the first place. I am just curious about this aspect
In: Earth Science
[It’s not, and your misgivings are correct.](https://criticalscience.medium.com/climate-action-sources-for-recycling-d0ab09e85a8a) Plastic is more expensive to recycle than to manufacture new, so our “recyclable” plastic waste is overwhelmingly sent to developing countries without the infrastructure to produce it themselves. Unfortunately, only a fraction of what goes in the recycling is recoverable, so the rest becomes garbage anyway – and these countries have much poorer waste management systems than the United States. Instead of a landfill, much of this plastic will get burned in rubbish heaps or dumped into the ocean.
Aluminum should absolutely be recycled. Other scrap metal is probably better off recycled as well. [**But if you live in a first-world country, it is usually more eco-friendly to send plastic to the landfill.**](https://old.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/jxrjmv/recycling_much_more_than_you_needed_to_know/)
Latest Answers