> For years, the United States also shipped much of its plastic waste overseas, choking local rivers and streams. A global convention now bans most trade in plastic waste
Most of this article is fine, but I can't believe this specific misinformation continues to be printed.
Exported plastic waste virtually entirely goes into landfills overseas, or is incinerated.
Whereas the waste choking local rivers and streams e.g. in Asia is virtually entirely local waste -- people littering, etc.
I'm 100% on the side of the environment -- which is why I want us to make policy based on actual fact, so efforts go towards what actually matters.
You're making an interesting point, but I do wish you'd support it. You're making a a counter-claim to TFA, but you don't have more credibility than the Times.
I would love some validation that our exported plastic waste goes into landfills, as you're stating, but I'm also skeptical that all the places we ship waste to have well designed landfills with proper water runoff management.
Well when waste is shipped, it is compacted and bailed. If it ends up not in a landfill, recycled or incincerated it is a deliberate act of illegal dumping.
The loophole was that people didn't ship recycling, they just shipped trash.
People still pay good money for recycled plastic, but apparently it was too much of an incentive for people to knowingly ship in mixed trash, use low cost workers to extract a few highly valuable elements in hazardous conditions and burn or discard the rest.
Yes, most of the consumer trash in local rivers will be from locals, but its still not great to have a mismanaged landfill of plastic near you thats full of inported trash.
> Exported plastic waste virtually entirely goes into landfills overseas, or is incinerated.
You are just hoping this is the case. With absolutely no way to verify this, you are just spreading more misinformation. I can attest from personal experience that many of those countries are hopelessly inept, corrupt, and unable to handle the entire incoming volume. They can't even handle their own "domestically produced"[1] garbage.
The facts are that an estimated 8 million tons of plastic waste enter the oceans every year, with the majority of that waste coming from the exact same countries to which the US exports its plastic waste. There are definitely unscrupulous importers who just dump the crap right back into the ocean.
[1] Of course, most of these countries are not producing their own local plastic. They are actually importing those goods too! We sell them food wrapped in garbage, and pure garbage too. What a deal for them!
Most of this article is fine, but I can't believe this specific misinformation continues to be printed.
Exported plastic waste virtually entirely goes into landfills overseas, or is incinerated.
Whereas the waste choking local rivers and streams e.g. in Asia is virtually entirely local waste -- people littering, etc.
I'm 100% on the side of the environment -- which is why I want us to make policy based on actual fact, so efforts go towards what actually matters.