mirhagk t1_itsgu5d wrote on October 25, 2022 at 11:38 PM

Reply to comment by crashtestpilot in Recycling plastic is practically impossible — and the problem is getting worse by chrisdh79

Ooo there is! On mobile so I don't have the link handy, but the appliance is actually you!

Take a water/pop bottle and fill it up with non-degradable waste (that flimsy plastic is a good candidate). Find a stick that you can push into the bottle, ideally as close to the size of the opening as you can while easily pushing it in. Push it in and out to jam the waste down. Screw the cap back on and repeat this whenever you get more waste. A shocking amount will fit in here and with ripping things up this covers most of the worst offenders for waste.

Eventually you'll fill it up and it will be a very dense and solid piece. With the cap on you now have a brick that you can use. Granted it's not perfectly brick shaped but since bottles are designed for packing they fit together well (if you use the same kind).

I think they are called eco bricks. I did it a while back and was pretty happy with the results but I'll be honest I just got overwhelmed with life. I'd LOVE if I had a trash compactor that did the same thing.

But it's worth noting landfills do do this already. With the proper barriers in place, trash makes a decent building material. I mean Manhattan has parts built out of trash. I know my local landfill is evaluating putting solar panels on top of it. The Simpsons made fun of it, but the idea works if done correctly. (Note I'm not claiming Manhattan did it correctly and I know a lot of it wasn't consumer waste, but just giving an example)

crashtestpilot t1_itsi4cj wrote on October 25, 2022 at 11:48 PM

I like it.

I think we can do better, but your suggestion is accessible, and affordable.

It does NOT scale without behavioral change, but what does, really?

mirhagk t1_itsirfp wrote on October 25, 2022 at 11:53 PM

Yeah it's why I didn't suggest it initially lol. It's cute and people should do it if they can, but it's like at-home composting and rainwater collection. I appreciate everyone who does it and we should encourage more but it's not realistic to expect everyone will do it.

Would love to see it improved upon, and combine with other methods to get a good waste management solution that isn't just built on dreams and lies.

crashtestpilot t1_itsnyzv wrote on October 26, 2022 at 12:32 AM

Yep. Yep yep yep.

I love the idea of weaponizing mycelia or animals to help us save the planet we're all on.

But we threw it out, and we're going to have to help pick it up.

EmulatingHeaven t1_ittlh9y wrote on October 26, 2022 at 5:27 AM

Honestly the big barrier for me in making eco bricks is cleaning the flimsy plastic that gets stuffed in. Outer wrapping from the toilet paper, that’s fine, but a lot of the garbage in my home would be from chip bags or baby food pouches.

mirhagk t1_ittlnoe wrote on October 26, 2022 at 5:29 AM

Yeah that's fair enough. I got a spray attachment for my sink, so most things are an easy rinse. I also picked up a decent shredder to shred the semi-rigid plastics, which do fit in fine but are a lot of effort to tear up otherwise.