Is it OK to recycle plastic?

[MadamePlatypus]

I mentioned this on the recycling thread in housekeeping - I am a bit confused about whether it is good or bad to recycle plastic. (Obviously it is better to reduce and re-use).
I think this link explains my dilemma, but would be interested if any MNers have an opinion on this.
link

Very interesting article Madameplatypus.
Do you know where plastic is recycled in the UK - the article was refering to the US. Like you have said reduce and reuse are better but you can only use plastic carrier bags a couple of times before they break. I still get my milk delivered in the mornings by the milkman so thats a few less plastic bottles.
My water butt and composter are made of recycled plastic ans I don't intent to throw them out.

i have a Patagonia windproof fleece jacket made out of plastic bottles that is 6 years old and still going strong!

I think milkmen are the original eco warriers! They even have battery powered vehicles. I suppose maybe I should find out from my council how they get their plastic recycled.

Our local milkman drives a diesel truck (alas). It used to wake me up at 4am 3 mornings a week. The kids and DH took turns dropping glass bottles on the floor. We get through 20 pints of week so it cost too much... I sure hope plastic is a good thing to recycle. If Britain goes like rest of Europe and starts incinerating more waste, the recycling plastic option might look better.

HI,
well, obviously recycling plastic is still better then not too, but yeah reducing rubbish of any kind and re-use is definately better!
There are now a lot of brilliant shopping bags you can buy and take with you when shopping, and those have a lot higher life span....maybe if all shops would charge for even their plain ole plastic bags people would be more encouraged to invest in more longterm solutions!
plastic packaging should be used less by manufacturers too imo...there is often far to much wrapping.
Maybe using glass bottles that you leave a deposit for at a shop that you claim back on return of the bottle once empty...so, bottles could be reused....less plastic again! Saying that, in Germany even most platic bottles come with that deposit charge...so..not sure if they are differently recycled....i.e. just cleaned and refilled.....!
Still a long way to go to find the solutions, I think! But Britain is finally doing more and more now for the environment.Although hte public may not always appreciate the changes, lol! The hoohaa in the area where I lived when they recently gave us more bins and boxes for recycling...unbelievable...I really can't see why it's such a hassle! Sorry of on a rant a bit there, lol!

In Sweden you are charged a small deposit on every drinks container you buy - even cans of lager - and every supermarket has a recycling machine which reads the barcodes on the containers and gives you a printed voucher for the amount of the deposit, which you can then use at the checkout. Brilliant idea - we went to Sweden in 2002 and I wrote to my MP when we got back saying why can't we do this. He forwarded it to la Beckett who was at Defra (I think!) at the time and in due course I got a standard reply saying they were considering lots of options. Ha.

The only drawback to this that I can see is the amount of space required at the supermarket to store all the empties (and theirs don't even sell wine/spirits, you have to go to a special shop for those, so the space required at a UK supermarket would be even greater!)

(No plastic bags at Swedish supermarkets either - they have paper)

JanH, that is how it works in Germany too...well....only been to Aldi this time and they had one of those machines, but remember seeing them in other supermarkets in germany in the past....it used to be done all manually for many years though...we have always had that small deposit charge from what I remember anyway!

we are going to be turning our plastic bottles into outdoor shelters at the dds school next weekend. I'm not sure how successful it'll be but it will while away a Saturday and the plastic only has to travel a mile to get there.

The machines -reverse vending machines were in The Times on Saturday. Apparently some schools have got them and they reward the kids with green merits. Sounds good but it must be expensive and not very green to make the machines in the first place for schools ( Can understand the need more in supermarkets where a lot more people will use each one.)

The problem with plastic is that it's bluky, and unless you separate by type, it's hard to reuse effectively.
Many pastic containers have the type of plastic somewher on them, but often it's hard to find, and of course no machine can read it.

Like others here, I could easily be persuaded that current attempts to recyclde do more harm than good.

The only solution I can think of is standardisation on containers. As MadamePlatypus says, milkmen have the right idea.
Although milk bottles are made by several manufcaturers, and bought by different dairies, they are interchangeable, and there is only one type that I know of.
Also, as I understand it the sizes of soap powder boxes are also standard.
I see no good reason why you can't have a set of bottles/jars of various sizes. If you used water soluble pigments the manufacturers could put attactive labels on theem.
Would not only make recycling a lot more effective, but also would knock a bit off their costs, through economies of scale.
Tins are trickier.

As for the whining over extra bins, you have to allow for the inherent incompetence of local authorities.

Bins are great for the fully able, rather horrid if you're not, especially if you have steps etc.
Also councils are congenitally incapable of negotiating contracts with supplier like waste collectors. Thus they often refuse to collect anything that is not *exactly" where they think it should be.
But the most common problem is that to save money, they have cut the number of collections.
In summer, there is a big problem with flies etc because they can't be bothered to collect them weekly.
And of course it being a council contract, the contractors often "forget" bins, making for a month gap, and the smell contravenes UN treaties on chemical and biological warfare.