Speaker 1: What's up nst heads. So, this right here is part
Speaker 1: one of a two part episode. The second part is
Speaker 1: out now as well, but this is the one you
Speaker 1: should listen to first. It is part one, so enjoy
Speaker 1: and make sure you tap into part two to finish
Speaker 1: the story and without further ado. Part one of two
Speaker 1: on the Big Truths and Big Lies about recycling. I'm Manny,
Speaker 1: I'm Noah, this is Devin and this is no such
Speaker 1: thing the show where you settle our dumb arguments and
Speaker 1: yours by actually doing the research. This week, does recycling
Speaker 1: even work? If it turns out to be the case
Speaker 1: that this is not really doing anything, I'm gonna be
Speaker 1: writing a very strongly worded letter.
Speaker 2: I No, There's no no such thing.
Speaker 3: No touch, thank.
Speaker 4: Touch, thanks.
Speaker 1: Touch, thank.
Speaker 5: Thank so.
Speaker 1: This week is a topic that we've been thinking about
Speaker 1: for a while, and a listener of ours also had
Speaker 1: the same question recently. Liz asked this, does recycling do
Speaker 1: anything or does it just make us feel better when
Speaker 1: we put things into the bin and send it away.
Speaker 1: This is one of those topics that for years I've
Speaker 1: thought about, and you know, every few months I feel
Speaker 1: like I would see a news story a headline come
Speaker 1: by that said basically like the truth about recycling, and
Speaker 1: I hadn't read them until now. Yeah, now we're doing
Speaker 1: a podcast about it. Before we get into that, I
Speaker 1: want to introduce our special guest co host and someone
Speaker 1: who actually worked on one of these pieces that I
Speaker 1: skipped over years ago, is our fourth Mic Naima Raza.
Speaker 6: Hi, guys, nice to see you.
Speaker 1: Mind introducing yourself.
Speaker 7: I do a podcast called Smart Girl Dumb Questions, which
Speaker 7: I'm realizing there's no such thing as a.
Speaker 6: Ormo.
Speaker 7: But yes, years ago, I did write or actually it
Speaker 7: was a video with The New York Times the Great
Speaker 7: Recycling Con. I can't claim to be a recycling expert,
Speaker 7: and I can't say that that has changed my behavior as.
Speaker 1: Much as it should have. So yeah, so don't spoil anything. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we'll get into that later.
Speaker 6: Except for the word con.
Speaker 5: I do have that out.
Speaker 1: That's okay, that's just that's a New York Times editorializing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: to begin, how do we all feel about recycling?
Speaker 5: Well, how do we feel about it? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Like emotionally, yeah, I mean do you do you enjoy it?
Speaker 5: Do you do it?
Speaker 1: I don't even have any guilt about not doing it.
Speaker 5: No, I do I do it. I think.
Speaker 8: I think I try to recycle too many things. I
Speaker 8: feel like most of the things i'm quote unquote recycling
Speaker 8: or putting in a recycling man probably don't get recycled,
Speaker 8: but in my mind I have to do it.
Speaker 5: Everyone. Once in the blue, I'll.
Speaker 8: Get like a plastic container from like a takeout place
Speaker 8: and throw it in the regular garbage and I feel,
Speaker 8: you know, like you just killed really shouldn't do that.
Speaker 5: But recycling is annoying.
Speaker 8: The most annoying thing about recycling is that the recycling
Speaker 8: can is never as big as the garbage can. But
Speaker 8: then the recycling stuff takes up so much more space,
Speaker 8: so it's like, yeah, so it's like a big inconvenience
Speaker 8: in like your home, all right, And then you're like,
Speaker 8: why am I even like does this even work?
Speaker 1: And how when you're sorting, how are you sorting? How
Speaker 1: much sorting are you doing? Just recycling bin for everything.
Speaker 5: I have one recycling bin for everything.
Speaker 8: My apartment building does not short in anything, so I'm
Speaker 8: not shorting stuffcause y'all all short stuff. So that's when
Speaker 8: you go downstairs to put into the bins. There's just
Speaker 8: recycling bins' just supposed to be cardboard and paper supposed
Speaker 8: to be separated from the plastic. But they don't do that,
Speaker 8: so I'm not doing it either. Yeah, somebody, somebody will
Speaker 8: figure it out at some.
Speaker 5: Point or not.
Speaker 8: Job creating your job exactly, I'm creating a shorter but
Speaker 8: I try to, you know, I try to fold up
Speaker 8: my boxes and do that sort of thing. I guess
Speaker 8: my overall emotion around recycling is I I think it's fake.
Speaker 8: I don't think it is actually happening, But I do
Speaker 8: do it because I feel like I don't want to
Speaker 8: be you know, you're not going to be the one
Speaker 8: who's I'm not problem exactly. I'm doing what I'm supposed
Speaker 8: to do. If down the line y'all aren't doing what
Speaker 8: y'all supposed to do, that's on you. But we talked
Speaker 8: about my big recycling. Beef is a weird recycling stuff, right,
Speaker 8: So I use brit of filters. I don't know, mostly
Speaker 8: just because it's like a water container in my fridge.
Speaker 8: I don't believe it actually does anything, but.
Speaker 5: I was I was looking.
Speaker 1: I was looking at the filtering.
Speaker 8: Exactly, but I was gett you know, it was time
Speaker 8: to replace the filter. So I'm looking at the filter,
Speaker 8: they'd be like, can I recycle this? And then I
Speaker 8: read the box and it's like, oh, you can recycle
Speaker 8: it if you put it in a box and ship
Speaker 8: it to wherever and then we'll recycle it for you.
Speaker 8: And I was like, this is the dumbest thing I've
Speaker 8: ever seen. I have to ship something so you can
Speaker 8: recycle it. Doesn't that offset the whole purpose of recycling?
Speaker 1: If not overc It's like, it's not like a drop
Speaker 1: off location.
Speaker 5: No, it's like in New York City.
Speaker 8: You gotta you gotta mail it off, mail off my
Speaker 8: filter to get recycled. I think the carbon footprint of
Speaker 8: me mailing it offsets me recycling, and they.
Speaker 1: Don't send you a new one or something. It's not.
Speaker 6: For me recycling.
Speaker 7: What about when you have like takeout and you're rinsing
Speaker 7: the things to recycle them, when you're using so much
Speaker 7: water and you're like, does this thing even recycle? I
Speaker 7: gott to rinse it because you can't put your dirty
Speaker 7: debris in that.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you gotta clean it up.
Speaker 1: I was dealing with this just last night because Monday
Speaker 1: is garbage and recycling, and my basic view is that, Like,
Speaker 1: I want to be a good citizen, but they make
Speaker 1: it too difficult. Every week I'm pulling up bag. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and so I just found myself doing this last night
Speaker 1: and I was like, this is terribles. I don't want
Speaker 1: to do this anymore. The drop off location for my
Speaker 1: Brita filter is the garbage can. I'm not doing any
Speaker 1: extra work. I think the government should make it a
Speaker 1: little bit easier.
Speaker 7: But if they gave you a replaceable filter for free,
Speaker 7: if you recycled yours, what do you recycle it?
Speaker 1: Like? Would I ship it and you get a replacement.
Speaker 6: As opposed to spending nine dollars?
Speaker 5: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I'm also not good with money. I'll just buy like
Speaker 1: I should just that would be the smart thing to do.
Speaker 8: Yeah, but I'm a timers money guy to yah where
Speaker 8: I'm like, oh, I got it, like print a label
Speaker 8: and like I'll s throw it out.
Speaker 1: The British should come with a package that you mail
Speaker 1: it out, and it should come with two so that
Speaker 1: way you you know you always have one immediate.
Speaker 7: All right, Chief Strategy Britt is listening, and you know
Speaker 7: I don't need to do this anymore.
Speaker 1: I'll the sponsor I'm very aligned with you all where
Speaker 1: it's like I separate, I put the things in the bin.
Speaker 1: My garbage areat my building is not separated at all.
Speaker 1: So it's just like it's going with God. From the
Speaker 1: little headlines I taken in. Yeah, I don't think this
Speaker 1: is going anywhere. At some point I thought, Okay, they're
Speaker 1: sending it to China, and maybe China's doing it.
Speaker 5: Mm hmm.
Speaker 1: I don't know this with absolutely zero knowledge about what
Speaker 1: happens after I do my recycling.
Speaker 7: Yeah, but it does make me feel better about buying
Speaker 7: glass bottles of coke.
Speaker 6: You have a plastic bottle coke there.
Speaker 7: It doesn't taste as good and doesn't recycle as well apparently.
Speaker 7: But but here's an anti feminist moment, which is to say,
Speaker 7: I actually, really, when I'm in a relationship, don't deal
Speaker 7: with recycling or trash. I feel like those are man
Speaker 7: duties in a home.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to saying the case in.
Speaker 8: My home, right, Yeah, well, like I'm not getting canceled.
Speaker 1: We'll be canceled by my wife.
Speaker 6: He doesn't want to get canceled from his new Brida job.
Speaker 1: Job. And then I think we should also say this
Speaker 1: varies right like city by city and state by state,
Speaker 1: like in New York, I mean, are super like I've
Speaker 1: gotten in trouble multiple times for recycling something incorrectly, and
Speaker 1: then my super will be like, look, if you keep
Speaker 1: doing this, we're gonna get fine.
Speaker 5: Yeah, buildings are supposed to get fine for cycling correct.
Speaker 1: So now I'm recycling so that he doesn't get fined,
Speaker 1: not necessarily to save the earth. I remember there's also
Speaker 1: some stuff where you're supposed to put all their cycling
Speaker 1: in a clear bag for slack bags for.
Speaker 5: The trash so they can sort through it.
Speaker 1: And then you know, I've heard other people say their
Speaker 1: buildings are definitely on them about this, and then it
Speaker 1: obviously varies so much where it's like this can't be
Speaker 1: that big of an issue if and a lot of
Speaker 1: buildings aren't doing.
Speaker 7: This, But in other countries all over the world, like
Speaker 7: it's very in the UK they will actually find you
Speaker 7: if you if you don't compost, like they'll find you
Speaker 7: as the owner and or the unit.
Speaker 6: And in Europe, I mean, they're.
Speaker 7: Just they're much like I think, they're just much better
Speaker 7: about these kinds of common good.
Speaker 1: Problems and separate bins and stuff to.
Speaker 7: I've noticed even in Australia's like there's a water shortage,
Speaker 7: showers are going to be like six minutes. Imagine telling
Speaker 7: Americans they can only shower for six minutes.
Speaker 1: Don't tell me that we've already for three amount of
Speaker 1: time than we do.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Three, not for water, not for water, not for.
Speaker 7: For antibacterial reasons, yeah, and just health washing away your
Speaker 7: naturally like what you need versus what you want.
Speaker 1: Go away to put it like that shower thing just
Speaker 1: comes up every episode. It sounds like we're all aligned.
Speaker 1: But let's do a vote. Does anyone here think recycling works?
Speaker 1: And I would like to believe it's doing something, But
Speaker 1: in your heart of hearts, uh, you know, I throw
Speaker 1: this out. What's happening? You gotta be doing something right.
Speaker 1: They're putting it in a different place than your garbage,
Speaker 1: is what I think is happening.
Speaker 5: I think a very small percentage of stuff. Actually.
Speaker 8: I think in the beginning, when we were like in
Speaker 8: elementary school, when we were recycling, I feel like that
Speaker 8: was the golden age.
Speaker 5: I think feel like they were really psychling.
Speaker 1: Do you think that's because you were in middle school?
Speaker 5: No, I think that they were actually doing stuff back then.
Speaker 9: Around down to the c I feel like where he
Speaker 9: was doing.
Speaker 5: The issue now.
Speaker 8: Back then, not everything was recyclable, and we weren't, you know,
Speaker 8: like we had a limited amount of things that we
Speaker 8: were recycling. Now every single thing is recyclable. Yeah, which
Speaker 8: there's just too much stuff. We're not using this much.
Speaker 1: When I was a kid, it really felt like just
Speaker 1: like soda cans.
Speaker 6: In Santa Claus was a live guys.
Speaker 7: I mean, I have to say, I don't know that
Speaker 7: the technology has gotten worse with time.
Speaker 8: No, I'm not saying it's gotten worse. I think we
Speaker 8: just have more things that we're trying to recycle.
Speaker 7: We used to, like recycle those plastic bags from Zachermarkets
Speaker 7: and stuff. I think it existed, we just weren't the
Speaker 7: ones consuming them and we didn't. I feel like it
Speaker 7: works with glass and aluminium, but when it comes to plastic,
Speaker 7: I think it's like I forget the number and I
Speaker 7: don't want to scoop it.
Speaker 1: Like I feel, Yeah, my guess is material by material,
Speaker 1: there's a variance. But I think kind of what I
Speaker 1: guess what Devin is saying is because there's so many
Speaker 1: things we're expected to try to recycle, and I think
Speaker 1: that complicates matters even more.
Speaker 7: But when you're when we're kids, I do think I
Speaker 7: thought recycling was magic. Like I thought, if you have sneakers,
Speaker 7: they will one day become a basketball court, you know,
Speaker 7: or like if you have a plastic bag one day
Speaker 7: become a park that and like everything was beautiful because
Speaker 7: Captain Planet.
Speaker 1: You just put it in and it comes out something new.
Speaker 1: But I will say this for the purposes of this episode.
Speaker 1: If it turns out to be the case that this
Speaker 1: is not really doing anything, I'm going to be writing
Speaker 1: a very strongly worded letter like we are doing so
Speaker 1: much work to or Mudania, all right, why we're well,
Speaker 1: I mean we're doing so much work at home. I
Speaker 1: would be devastated to find out that it's not really
Speaker 1: doing anything.
Speaker 8: But what if we find out I think this episode,
Speaker 8: outside of the laundry episode, has the biggest chance to
Speaker 8: change my personal behavior. Yeah, because if it turns out
Speaker 8: it's not doing anything, then I'm not reciting what do anymore?
Speaker 1: Throwing the garbage, It's all going to be in the
Speaker 1: black bag. Yeah, they're not gonna be black check.
Speaker 7: Maybe you should over your ears for the rest, will
Speaker 7: you stop buying stuff.
Speaker 6: That's I think, like, that's.
Speaker 1: Gonna be my story when my super comes around, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna be like, actually, I don't purchase anything to recycle.
Speaker 1: That's why you're not seeing any recycling.
Speaker 7: I'm a real environmentalist who writes strongly worded letters.
Speaker 6: Yeah, on Tuesdays.
Speaker 1: Well, why don't we answer some of these questions after
Speaker 1: the break, we're gonna hear from an advocate against the
Speaker 1: big plastic industry.
Speaker 8: Oh all right, fellas, I need you to help me
Speaker 8: with a problem that I got. You know, usually we're
Speaker 8: the ones helping other people with their problems. But I'm
Speaker 8: about to go abroad and I'm going to watch Met games. Noah,
Speaker 8: how can I watch them?
Speaker 5: That's a tough one.
Speaker 1: Maybe get a really large telescope.
Speaker 5: I don't think that's the best way to do it. Manny,
Speaker 5: do you have any solutions on how I can watch
Speaker 5: Mets games?
Speaker 1: You broad I think I've got a slightly more practical
Speaker 1: solution for you, Devin. If you use nor VPN, you'll
Speaker 1: be able to change the location of your laptop's IP
Speaker 1: address and watch the content with no problem. What about
Speaker 1: my privacy online? I'm worried someone's watching me. First of all,
Speaker 1: no one is watching you, Noah, but in case someone
Speaker 1: was watching you, NordVPN provides you with privacy online, leaving
Speaker 1: no digital footprint by hiding your IP address. It's like
Speaker 1: wearing an invisibility cloak while you're surfing the web.
Speaker 5: Sounds comfy.
Speaker 8: So many I've heard about these VPNs and how they're
Speaker 8: super slow?
Speaker 5: How do I make sure my internet is not throttling?
Speaker 1: If you want to use a VPN without slowing down
Speaker 1: your internet, Devin, You're gonna want to use NordVPN because
Speaker 1: whenever I use it, I don't see any buffering or
Speaker 1: lagging while I'm streaming my favorite content.
Speaker 5: How do I get NordVPN, Devin?
Speaker 1: If you or our listeners want to get the best
Speaker 1: discount off of your NordVPN plan, go to NordVPN dot
Speaker 1: com slash nst. Our link will also give you four
Speaker 1: extra months on the two year plan, and there's no
Speaker 1: risk because Nord has a thirty day money back guarantee.
Speaker 1: The link is in the show notes. That's NordVPN dot
Speaker 1: com slash nst We are back. I'm Manny, Noah, am
Speaker 1: I allowed to say my name is now you are, yeah,
Speaker 1: and we are figuring out the truth behind recycling. Wow,
Speaker 1: is it a lie? I spoke. I spoke to someone
Speaker 1: who's done a lot of work on this.
Speaker 10: So my name is Davis Allen. I'm an environmental historian
Speaker 10: by training. I work as an investigative researcher at the
Speaker 10: Center for Climate Integrity, where we provide support for communities
Speaker 10: that are holding big oil accountable through litigation.
Speaker 1: So Davis Allen has working on this for years. His
Speaker 1: group has put out a bunch of really in depth
Speaker 1: reports investigating plastics and recycling and kind of some of
Speaker 1: the what they would say are lies of the big
Speaker 1: oil industry. We're mainly focusing on plastics recycling for the
Speaker 1: purpose of this. The main kind of thesis is that
Speaker 1: recycling as we know it is basically essentially a pr
Speaker 1: campaign made by and sponsored by big oil. Plastics come
Speaker 1: from oil, and basically this is a way that they
Speaker 1: can kind of clean up their image by saying, Hey,
Speaker 1: this isn't just like trash. It's going to be reused
Speaker 1: and make.
Speaker 5: You feel better.
Speaker 1: But throwing the stuff in the garbage.
Speaker 7: Who do you think packed for all those ads used
Speaker 7: to as a kid when you're a hunky doory recycling.
Speaker 1: All we check the credits to Captain Planet.
Speaker 5: I don't know.
Speaker 1: It's green heartbreaking. If there's something sinister behind Captain Planet,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I think they're well, yeah, I will
Speaker 1: look at that. Quick side note here, I did look
Speaker 1: into it, and Captain Planet is innocent, so don't worry
Speaker 1: about that.
Speaker 6: Greenwashing. Greenwashing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I didn't know about this, so first I opened
Speaker 1: up with a big one. I asked Davis. One of
Speaker 1: the most common misconceptions about recycling that it does anything,
Speaker 1: it works, Yeah, that exists.
Speaker 10: I think the biggest misconception really is the idea that
Speaker 10: because of recycling, a disposable consumer economy is not a
Speaker 10: major environmental problem, because it perpetuates a feeling among people
Speaker 10: using these products that there isn't really a major environmental
Speaker 10: impact because whatever the product is just getting cycled back
Speaker 10: through system and turning into a new product. And that's
Speaker 10: unfortunately just not how recycling works. In the vast majority
Speaker 10: of cases. There are some materials that are recycled, it
Speaker 10: are much more efficiently recycled, so something like aluminum, a
Speaker 10: much higher percentage of the aluminum actually gets turned into
Speaker 10: a new illuminim product. But even in that kind of
Speaker 10: case where ninety nine percent of the material is getting
Speaker 10: turned into a UKN or whatever, there are still a
Speaker 10: lot of environmental costs in that process that make it
Speaker 10: far less efficient than some kind of reusable approach. So basically,
Speaker 10: I think the biggest misconception is that the whole idea
Speaker 10: of a circle being not a problem when really any
Speaker 10: disposable product is ultimately more of a straight line where
Speaker 10: you're having a lot of environmental costs in that process.
Speaker 1: So basically there's a misconception that recycling is offsetting some
Speaker 1: of the more gross things we do with consumer products.
Speaker 1: But in reality, it's just like what like a drop
Speaker 1: in the bucket compared to Yeah, and basically like kind
Speaker 1: of what Naima was saying, where we have this image
Speaker 1: from middle school where it's like you put the thing
Speaker 1: in the bin and then it comes out as a
Speaker 1: new product. Totally you don't lose anything. Yeah, just like
Speaker 1: this perfect one to one replacement. That's just not true
Speaker 1: based on the costs and other factors of actually doing
Speaker 1: the recycling.
Speaker 10: So the biggest problem with things not getting recycled is
Speaker 10: just that it doesn't make a whole lot of sense
Speaker 10: to recycle the vast majority of plastics, recycled plastic, once
Speaker 10: you have it as a new sort of material, a
Speaker 10: new raw form of plastic to be turned into something
Speaker 10: is pretty low quality. It's well suited for things like
Speaker 10: trash cans, ironically, recycling bins, plastic crate that holds the
Speaker 10: materials that are getting shipped, things like that, but it's
Speaker 10: not the kind of plastic that is useful.
Speaker 3: For most applications.
Speaker 10: The reality is, when we're using all these plastic products,
Speaker 10: they have pretty particular specifications for what they need it
Speaker 10: to be able to do, and recycled plastic doesn't meet
Speaker 10: most of those specifications.
Speaker 1: So that's basically how recycling does or doesn't work these days.
Speaker 5: It's a scam.
Speaker 6: Way did this story from the New York Times. It
Speaker 6: was like twenty nineteen.
Speaker 7: But it's like the cost of making a new plastic
Speaker 7: bag from like a plastic bag is much higher than
Speaker 7: just making a new plastic bag, So why would a
Speaker 7: company then make a plastic bag from an old plastic
Speaker 7: bag or whatever the case may be in sir, So, yeah,
Speaker 7: it enables consumption because we feel so virtuous, we have
Speaker 7: like a little halo. This guy is going to take
Speaker 7: the halo off our head.
Speaker 1: Truly. Yeah, Ask what are plastics and where do they
Speaker 1: come from?
Speaker 6: Yeah? That I don't know.
Speaker 2: Actually, plastics come from many different raw materials. Some of
Speaker 2: the materials are natural like water and air. Some are
Speaker 2: growing things like corn and potatoes. Others are minerals such
Speaker 2: as oil, coal, and limestone. From these various raw materials,
Speaker 2: chemists derive many different chemicals, which, when combined properly, will
Speaker 2: form plastics.
Speaker 10: There's often the misconception that plastic is one thing. In reality,
Speaker 10: there are thousands of different chemicals that make up plastics,
Speaker 10: So they're really an extremely broad category of materials that
Speaker 10: happen to share some key characteristics. I'll say, in particular,
Speaker 10: the vast majority, something like ninety nine percent currently are
Speaker 10: made of fossil fuels, and they're engineered to address lots
Speaker 10: of particular use cases. But yeah, there are a really wide,
Speaker 10: diverse group of materials.
Speaker 6: But they just make it like they create it in
Speaker 6: a lab.
Speaker 7: Yeah, yeah, from oil downstream stuff that they don't need
Speaker 7: to like pump into the vehicle.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Okay, Yes, this is a dream of the future. Get
Speaker 2: out of such dreams has come all that we call progress.
Speaker 2: So in the years ahead, dreams like this and many
Speaker 2: more will become realities.
Speaker 1: So now we're going to kind of go back and
Speaker 1: do a little history lesson on plastics becoming disposable. So
Speaker 1: I was curious, like when did people even start to
Speaker 1: care about single use plastics and waste. Disposable plastics were
Speaker 1: introduced post World War Two. Before that, plastic was largely
Speaker 1: seen as a more durable material, so products like radios.
Speaker 1: Then the plastics industry realized they would make more money
Speaker 1: if they made disposable ducks instead of one as you
Speaker 1: buy and keep for twenty years. Yeah yeah, so again
Speaker 1: please yeah. So a lot of that is packaging and
Speaker 1: other single use items. So like before that, grocery stories,
Speaker 1: that sort of thing had bulk things and you would
Speaker 1: go fill up a bag and then take it away
Speaker 1: instead of individually wrapped pieces. The industry exploded and it
Speaker 1: totally changed our consumer economy. Things that had no packaging
Speaker 1: previously now did. Here's one example of that shift.
Speaker 10: In the report, we talk about an instance in the
Speaker 10: fifties in which many infants choked on plastic dry cleaner
Speaker 10: bags were killed by plastic dry cleaner bags in a
Speaker 10: single year. And that was a particularly interesting example where
Speaker 10: you see in a one moment in time it go
Speaker 10: from a durable concept of plastics to a disposable one,
Speaker 10: because you literally had DuPont, who was making the bags,
Speaker 10: telling people you can keep this bag, you can do
Speaker 10: all kinds of things with it, you can cover your
Speaker 10: sofa with it or whatever. And then the plastics industry
Speaker 10: launched this public relations campaign to try to counteract the
Speaker 10: terrible publicity from all of these children dying. Their pr
Speaker 10: campaign was you've got to throw these things away. They
Speaker 10: blamed the mothers explicitly of the children who had died
Speaker 10: for not throwing away the plastics after they had told
Speaker 10: them you can keep using them. So that's a particularly
Speaker 10: interesting example where you see that transition. But the public
Speaker 10: backlash against disposable plastics really began, especially around nineteen seventy.
Speaker 11: Good Evening, a unique day in American history, is ending,
Speaker 11: a day set aside for a nationwide outpouring of mankind
Speaker 11: seeking its own survival. Birthday, a day dedicated to enlisting
Speaker 11: all the citizens of a boutiful country and the common
Speaker 11: cause of saving light from the deadly byproducts of that
Speaker 11: body the fouled skies, the filthy waters, the litterardary.
Speaker 10: The first Earth Day was a catalyst for so many
Speaker 10: environmental movements, but it was especially significant for the plastic system,
Speaker 10: where people recognize this stuff is ending up in the environment,
Speaker 10: and it was a first backlash against disposable plastics. That
Speaker 10: was a catalyst for the industry trying to figure out,
Speaker 10: what are we going to do? How are we going
Speaker 10: to resolve this new public relations nightmare, And they initially
Speaker 10: go to landfilling and incideration and then just looking into recycling.
Speaker 3: Right from the beginning.
Speaker 10: We have docks from the early nineteen seventies where the
Speaker 10: Society of the Plastics Industry, which was working on behalf
Speaker 10: of all the big plastic producers, was trying to figure
Speaker 10: out is recycling feasible? Basically, is recycling something that could
Speaker 10: offer solution. They didn't really promote it early on because
Speaker 10: their initial finding was no, it's not.
Speaker 3: A good solution for plastics.
Speaker 10: So it really only came later that they began to
Speaker 10: promote it as a solution.
Speaker 1: So in short, it's basically like Earth they happens, people
Speaker 1: are like, hey, this seems pretty bad. Then they're like, okay,
Speaker 1: we'll just burn it all and everyone's like cool. And
Speaker 1: then after like twenty years, people are like, oh, maybe
Speaker 1: burning stuff isn't so good, and then they're like, okay,
Speaker 1: we can we'll recycle. And that's kind of lines up
Speaker 1: with us growing up with all this recycling propaganda.
Speaker 5: Yeah, nineties prime.
Speaker 7: Recycling that the baby story is so much bad, I'm
Speaker 7: sure as a new father.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, oh my god. I mean every day I'm like,
Speaker 1: am I gonna kill this baby by accident? I can't believe.
Speaker 1: So what do the even dry cleaning bags, like the
Speaker 1: bags or seed would come back in? Yeah, big ones.
Speaker 8: But y'all remember when we were younger, it was a
Speaker 8: big thing of our parents being like, never put a
Speaker 8: plastic bag over your head. Yeah, I'm assuming it's because
Speaker 8: of this that story are their stories?
Speaker 5: Wow?
Speaker 7: I mean I can't believe, like this industry is just
Speaker 7: like surviving and writing like baby killings.
Speaker 1: Development in the industry is a like a pr move. Yeah,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, fix some previous mistake. Okay, So we heard
Speaker 1: a lot about what plastic is, how we got so
Speaker 1: much of it, and how we landed where we are today.
Speaker 1: As far as recycling being a big sort of solution
Speaker 1: to deal with it. After the break, Davis is going
Speaker 1: to tell us why he thinks big recycling is basically
Speaker 1: a fantasy made up to guilt trip little people like
Speaker 1: you and me to take responsibility for a disposable consumption
Speaker 1: culture that's mostly.
Speaker 10: Out of our control.
Speaker 1: So now we're going to dive into Davis's main piesis
Speaker 1: that recycling is a way to push a narrative of
Speaker 1: guilt onto us, the consumer, rather than looking towards the
Speaker 1: big oil companies actually producing and profiting from all of
Speaker 1: this plastic waste. And remember this is just part one.
Speaker 1: In part two, we'll visit a recycling plant to see
Speaker 1: how recycling actually works on the ground, and here from
Speaker 1: the pro recycling side, But for now, more of my
Speaker 1: conversation with Davis Allen from the Center for Climate Integrity.
Speaker 1: It seems basically they landed on like we can basically
Speaker 1: guilt people and the public into blaming themselves for plastic waste.
Speaker 1: If that's true, can you talk about how we got
Speaker 1: to the kind of that point from where we are
Speaker 1: in the early seventies there.
Speaker 3: I think that is true.
Speaker 10: I think that's the exact trajectory of what happened really,
Speaker 10: they knew that recycling was not viable for the vast
Speaker 10: majority of plastics, and they knew that it wasn't a solution.
Speaker 10: Even when plastics can be recycled, that process degrades the quality,
Speaker 10: and so it's not something that can keep happening over
Speaker 10: and over again like with some other materials. It's something
Speaker 10: that represents a very limited strategy to deal with plastic,
Speaker 10: especially when we are knowingly producing so much plastic that
Speaker 10: is meant to be used once and then end up
Speaker 10: in the waste system. So they understood all of those problems.
Speaker 10: They were very open internally within the industry recognizing that
Speaker 10: these things would prevent plastic recycling from existing on a
Speaker 10: wide scale and certainly solving the problem of the plastic
Speaker 10: waste crisis even at that early stage. But shifting the
Speaker 10: blame to individual consumers was a really effective way of
Speaker 10: taking attention off of the producers, off of the industry
Speaker 10: that was producing and all the plastic, and creating a
Speaker 10: personal responsibility narrative in which people felt it was their
Speaker 10: job to solve this problem. That process of shifting blame
Speaker 10: to the consumers was so effective because people want to
Speaker 10: do right by the environment, right they want to behave
Speaker 10: in a way that feels sustainable and feels in alignment
Speaker 10: with their values and things, and the recycling campaigns really
Speaker 10: tapped directly into that impulse and took advantage of them
Speaker 10: to make it seem like an individual person putting their
Speaker 10: plastic item in the bin was resolving the deeper contradiction that,
Speaker 10: of course, recycling can do nothing to address. Whether they
Speaker 10: were targeting local municipalities convincing them to set up recycling
Speaker 10: programs that they knew would not be economically sustainable, whether
Speaker 10: they were creating sponsored materials for classrooms to basically advertise
Speaker 10: recycling to kids. As somebody who grew up in the nineties,
Speaker 10: I remember vividly being in elementary school and consuming all
Speaker 10: kinds of stuff telling me about the value of recycling,
Speaker 10: and I ate it up. And it has been a
Speaker 10: really weird feeling to go back and see this stuff
Speaker 10: as an adult and realize that it was made by
Speaker 10: DuPont or the American Plastics Council, or any number of
Speaker 10: different companies and groups, and was, yeah, again explicitly targeting
Speaker 10: that impulse to take care of the environment and to
Speaker 10: do our best. I've been amazed in my own experience.
Speaker 10: Since we published this report, so many people come up
Speaker 10: to me, and I feel are basically like confessing their
Speaker 10: plastic use to me and telling me how bad they
Speaker 10: feel about using plastics.
Speaker 3: And I'm like, none of us can avoid using plastics.
Speaker 10: They have made it virtually impossible to not rely upon
Speaker 10: plastics every day. You know, the vast majority of these
Speaker 10: things don't need to be plastic, but it remains a
Speaker 10: really effective business model to make people feel bad about
Speaker 10: it while also continuing to produce endless amounts of it.
Speaker 1: To be honest, rereading the report made me feel better
Speaker 1: because it's like, Okay, well, this is kind of it's
Speaker 1: not all my fault, you know, you know, backwards away,
Speaker 1: it's kind of like, okay, like, I know I don't
Speaker 1: soar it perfectly, but it's out of my hands.
Speaker 10: I think that should be the takeaway really. Of course,
Speaker 10: it's incredibly demoralizing to you realize how we have been
Speaker 10: lied to and manipulated and all of these things. But
Speaker 10: at the same time, it's, yeah, you see how this
Speaker 10: stuff happens. You see the way that they were talking
Speaker 10: to each other at industry conferences and things. This is
Speaker 10: not the fault of the people using the plastic in
Speaker 10: the vast majority of cases, and there's just nothing you
Speaker 10: can really do. And that doesn't mean that we shouldn't
Speaker 10: do anything, we should just give up and become nihilists
Speaker 10: about it.
Speaker 3: In my own.
Speaker 10: Life, I have still adjusted some of my behaviors and
Speaker 10: I like try to reduce my plastic.
Speaker 3: Usage in various ways. But I also recognize that's mostly
Speaker 3: for me.
Speaker 10: That's mostly because of the way that it makes me
Speaker 10: feel about it, not the fact that it actually is
Speaker 10: contributing very much. Because these companies are making just ungodly
Speaker 10: amounts of plastic and we're not part of that in
Speaker 10: any way. The recycling thing is a distraction. It's not
Speaker 10: anything to do with the actual problem.
Speaker 1: I mean, there you go.
Speaker 6: That's a good word. That's a better word than colin. Actually, yeah,
Speaker 6: that's a really good over here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think I feel like that's you see that
Speaker 1: so much, especially with any climate related things, Like think
Speaker 1: about flying, It's like, okay, I could not take a
Speaker 1: flight my two flights a year that I take. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: you know it's like people in charge of these things
Speaker 1: are flying every day.
Speaker 7: Yeah, the carbon off sets, you can just buy carbon
Speaker 7: off sets that seems like a distraction too.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you're probably, yeah, and it's.
Speaker 6: Like someone making money. Why I'm paying more money to offset?
Speaker 5: Like why me.
Speaker 1: Someoney tell you to you know, not use your air conditioner.
Speaker 1: It's like, okay, I can see the argument here. But
Speaker 1: also there's all these gigantic buildings in Manhattan that are
Speaker 1: running twenty four seven. It's like, maybe we should start
Speaker 1: with someone else.
Speaker 7: But that's different even because like by not I mean
Speaker 7: like I actually do do those some of those things,
Speaker 7: because I feel like, okay, if if everyone were to
Speaker 7: do this action, then this thing would be This is
Speaker 7: like even if you do this action, this action is dumb,
Speaker 7: so you're just wasting your time.
Speaker 6: Action is nice, which, to be.
Speaker 7: Clear, you should still recycle, especially blast aluminium, especially plastic
Speaker 7: bottles that are of the recycling kind. But yeah, like
Speaker 7: I but it's actually just like wasting my time and
Speaker 7: making me feel good and letting me continue to purchase,
Speaker 7: which is so bad.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean there's no real way to avoid plastics efficiently.
Speaker 7: Although like, do you what we think if we made
Speaker 7: like a plastic free town, it would be a really
Speaker 7: like people would want to move there, Like I should
Speaker 7: we do that, Like, I think some people want to
Speaker 7: live in a plastic free zone for their health and
Speaker 7: well being and for their virtuosity.
Speaker 6: You could like create a little plastic neighborhood.
Speaker 1: One of the bigger questions is just like how much
Speaker 1: stuff that we quote unquote recycle actually gets recycled, So
Speaker 1: that would be the recycling rate is the term they
Speaker 1: used to study this.
Speaker 5: So first give.
Speaker 1: Here's a definition of recycling rate, and then what the
Speaker 1: actual recycling rate is for the United States.
Speaker 10: A recycling rate is the percentage of plastic that is
Speaker 10: entering the waste system that is getting recycled i e.
Speaker 10: In our case, mostly almost all mechanically recycled, so that
Speaker 10: means grinding and shredding the plastic down into small bits
Speaker 10: and cycling it through a system in which it gets
Speaker 10: basically melted down and turned into a new plastic product. Yeah,
Speaker 10: it's the percentage of the plastic entering the waste stream.
Speaker 10: So it's not new plastic that's being produced, because we
Speaker 10: don't want to count durable plastics against that recycling rate.
Speaker 10: It's only plastic that's entering the waste stream.
Speaker 1: For plastics, what's the current recycling rate in the US.
Speaker 10: For plastics, the recycling rate is close to five to
Speaker 10: six percent. The highest the plastics recycling rate has ever
Speaker 10: been was nine percent. But at that point it was
Speaker 10: a little bit deceptive because it counted a lot of
Speaker 10: plastics that were being shipped to China to be recycled.
Speaker 10: But there's a lot of plastic being shipped to China
Speaker 10: that was never going to get recycled. They have the
Speaker 10: same sort of economic limitations that we do, and that
Speaker 10: number was deceptively high for a bit.
Speaker 1: So it's more like it's not recycled, but it's more
Speaker 1: out of our hands.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 10: It provided a very easy way for us to pretend
Speaker 10: that things are being recycled in the same way that
Speaker 10: people talk about wish cycling on like an individual level,
Speaker 10: putting something in the bin thinking maybe it'll get recycled.
Speaker 10: We were doing that as a country, you know, engaging
Speaker 10: in some pretty major waste imperialism.
Speaker 3: And we still do.
Speaker 10: It's just not to China anymore, because China decided that
Speaker 10: they don't want to accept our trash anymore. The rate
Speaker 10: currently in the United States is probably around five or
Speaker 10: six percent.
Speaker 1: And Davis went on to tell me that certain plastic
Speaker 1: products have a higher recycling rate. So a pet bottle,
Speaker 1: think of a typical soda bottle, is recycled at around
Speaker 1: thirty three percent, which is on the higher end of things,
Speaker 1: whereas other types like polypropylene aka plastic number five might
Speaker 1: be as low as one percent or even less.
Speaker 6: Wait, I'm so confused.
Speaker 7: They wanted to make up a number of how much
Speaker 7: they were recycling, and the highest they could make up.
Speaker 6: Was nine percent.
Speaker 1: That's like that that's like basically giving yourself, like all
Speaker 1: the advantages of being like okay, well let's say this
Speaker 1: and thet'll say.
Speaker 7: That, but like nine percent is the highest they could
Speaker 7: eke out, Like if you're going to tell lie, it
Speaker 7: would be like ninety nine percent.
Speaker 1: Before you played that clip, all I was asking for
Speaker 1: was ten percent recyclable rate, meaning I recycle is actually
Speaker 1: going to get recycled. I couldn't even get ten percent.
Speaker 7: Well that's not you know, that depends on like the
Speaker 7: average math of what you consume. The plastics are fewer
Speaker 7: than and some of the plastics are thirty three percent.
Speaker 1: A lot of these water bottles do some service for
Speaker 1: the country. I can't believe that five, five to six
Speaker 1: percent every numbers Ye crazy. Yeah. When I heard that,
Speaker 1: I was pretty shocked. It's just like it's so it's
Speaker 1: like I can't believe how much time we've spent thinking
Speaker 1: about this. Yeah, and then you know, Davis mentions the
Speaker 1: incineration some countries counting thats recycling to well, we got
Speaker 1: rid of it, we turned it into dicycling, it into toxic.
Speaker 5: I actually felt.
Speaker 7: Sad for the plastic as he was talking about it,
Speaker 7: like it was pretty dehumanizing, plasticizing, like they.
Speaker 6: Crush it and they do this.
Speaker 1: And you asked me earlier about if doing this interview
Speaker 1: changed my habits. Yes, and the answer is no, But
Speaker 1: did you think about changing him? Not really, I mean
Speaker 1: changing your habits would not do anything, I guess it.
Speaker 7: I kind of knew that when your answer to reading
Speaker 7: the report was like, oh, thank god, it's not my problem.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 6: I like that confession.
Speaker 1: I like I like reasonable items when I can. But
Speaker 1: I remember I'm a small man and you know, a
Speaker 1: big world. That's my knock off from your show.
Speaker 7: World. You know what, I think you can use this
Speaker 7: like reduce reuse. Recycle is like in dating, so you
Speaker 7: should reduce the number of people you date.
Speaker 6: You can reuse your you can go.
Speaker 7: Back to your accents, great classes, emergency, and then you
Speaker 7: should recycle them because like I try it so much.
Speaker 7: When like it doesn't work out, well, I'll be like, oh,
Speaker 7: you know, but I have a friend that I think
Speaker 7: and people don't.
Speaker 6: People don't like that.
Speaker 8: Well, you yourself will say hey, I know for me,
Speaker 8: but like I should date my friends.
Speaker 7: I say, like, it doesn't seem like this will be
Speaker 7: the thing, but I have a friend because I like it's.
Speaker 1: Kind of nice because it's like it's still a stamp
Speaker 1: of approval.
Speaker 7: Yeah, it's a standard approval, but I don't think people
Speaker 7: like it. But like, but and it's also like, actually
Speaker 7: might work out because you friend is kind of I've
Speaker 7: always thought the idea that you can't date like your
Speaker 7: friend's access is kind of screwed up because your friend
Speaker 7: is like like you with a tweak, Like maybe that
Speaker 7: tweak is what's needed to make your.
Speaker 1: Probably someone who was upset the person that you were
Speaker 1: saying that to you're breaking up with the guy your friend.
Speaker 6: I already said it. I waited like two extra like that.
Speaker 7: I was like, I had this thought, but I thought
Speaker 7: I was, like they should be together, So.
Speaker 5: Take it away. From the We're gonna away from.
Speaker 7: Takeaways branded on men single men?
Speaker 1: Okay it in the dating world, Yeah, I mean I
Speaker 1: bet the efficiency rate would be way higher than five.
Speaker 7: I'm telling you reduced for youse recycle your men that
Speaker 7: And you know what the thing is, because like plastic
Speaker 7: gets less good when you recycle it, but like men
Speaker 7: get more good after we did.
Speaker 5: That's true because you make them better.
Speaker 7: We make everybody gets better after a relationship men, women, whatever, Like.
Speaker 5: I don't know if everybody ran through.
Speaker 6: That's the idea, learn something.
Speaker 7: Hopefully there should be like a cooling pod exit crazy
Speaker 7: ex girlfriend ratio come to anyway.
Speaker 1: Okay, so that's it for part one. Now scroll down
Speaker 1: and click on part two to hear the rest. In
Speaker 1: part two, we hear more about what happens with the
Speaker 1: plastic when we put it in the bin. We'll go
Speaker 1: on a field trip to a recycling center to see
Speaker 1: what's going on.
Speaker 5: It looked like some shit out of like future.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and talk to a representative there to see if
Speaker 1: recycling is actually a total scam or not.
Speaker 4: So there's the statistic that everyone loves to like run
Speaker 4: at me with their hands flailing in the air only
Speaker 4: nine percent of plastic gets recycled, So I just want
Speaker 4: to explain that statistic because it's a bit misunderstood.
Speaker 1: This is just the beginnings such thing as a production
Speaker 1: of Kaleidoscope content. Our executive producers are Kate Osborne and
Speaker 1: Mangesh Hatakader. This show is created by Mandy Fidel, Noah
Speaker 1: Friedman and Devin jose Femine. Credit song by Manny Fidell,
Speaker 1: mixing by Steve Bone. Thank you so much to our
Speaker 1: guests Naim Moraza and Davis Allen. Make sure you check
Speaker 1: out Niama podcast. It's called Smart Girl Dumb Questions. It's
Speaker 1: very funny, very smart and very good. You can go
Speaker 1: to Climate Integrity dot org to see the record. Davis
Speaker 1: has been working on a Visit No Such Thing dot
Speaker 1: show to subscribe to our newsletter for links to research
Speaker 1: in more. And lastly, we want to hear from you.
Speaker 1: We made a survey to get feedback about what you
Speaker 1: like about the show, which you don't like about the show.
Speaker 5: And a lot more.
Speaker 1: You can find the link in our show notes and
Speaker 1: on our newsletter, so please let us know what you think.
Speaker 1: And lastly, don't forget to jump into part two as
Speaker 1: soon as you can. Thanks nos nos noss.
Speaker 4: No such things.