Science
General discussions about "science" itself
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Straws may have a comeback? Hell yeah.
Article in 15 years time: Cases of bromism are rising globally across human and animal life. Worlds oceans experiencing record high levels of bromine salts from degraded single use tPB containers.
Paper cups have been around for thousands of years and have held hot drinks since the start. Why are we re-inventing paper with chemically treated paper to get something that looks more plastic like/transparent while only holding liquids for a few hours.
To replace single use plastics.
Should we just stop using single use plastics? Yes. Will mankind be that smart? Lol yeah right
It’s not so much about humanity being smart as it is about governments having the incentive to intervene. They set the rules as to what is allowed, easy and cheap. Companies just play the game by the rules set by those governments, while consumers buy what’s available.
Releasing greenhouse gases, and manufacturing single use items out of very durable materials is cheap at the moment, so that’s what companies end up doing.
We can already replace those single use plastics with paper.
This isn’t a replacement for a bottle of water on a shelf, those will still need to be plastic as they need to hold up for more than a few hours.
I think you missed the second part of my response.
Lemme spell it out more explicitly. The majority of voting humans will not accept a world without single use plastics. This is because they are dumb as shit. If an alternative is presented that is functionally the same the masses will more readily accept a ban on petroleum based single use non-biodegradable plastics (paper replacements are not functionally the same. see paper straws). Now I don't want to get bogged down in pedantry, so let's keep this broad.
Packaging materials, coffee cup lids, shrink wrap, the list goes on. The world is addicted to cheap throwaway plastics and they will need to be weaned off or the petroleum lobby will just rile up the majority and regulation will fail. This is what I'm saying. Will the alternative have it's own problems? Absolutely. The hydrophobic coatings they'll put on food containers will give people cancer. Your scenario at the top is very probable, or something like it. But good luck convincing them to jump straight to sustainability.
Hell, I'm typing this on a device made of materials mined by children and assembled by political prisoners. And when it breaks, I'll go buy another, because I need it to work. If you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go drink until I'm not thinking about this anymore
The vast majority of paper cups are plastic lined. Before that, we used to use wax coated paper but that's less common these days.
No they don't. We have glass
Good point!