I have two, glass, 1-gallon apple cider jugs. I’ve had them for about 30 years, and I used them for making sun tea. I still use one, while the other is awaiting cleaning after sitting outside for about 20 years. It occurred to me yesterday that I would be out of luck if I wanted to replace them. All of the apple cider jugs I’ve seen within memory at the supermarkets have been in plastic containers.
I bought a new bottle of 3-In-One oil. It’s in a plastic bottle. The old one I have (which is still about half-full) is a metal can with just a plastic tip.
I think manufacturers should go back to putting their products into glass or metal containers. Not everybody recycles. Glass in a landfill would be harmless, and metal containers will rust. (Sure, in the case of the oil, there would be the plastic tip; but that’s better than tossing a container entirely made of plastic.)
Of course glass is heavier and more expensive than plastic. The weight would increase shipping costs, and the making/purchasing of the containers will add to the production costs. But glass is so much more useful. My sun tea jugs aren’t taking up space in a landfill. I save some of the glass jars from products that still use them, for re-purposing. When I mix up spices, I need someplace to put them. Chipped beef jars are great for keeping bacon drippings. Or for tacks or screws or whatever.
If plastic recycling really is a ‘fraud’, then forcing companies to recycle plastic would add to costs anyway. So let’s go back to glass and metal, which are more useful and better for the environment.
As a matter of convenience yes: your sun tea jugs (which I hope you’re brewing overnight in the fridge, not cultivating bacteria in the sun), those Japanese-style packages of one banana swathed in plastic, etc.
Otherwise keep medical equipment disposable/recyclable plastic
I’ve done all the responsible environmental things a normal household can for 40 years, including following the incomprehensible and seemingly whimsical rules for recycling plastics. I wouldn’t mind getting rid of them.
The problem is that I remember the days before plastic containers. Glass is heavy. Glass needs to be thoroughly rewashed before it can be reused. And most of all, glass breaks. Shards of glass everywhere that you never find all of the first time through so you find them later when they were sticking into your skin.
The convenience factor from plastic is gigantic. The safety factor is less obvious but also major. The cost factor is overwhelming. Most of the same applies to metal containers in the same way. I don’t know how to compare the environmental costs of manufacturing plastic containers versus glass or metal containers but that has to be a consideration.
I’d say the cons of glass and metal beat the cons of plastic but I’d like to hear more arguments about them.
It also breaks a lot more easily. One of the reasons I typically get cans of beer instead of bottles (at my store) is because they’re a lot less likely to come in broken and if someone drops a six pack, instead (up to) 6 bottles worth of beer and glass on the floor it’s maybe one dented can that popped open.
Agreed. You can get similar glass jugs on Amazon, but you’re probably better off just going to a brewpub or a place that sells homebrew supplies.
In addition to glass breaking and producing hazardous shards, there is also the issue of running out of accessible glass-grade sand. (Glass can be recycled but it is nearly if not even more energy intensive than producing virgin glass from sand, and colorants and other impurities limit the uses for recycled glass) And while we aren’t running out of iron ore, the carbon and ecological footprint of ore mining, refining, alloying, and production is pretty high even if you are using an electric arc furnace. I don’t have the statistics at hand to argue the relative impact of the production of polymers, steel, aluminum, or glass on “the environment” but they all have a substantial impact, and it isn’t as if most people are washing and reusing glass containers.
I personally avoid the use of non-silicone plastic containers and packaging whenever possible (to the extent that is reasonable); I don’t drink bottled water, store food in reusable stainless steel and silicone containers, et cetera. But polymer-based materials are an intrinsic part of our society and many industries, especially the medical industry where it provides impermeable barriers and electrostatic filters for single use PPE like gloves and N95 masks, and is used for storing and conveying various fluids where glass is too heavy or delicate to be used around patients. Polymers are also critical in many other materials and products, and as noted, reduce shipping weight (and loss due to breakage). That they also have significant downsides is an unavoidable fact but I strongly doubt that we could maintain an industrial society of this scale without ‘plastics’, notwithstanding making sun tea.
Of course, the problem is that brewpubs refuse to put their beer in a growler labeled with another brewpub’s brand, so you end up with a dozen growlers. (Or is that just me?) I finally got my local brewpub to accept putting beer in non-branded growlers, and got a stock of stainless steel growlers with a swing-top clamp from one manufacturer just before they stopped making them. But many brewpubs refuse to fill growlers than don’t show their brand.
The issue is not a total ban on plastics, but the removal of them from standard commercial uses.
I will fight to the death against anyone suggesting we go back to glass lenses. Eyeglasses fall all … the … time. When I was a kid the thought of having to expensively replace my lens because of my carelessness terrified me. Nevertheless, I doubt that landfills are overflowing with old eyeglass plastic.
The overwhelming quantity of plastic in the world is a problem. But the reason that problem exists is that plastics were an almost miraculous solution to earlier problems. Going back to old problems is seldom the right way forward.
Why would I contaminate a perfectly good growler with tea? Next you’re going to tell me to serve tomato juice in a snifter! What happened to you, @silenus? Did the pod people take over your body?
That is both horrifying and remarkable in an “Overdone Holiday” sort of vibe at the same time. But as any Wisconsinite will tell you that it’s not a real Bloody Mary without a garnish consisting of a celery stalk, a large dill pickle, some cheddar cheese curds, a lime wedge, a lance of olives, an Old Wisconsin Beef Snack Stick, and a bunch of random things they found in the bottom of the produce drawer (apples, lettuce, old button mushrooms, a piece of lemon rind that fell down there, et cetera). That glass isn’t nearly big enough for that garden. Try harder next time.
The difference between plastic and glass/metal isn’t that plastic is harder to recycle. If anything, it’s easier, on a product-to-product basis. The difference is the price of the original material. New metal is more expensive than recycling metal, so metal gets recycled, but new plastic is cheaper than recycling plastic.
For actual, practical drinking, the most I do is large stuffed olive, cocktail onion, cornichon and a lemon wedge all skewered on cocktail spears saved from various high-end Vegas resorts. Going “full Wisconsin” is a step I’m not willing to take. That way leads to supper clubs and Brandy Old Fashioneds. (shudder)
