what the heck does “styro” in styrofoam mean, and what is it made from?
Styrofoam is made from polystyrene plastic, I believe.
Yep, the polymer is polystyrene, and it’s made by blowing lots of air into it, thus “foam.”
It’s cool stuff, but hell on the environment.
Styrofoam, aka “expanded polystyrene” or “foamed polystyrene” is basically what it’s name sounds like. That is, it is a foam of polystyrene that is “expanded” with a gas. This used to be done with chlorofluorocarbons (CFC’s), as they were cheap and non-toxic to humans. Nowadays, nitrogen is used in it’s place in industrialized nations.
According to something I read recently at the Argonne National Labs Website, styrofoam is a very under-recycled substance, and reportedly requires much less resources (such as process water) to recycle than paper.
Styrofoam[sup]tm[/sup] is also trademarked by Dow Chemical; it is their brand name for polystyrene foam inuslation. Perhaps unfortunately for them, the name has become a generic one for all polystyrene foam products (Dow is adamant, BTW, that Styrofoam [sup]tm[/sup] has never been used to make cups…).
Err…that’s ‘insulation’
I’d be willing to bet that more styrofoam is recycled than folks think. I hardly ever throw out “packing materials” and would think most people recycle in the best way possible, reuse the materials in the same way…pass 'em on.
[nitpick?]
So, that’s the “reuse” portion of the “reduce-reuse-recycle” slogan. Recycling involves breaking down and reforming waste materials. If you’re saving the materials, then they aren’t even “waste” yet.
[/nitpick]
There I stand, in Paradise Valley, Montana. In the home of one Al Giddings, diver and underwater cameraman extraordinaire. In his trophy case, along with dozens of other incredible items, is a polysterene thimble with fine line drawing on it.
I inquire, being the inquisitive type that I am. Al informs me that when he did the dives on the sunken ship Titanic prior to the actual dives for filming the movie "Titanic", each person topside drew stuff on a foam coffee cup, and they put them all in a mesh bag, and tied it to the outside of the bathysphere.
Due to the incredible force of pressure that far below sea level, the large sized coffee cups were reduced to the size of your average thimble. He even let me carefully hold it for a second. A VERY cool souvenier, courtesy of pressure. Up here on the surface of the earth, that stuff definitely takes up a ton of landfill room....but, recycling it is even less sexy than recycling soda cans.
CartooniverseMost of the bad rap foamed polystyrene got came from when it was blown with CFC’s rather than air. As I understand it, the CFC’s were not recovered, meaning they were all released to the outside air. After the initial report of CFC’s effect on the ozone layer, they stopped using CFC’s and started using compressed air to blow the foam.
Foam Polystyrene is used in a lot of applications involving food. The FDA frowns (meaning restricts/prohibits) on recycling foam cups, plates, etc. because of the worry of passing along diseases, so the recycled foam could only be used in non-food related applications, and there isn’t that much of a demand for it there. Other than that, it is a very easy to recycle material.
Thanks for the memory job, Engineer 
It didn’t really fit with the previous post of mine, but was sufficiently horrifying to want to pass along now.
I shot a job for a large manufacturer of styrofoam (sic) plates and bowls. I stood in an airplane-hanger like building and watched this HUUUUUUGE roll of foam, being slowly drawn through a hot metal stamping machine. The plates and bowls were removed by hand, as the now-partially moulded roll came out of the stamping area. Of course, everything left of the rolls was 100% recycled.
I noticed a haze up near the ceiling, and a funky smell. I asked about it, and one of the workers said, " Ahh, it’s not such a bad blue smoke day today". They explained that sometimes the hot stamping machine would stop, and so the portion of foam that was being stamped would catch fire.
They further explained that the smoke was filled with cyanide, since when you burn polystyrene, you get cyanic acid as a byproduct. It sure smelled evil, but I don’t know if it was true or not. I’ll never forget that very faint haze up there.
Thank god I so rarely shoot industrials now. There was that incident in Chicago with the Butterfingers…
CartooniverseStyrofoam is also one of the most ubiquitous pollutants. Packing pellets (peanuts) are now found everywhere on earth, even Antarctica.
Disgusting!