New York Minute 155 - Recycling Plastic

Recycle a plastic bottle in New York, and the state will pay you five cents. The money doesn’t actually come from the state. It’s a deposit that was collected at the time that the bottle was purchased as an incentive to recycle. But a lot of people don’t bother to recycle; they just toss their bottles into the trash. 

Other people, people who need money, go through trash cans and trash bags collecting any bottles that they can find. They trade the bottles in for cash. It’s a common activity; I see people scavenging for recyclables every day.

They tend to do this early in the morning or just before sunset. Mild temperatures could explain this timing in the summer, but the schedule seems to hold steady throughout the year for reasons that I don’t understand.

I saw a couple of scavengers picking through a garbage bag this morning as I was walking to the office. I was a bit concerned when I saw them, because they were picking through a pile of broken glass to collect their plastic bottles. I don’t know if the glass came from the garbage bag, or if someone had broken some it in the vicinity, but there was a lot of it.

I’ve see an alarming amount of broken glass in the streets and on the sidewalks this year. Smashing glass bottles seems to be one of the current fads for people with a lot of rage and limited productive outlets. Vandals have been smashing the screens of the free Internet stations that the city has provided, as well. It’s a shame. It’s dangerous, and in the case of the Internet screens, expensive to the taxpayer.

At one time, plastic bottles seemed like a wonderful alternative to glass. They don’t break or leave hazardous shards behind. I would be much more comfortable taking a plastic bottle into a slimming pool, for instance. But the environmental impacts of plastic are severe. 

One potential solution to plastic pollution is to return to distributing beverages in glass bottles. Glass can be sterilized and reused But glass requires care, and this isn’t a careful world. It’s a break it if it can be broken world. 

I don’t know what the ideal product is for replacing plastic containers, but if it’s breakable, it’s not going to work. Some people derive a bit too much pleasure from breaking things.

Copyright © 2019 Daniel R. South 

All Rights Reserved