
Plastics: What's Recyclable, What Becomes Trash and Why - kevinrpope
https://apps.npr.org/plastics-recycling/
======
Areading314
The truth is that plastic generally can't be recycled, and we should stop
pretending as such. Consequently it would make sense to tax it and generally
discourage its use as much as possible.

Polluters get away with overusing plastic packaging precisely because
consumers stop caring when they think it can be recycled.

~~~
mirimir
It's appalling how much many containers (plastic, waxed paper, and multiple-
layer) and how much packaging we go through every week. We get some bulk food
from the local coop. And in the summer, we buy from farmers' markets.

But there's no practical way to buy milk, ice cream, detergent for dishes and
clothes, prescription drugs, etc. So I end up saving containers, thinking that
I'll find some use for them. But it's pretty hopeless.

So yes, I'd say that we need regulations.

~~~
LandR
We can still get milk delivered in glass bottles here. But everything else I
agree is pretty impossible to avoid plastic.

Hell, I even saw some fruit, _fruit_ , in plastic containers at the
supermarket. I guess to stop it getting bashed. It was peaches.

~~~
the_gastropod
This drives me bonkers. Tomatoes in little plastic crates, bananas is plastic
bags, (bananas come with their own really great packaging! Why the hell do
they put them in bags?!) cellophane-wrapped cucumbers. My previous employer
got Fresh Direct shipments frequently, and the blackberries, raspberries, etc.
came packaged in Russian doll nested plastic crates. Made my head explode.

~~~
Scaevolus
"a wrapped cucumber lasts more than three times as long as an unwrapped one"

[https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-
drink/feat...](https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-
drink/features/a-lesson-in-packaging-myths-is-shrink-wrap-on-a-cucumber-
really-mindless-waste-8340812.html)

~~~
coldtea
So just eat the cucumber earlier and shop more often/local?

Compared to destroying the environment sounds like a bargain!

~~~
ianai
And the cucumber will just decompose back into the environment if disposed as
trash, too.

------
martin-adams
Maybe a solution is the same with cigarettes in the UK. Any packaging which is
non-recyclable must be a standard color (i.e. red), and may not contain any
creative branding on it. If advertisers want to market their products and make
them look attractive on the shelves, they'll find creative solutions to using
recyclable packaging.

~~~
joshspankit
I have been thinking that it could also work to force all material which is
not in direct contact with food to be single-process recyclable. No layers,
made from a select number of materials, and no extra labels. Just drop the
package in the recycle and it can be re-used as-is.

~~~
ianai
I wonder whether a standardized product container could gain market share. One
option, make containers that consumers can purchase and then refill with
standard disbursement containers at stores. Maybe the disbursement container
would label the container with the usual store label. Another would be to
strictly enforce containment options for different form factors ala the other
comments here.

------
wlesieutre
I live in New Haven and saw on our handy recycling flyer [0] that pizza boxes
are listed, with no caveat, as being a single stream curbside recyclable item.

Which is great, because pizza is a whole _thing_ in this town. We eat a lot of
it.

So I was surprised to learn, if you go poking around and find the RecycleCT
website [1] and hover your mouse over the pizza box, up pops this note. "No
food residue. No liner."

Never in my life have I had a pizza box without grease soaked through it.

Maybe they've just given up, and knowing it won't be recycled anyway, they
don't bother to make a fuss about what can go in the bin? Is this flyer just
there to make us feel better about our waste? Because otherwise that's a
pretty major note to forget to mention. Pizza boxes are recyclable, just as
long as there's never been any pizza in it.

[0]
[https://www.newhavenct.gov/civicax/filebank/blobdload.aspx?b...](https://www.newhavenct.gov/civicax/filebank/blobdload.aspx?blobid=31946)

[1] [https://www.recyclect.com](https://www.recyclect.com)

~~~
detritus
This is a common misconception and one which has led to me having many
'conversations' with housemates and neighbours over the years.

You might find that greasy, unlaminated cardboard is recyclable in the
food/organic waste stream, as it is here in London.

~~~
wlesieutre
The only food/organic waste stream I've got here is the sewer, curbside pickup
has trash and recycling

------
paultopia
This is LUDICROUS. Recycling is harder than doing your taxes. We desperately
need uniformity on this.

" _BEVERAGE BOTTLES Recyclable. Be sure to remove the plastic film label,
which isn’t recyclable._ " FFS. Have you ever tried to remove one of those
labels? It's impossible.

" _A bottle with a cap or an opening the same size or smaller than the base of
the bottle is probably going to be recyclable._ " \-- WTF does the size of the
opening have to do with it?

" _The How2Recycle label is showing up on more products at the grocery store
... GreenBlue says that there are more than 2,500 variations of the label in
circulation_ " 2500 different recycling rules?!

This is not a consumer-level problem. It's completely ridiculous to expect
millions of ordinary people to succeed at this kind of task on a daily or
weekly basis. It needs to be solved further up the supply chain, or processors
need to be centralized and standardized. Period.

~~~
spodek
I found a simple 80% solution for home plastic: I avoid packaged food in favor
of fresh, unwrapped fruits, vegetables, and foods from bulk bins.

Now I have a load of garbage to empty a little less than once a year and a
load of metal and plastic recycling once or twice a year.

Plus my food tastes better and costs less.

Everyone is free to do what they want, and experience shows someone will have
to tell me the solution doesn't work for someone, but I hope people do similar
so the manufacturers' warehouses fill with plastic instead of the oceans and
they stop producing it.

~~~
Reedx
I mean c'mon, individually plastic-wrapped apples? It's crazy how much
unnecessary packaging there is at the grocery store.

But yeah, it is possible to avoid a lot of it. And if you're _really_
dedicated, you can essentially get to zero waste. Here's someone that was able
to fit 5 years of their trash into mason jar:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZT0uqEPzbd0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZT0uqEPzbd0)

~~~
TeMPOraL
Been there. Complained about this very thing on HN, and got shot down.
Apparently, individually plastic-wrapped fruits exist because of people with
motor disabilities.

I accept that, and I understand that under our economy, it's better (cheaper)
for people with such aliments that these fruits are just another item in
grocery stores, and not specialty item in special stores (which would be sold
for a much higher price). Still, I can't shake the feeling that this is
_wrong_ , there must be a better way of supporting people with motor problems
than carpet-bombing shops with environmentally absurd individually packaged
fruits, and exposing those to regular people without motor problems, some of
which will start buying (and thus creating demand) out of convenience or false
perception of quality...

~~~
rdl
I think the pre cut/wrapped apple slices and oranges and such are arguably for
disabled people (or children, or convenience, and priced at a 5-10x premium)
but the individually wrapped whole fruit, which are sold in much higher
volumes, make less sense.

------
modo_
I toured the Recology recycling facility a few months ago. The sorting
technology is impressive, but the amount of material that they remove and send
to the landfill had me questioning the efficacy of the program.

It sucks to push the packaging crimes of businesses onto consumers, but I
think improving the public's understanding of what can and cannot be recycled
can still have a massive impact on the effectiveness of recycling programs.

San Francisco has a great website to help you figure out what goes in which
bin: [https://sfrecycles.org/](https://sfrecycles.org/)

(Note that you can recycle fabrics -- this isn't possible through most
recycling programs!)

~~~
lyjackal
Public awareness at the unrecyle-ability of the majority of products should
hopefully upstream business packaging change.

~~~
baroffoos
Hopefully. Recycling almost feels like it has been a trick by corporations

"Don't worry, you can consume as much as you want and as long as you put it in
the recycling bin its all good"

~~~
lotsofpulp
It was a trick, and by politicians and people themselves, who wanted to be
seen as being environmentally conscious.

The only solution has always been to reduce consumption, but deep down,
everyone wants to consume more and more, while at the same time feel better
about and blissfully ignore that they are destroying the environment.

~~~
5040
>The only solution has always been to reduce consumption, but deep down,
everyone wants to consume more and more, while at the same time feel better
about and blissfully ignore that they are destroying the environment.

Maybe I'm only thinking of this because I've been reading Tocqueville, but
might not religion be the thing to encourage restraint here?

~~~
lotsofpulp
Maybe Buddhism, other than that I see lots of consumption in other religions.

------
teekert
Be carefull with this info, much depends on the factory. In the Netherlands we
separate plastic and much cannot be recycled but new techniques and factories
are being developed as a results of the constant stream of (at the moment!)
worthless plastics. [0]

[0] [https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2018/06/18/weg-met-plastic-in-
laag...](https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2018/06/18/weg-met-plastic-in-laagjes-dat-
is-niet-te-recyclen-a1607033)

~~~
masklinn
> Be carefull with this info, much depends on the factory.

Indeed, recently we were looking into getting bio-degradable / compostable
cups for an event, however:

* you need "industrial" (high-temperature) composting, your garden's compost pile is not going to work (it will probably degrade over time but very slowly)

* the average collection center can't easily differentiate between bio-degradable and regular plastic (you have to check each cup individually) so they just reject everything

~~~
pbhjpbhj
The bio-degradable items won't degrade at the expected rate, as you say it's
an industrial composting facility that's needed, but they _will_ degrade far,
far, more readily and won't leave the environment strewn with microplastics.
That's what we seek.

I've tested composting a couple of compostable nappies (aka diapers) in my
under-used, low temperature, domestic compost bin. After about 3 years we
emptied it out and there was no sign of the nappies at all.

If an animal eats the corn-starch (or whatever compostable type it is) cup
then it's not going to be especially harmful to them. Moreover, it appears
from what I've seen that the compostable materials will not retain mechanical
integrity after a small time of exposure to weather, this is good too.

It's not all sunbeams though, we had a fairtrade chocolate bar for sale in our
store that was wrapped entirely in compostable wrapping (with vegetable dye
printing, etc.), the compostable "cellophane" wrap was incredible. Completely
transparent, flexible, shiny. But [I believe] the humidity was too high and
the wrap grew sticky before the shelf life of the chocolate [<1y] had come.

It mightn't be perfect but it's a good way better.

------
supernova87a
The plastics and chemicals industries -- as a chemistry professor used to put
it -- are but a pimple on the butt of the petroleum fuels industry.

They are a tiny portion of what's getting produced every day. And as long as
petroleum keeps getting pumped out of the ground for dirt cheap and getting
burned, plastics will be an inevitable byproduct.

It just costs pretty much $0 to make new plastic from that stream of
petroleum, versus recycling which takes human effort, more equipment,
logistics, etc.

Until we tax petroleum coming out of the ground for all the later problems it
causes us, I too am disappointed but resigned to having recycling being a
further waste of resources.

~~~
Areading314
There are 2 separate externalities with different costs:

* CO2 emissions through burning fossil fuel

* plastic garbage with 1000 year lifetimes being littered around the planet

While we should absolutely be addressing both, you have to target these 2
problems separately

Edit: To clarify what I'd propose would be a tax on fossil fuel production,
and then an additional, much higher tax on production of things like plastic
bags

------
gregable
I've sort of wondered if recycling plastics is actually maybe bad from a CO2
angle.

It seems that using mined virgin oil for plastics that gets tossed in a
landfill means that at least a little more of the oil we are mining ends up
not getting burned and emitted as CO2. In this way, we're creating non-global
warming demand for oil which competes with the energy demand in the market. I
don't know if this is a reasonable way of thinking about it.

Of course, the energy required to haul a bottle of water hundreds of miles is
huge, so I'm not arguing for buying more plastic waste, just not sure how
recycling existing plastic waste affects global warming in particular.

~~~
esotericn
The amount of oil in the ground is effectively infinite with regard to any
sane carbon budget, so this could only really make sense in the short term.

Ultimately in time I suppose you could consider plastics recycling as a way to
extract less oil. If, for example, you could recycle 80%, then you only need
to extract 20% of the oil, which is likely to be far better for the
environment (less fracking etc).

On geological timescales a lot of the stuff we are doing is bonkers. It looks
sort of OK now because we've 'only' had 100 years of it.

~~~
gregable
That's a good point. It's not as though adding a little demand is likely to do
anything other than increase supply in this case.

------
nkurz
Does anyone have a article that clearly shows the energy costs for different
container options? Let's use a 12 oz / 330 mL container of soda as the
example. What I'd like to see would be something like this:

    
    
                New     Recycle  
      Glass:    GN Kwh  GR Kwh
      Plastic:  PN Kwh  PR Kwh
      Aluminum: AN Kwh  AR Kwh
    

That is, rather than seeing statistics that say a recycled aluminum can uses
only 5% of the energy needed to create a new can (AN vs AR), I'd like to see
how that 5% compares to the energy to create a new plastic bottle (AR vs PN),
or to recycle a plastic bottle (AR vs PR). And I'd love for it to be units
that make sense. My searching hasn't turned up much.

~~~
dkbrk
It's kWh not Kwh

SI prefixes and units are case sensitive.

"k" is the prefix for kilo; "K" is Kelvin.

Similarly, "W" is Watt. "w", as far as I'm aware, doesn't mean anything.

"h" is the accepted symbol for the use of hour with the SI.

------
leggomylibro
You can recycle polyethylene pretty easily on its own, and a lot of those
plastic wraps that the article says aren't recycled are made out of LDPE. HDPE
and LDPE are great materials for a lot of things that you might otherwise make
out of wood or 3D-print. It's easy to machine, and it can be very strong and
rigid for its weight.

Basically, you just shred the donor plastic, heat it to 300-350F, press the
air out, and let it cool. With LDPE plastic wrap, you can fold and stack it
instead of shredding it. You can also get cool tie-dye effects by using
multiple colors in the same batch.

You can use plywood for the walls of your molds, and a toaster oven that you
don't plan on cooking with ever again can be a reasonable furnace. To compress
the hot plastic, try making a loose-fitting lid and tamping or clamping it
down while the plastic heats.

But make sure that it is polyethylene - some plastics, like PVC, release
highly toxic fumes. And others, like polypropylene, are often mixed with
plasticizers which evaporate into nasty fumes and reduce the quality of the
recycled plastic.

~~~
userbinator
Notably, plastic bags are a plentiful source of nearly pure polyethylene,
which being composed entirely of only hydrogen and carbon essentially in the
form of a petroleum wax, is also one of the safest plastics to work with. The
decomposition products of fluoro/chloropolymers can be deadly.

------
vfc1
The US actually sends a lot of its unrecyclable plastic trash in boats across
the world to Asia (in return ships that delivered goods), but it's coming back
more and more.

Here is a cool video that explains this - Asian Nations Reject Western Trash -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-htnUTN4mH0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-htnUTN4mH0)

For example, for recycling plastic bottles, we are supposed to take the
plastic lid off, and even remove the attachment of the lid and separate it
from the main plastic body.

Otherwise, the bottle can't actually be recycled. Single use plastics are
everywhere where I live and more prevalent than ever: you want to buy 4
peaches at the supermarket? They come in a small plastic box wrapped in a
plastic sheet.

The only way is going to be to make it illegal and force people to use paper
bags or reusable bags, not only for carrying the groceries but also to
separate fruit, use reusable containers for grains, etc.

But it has to be mandatory for everyone in order to make any significant
difference.

~~~
pjc50
> force people

Force _companies_. Individuals don't get to choose what the packaging is made
of. And making it too inconvenient for end users is going to get pushback we
don't need.

I'm wondering if there should be a mandatory deposit scheme on _all_ packaging
as there currently is on glass bottles in some place. Give people a few cents
for returning a plastic bottle, and make it the manufacturer's problem to
recycle or dispose of it. If your deposit-return system scans the barcode, it
knows what product it is and which recycling stream to put it into ...

------
gregable
Worth noting for anyone who thinks "why bother recycling", this is
specifically about plastics.

If you have metal, aluminum _especially_ is a very valuable recyclable, so
definitely keep recycling that.

~~~
skybrian
Even then, your curbside recycling probably can't deal with random scrap
metal. The one at our house only wants aluminum and tin _containers_. Anything
else, you should probably give to a scrap metal recycler.

It doesn't matter what is theoretically recyclable. All that matters is what
the recycler can handle.

So the rule of thumb is: there is no rule of thumb. Follow the local rules.

~~~
Scoundreller
Dépends on your area. Around here, scrappers roam around on garbage day and
pickup the scrap metal or anything salvageable.

------
daveslash
I like the "wishcycle" term - have never heard that before. Where I life in
Southern California we have "single stream recycling" \-- you throw all of
your recyclables into one bin. I used to have a roommate who I had to
continually remind _" leftover burritos and hair extensions are not
recyclable"_. Her attitude was _" I just throw everything in there... they'll
pick out what they don't want."_ Some days I really wonder how effective such
a recycling system is at _recycling_ vs. how much it only serves to make us
feel good about ourselves.

------
mc32
Someone has run the numbers and figure out energy cost and total tonnage and
figure out what makes sense to streamline.

Plastics is a term which applies to thousands of different polymers. Some it
makes sense to recycle, some don’t.

We can then begin to whittle down on the plastics we allow on the items which
make most sense. For example we don’t needs tends of different plastics just
because one vendor prefers the aesthetics of one over the other. Give them a
select choice rather than an infinite choice.

Then label the packaging simply with simple easy to understand labels which
are clearly visible. Avoid mixing incompatible plastics.

~~~
maxerickson
There's a few plastics that are used for most packaging, the type is labeled
on most such packaging. It can be hard to see.

[https://www.greenlivingtips.com/articles/recycling-by-the-
nu...](https://www.greenlivingtips.com/articles/recycling-by-the-numbers.html)

------
swframe2
I was wondering if we should put "seller unique rfids" on everything so the
trash can be sorted and returned to the seller. Then we just add the cost of
recycling to the cost of the product. Alternatively, add a "recycler unique
rfid" and every seller has to partner with a recycler in order to sell a
product.

~~~
nightfly
Now you've got to ship everything back to the seller, and then the seller has
to ship the waste to their actual processor. Plus the added cost/waste of the
RFID tag.

~~~
cj
> Now you’ve got to ship everything back to the seller, and then the seller
> has to ship the waste to their actual processor

That’s actually an interesting idea.

If it actually worked that way, there would be an amazingly high incentive for
sellers to minimize packaging waste.

It would also have a side effect of making high-waste packaged goods much more
expensive than low-waste packaged food, promoting the purchase of eco-friendly
packaging.

I wonder if there’s a less radical way to implement these kind of market
incentives.

~~~
thereisnospork
>If it actually worked that way, there would be an amazingly high incentive
for sellers to minimize packaging waste.

But why? Adding a nonsense convoluted disincentive is inane. Landfills are
cheap and plentiful and filling them with plastic doesn't hurt anything (and
can be billed to either supplier or consumer) If something is worth recycling
the market will sort it.

------
alexisread
I think taxing packaging along with a country-wide standard for recycling AND
for standardised containers (as per other posts here) would be the best option
- win-win for governments. Non-homogeneous packaging eg. Cardboard food
containers with plastic windows would be taxed heavily.

Taxing packaging by weight and type would theoretically work to minimise
packaging and encourage eg. Bringing a tupperware container to the shops. The
standardised (countrywide) container types would mean you could eg. Put your
standard coffebean container under the supermarket dispenser and do away with
packaging.

The taxation would apply to manufacturers (import) not consumers, thus
incentivising them to advertise green credentials as a feature, and to cut
down packaging or pass the cost on (at which point most customers would move
to the cheaper product).

As far as non-homogeneous packaging goes, if it takes longer than 5sec to
separate each bit into homogeneous parts, then I'd class it as non-
homogeneous.

------
np_tedious
Something I've wondered about but never been able to find a clear answer: what
is the cost of putting a non recyclable item in the recycling?

I'm sure there's a lot of "it depends" in this answer, just as there is for
most parts of this article. Still, even a ballpark answer would really help
with the applied question of how much confidence in an item's recyclability
one should have before putting it in the bin.

If I'm 95% sure then I'll do it. If I think the odds are 10% I won't. But
where is the line? This depends on the cost of being wrong in terms of
processing effort/energy, potential to ruin surrounding goods items, etc

------
dh-g
Lately I've been playing around with melting down and reforming plastics that
aren't recyclable in my area. It has been enjoyable and I've made a few usable
things already.

The [https://preciousplastic.com/](https://preciousplastic.com/) project takes
this much further.

------
quickthrower2
Coffee cups are a no too - [https://envirobank.com.au/coffee-cups-recyclable-
or-not/](https://envirobank.com.au/coffee-cups-recyclable-or-not/). You can't
just split into lid and cup and chuck one in the paper bin and the other in
the plastic bin.

------
remarkEon
Recently I got some 9V batteries from Amazon (for the smoke detector). They
all came individualy shrink wrapped in plastic - all 8 of them - despite
coming in a box that was surely strong enough to protect them from damage on
the short trip from the fulfillment center. Why? Protect from corrosion?

This is probably a poor example, as I'm sure there must be _some_ reason to do
this with batteries, but so many things we buy online now come with mountains
of non-recyclable plastics that just create more waste. I'm with other
commenters here: tax the hell out of this stuff and force retailers,
especially ones with clout like Amazon, to develop different packaging
technologies that don't overuse plastics for literally everything.

------
tasty_freeze
Considering the success of neural network image classifiers, it seems garbage
sorting would be a slam dunk application for these reasons:

(1) the training data is readily available. there are human sorters who
already are classifying everything in real-time as they pick stuff off the
conveyor and move the item to the right bin. train cameras on the conveyor
belt and the analyze which items are picked out and which bin they get tossed
in.

(2) the NN doesn't have to be anywhere near as accurate as, say, a self-
driving car. tune the classifier to minimize false positives. If the resulting
NN can classify only 70% of the items, but accurately, that means 70% of the
garbage stream can be automated and run 24/7\. Humans can still go through the
remaining 30% if it economically makes sense.

------
runn1ng
oh so it seems my strategy “put everything that has some plastic in it, maybe,
who knows, it looks plasticky” to the yellow bins is actually harmful

------
alanbernstein
Why can't we just package more food items in aluminum? Every time I read about
the mess that is recycling, I am reassured that aluminum is the absolute best
case material. Why are we only using it for soda cans?

~~~
JTbane
Soda can designs have to be under pressure to be strong.

~~~
alanbernstein
Thanks, that does answer my second question, and implicitly my first - other
containers would need to be thicker and more expensive.

What I mean to ask is, why don't we incentivize manufacturers to use more
expensive aluminum packaging? It seems reasonable that the cost of
manufacturing aluminum may be less than the sum of all costs of using plastic.
It also seems that no companies will choose to do this without incentives.

------
sokoloff
We have an all-generation family vacation each year in TN (lots of food and
drink). Coming from MA, we are used to recycling and so would collect
recyclables and take them to the grocery store collection point (curbside was
garbage only).

This year, we did the same and noticed the recycling collection bins were
gone. Went inside to inquire and were _proudly_ told, “Oh, we got a big new
landfill opened up with _plenty of space_ ; we don’t have to recycle anymore!”

Ugh.

------
ciconia
Just stop buying things in plastic . There _are_ alternatives - stores that
sell products in bulk, growing your own food, reusing containers. The
solutions are there.

~~~
pixl97
I'm not sure if you've bought much at the store, but trying to eliminate
plastic from your purchases sounds like a great way to spend a lot more money
currently. You are limited to a tiny number of options.

Also when it comes to products that present contamination risks, plastic is an
excellent barrier to prevent the spread of microbes.

------
mschuster91
What I don't see anywhere is chemical-based recycling. Many plastics can be
dissolved in acetone, for example. Shred it all to flakes, put it in a vat of
acetone, burn the stuff that isn't dissolvable and then take the raw materials
out of the acetone?

Or is the dissolving-into-acetone part a non-reversible operation and one ends
up with a boatload of contaminated acetone?

------
jokoon
Before reading this, I thought that non-reusable plastics should be banned,
and that only reusable packaging should be allowed, should it be high quality
plastics, glass, stainless steel...

Some plastic types should be banned, it would make recycling more viable...

I'm really curious how much plastic China was importing, and what they were
doing with it.

------
gwbas1c
I always joke that we'll have robots that take care of this problem before we
have self-driving cars.

On a more serious note: This is far too confusing, and most of this burden
belongs to the recycling processor, not the consumer.

------
ohiovr
nearly everything we acquire ends up in a landfill eventually, plastic or not.
Plastic unlike metals can never be restored as good as new. The recycled
plastic will always be inferior. Metals do not have that problem.

~~~
chmaynard
Interesting, four statements in a row that are obviously false. Can you tell
us anything that's true?

~~~
ohiovr
Someday you will have to sell an estate then you will understand.

------
drizze
Does anyone have this info in a nice info graphic? I would love to hang this
in my kitchen as a quick reference.

------
ummonk
We all know recycling is a scam. Packaging should all be compostable, not
recyclable.

~~~
693471
I think the packaging waste would be more than the actual food waste and ruin
the compost balance if we just tried to blindly mix it all. I compost my food
waste and I definitely have more packaging waste each week than food waste.

