NYC’s dual stream includes also curb side collection of recyclables

My recommendation is to read about the true plastic recovery rate

by Prof. Marco J. Castaldi

NYC’s dual stream includes also curb side collection of recyclables. From this stream overall, 40,174 tonnes of plastics in residential aggregate discards are recovered annual in NYC. This represents rigid plastic that are properly separated from NYC dual stream, then sorted and sold by the MRFs. This yields a recovery rate of nine point four (9,4) % for all plastics… This shows  that increased diverson of plastics will not result in an equivalent increase of recovered plastics.

In  order to improve plastic recovery rates, based on these findings, the article

Quantitative analysis of residential plastic recycling in New York City

makes two recommendations:
-    limit plastic consumption to the highly recyclable #1, #2, and #5 polymers and
-    reduce the production of plastic films that make up a large portion of plastic waste stream, are a sizable contributor to MRF contamination, and do not currently have widespread recycling capability.

I recommend to study this article!  

---

published: , 5|2023
Keywords: Collection, Resource management, Plastics