Where does paint all go?

[Jimk]

Pffft! Pots & kettles OCD i m !

[Jimk]

& encouraged fly tipping by charging for dealing with certain (some eminently & profitably recyclable) waste streams...

[Brian Gaff (Sofa)]

With talk of pollution and microplastic, I see paint degenerate particularly outside, surly much of it is in microscopic flakes and this has been going on for years. Brian

[Ian Jackson]

In message <r08v9e$6hm$ [e-mail], "Brian Gaff (Sofa)" [e-mail]> writes

Actually, where do many things go? Rocks become stones, which become pebbles, which become sand, which becomes microscopic sandy dust and the inorganic component of soil. How does this differ from the harmful microscopic grains of degenerated plastic - and, presumably, paint?

[Chris Hogg]

While I can understand why large pieces of plastic floating in the sea can be hazardous to marine life (complete plastic bags ingested by turtles, whales etc, and seals and dolphins becoming entangled in lost or discarded fishing nets, for example), the dangers of finer plastic is not immediately obvious, not to me at least. I would expect most of it to pass right through and be crapped out as with ordinary marine food residues. And if some does get absorbed into the organs of the marine life, is it actually doing any harm? And if we eat said marine life, is it actually going to harm us? I suspect the answer to both those questions is no and no.

And does the plastic never break down in the sea; is it there 'for ever' as we're so often being told? Well, no. It breaks down into finer and finer pieces, certainly, but that just exposes more surface for the plastic-munching bacteria to get at and hasten the eventual decomposition of the plastic. The lifetime of plastics in the oceans is finite.

See for example,

My own view is that we should take an intelligent view of plastics. They are, after all, an essential component of modern living, but we should use less where we can, and recycle where we can't.

[T i m]

Because when rocks get washed into the rivers and then to the sea, they don't float so don't stay in suspension for the fish to eat, or if they do they are generally very much smaller than the equivalent plastic partials so may pass though small creatures?

Also, paint flakes may contain lead and may then poison small creatures?

Cheers, T i m

[The Natural Philosopher]

And biological fauna become oil and flora become coal.

All plastic degrades eventually.

[The Natural Philosopher]

and simply burn where we can't recycle.

[polygonum_on_google]

Paint flakes are quite able to poison big creatures as well!

[Andrew]

And pebbles and sand can be recycled into concrete, which can then be recycled again ...

[T i m]

<snip>

Well, quite. ;-(

I was talking to a fellow dog walker yesterday who had a visitor stay from the USA and their visitor stated how dirty they considered the UK to be, specifically as compared to wherever they lived (and I'm guessing some states / cities / towns were god / bad over there too).

Mum and Dad went to Singapore a few years back and they said that place was immaculate and I believe there are very strong fines for littering or dropping gum. [1]

And that's the point here. Few councils seem to go out of their way to provide street bins, other than maybe in the town centres / shopping areas / parks, possibly because of the cost of collection ... versus sending out the road sweeper (that rarely covers all the corners / under / in hedges etc) or, better still, educating the minority (I believe it to be) to be more responsible for their own waste.

Like, they take a bag of picnic crap into the park to consume, then think it then becomes the parks responsibility to deal with it. If they don't they put plastic bottles or other general waste into the dog poo bin (even though it states clearly on the front it's *only* for dog waste) of if they can't get it in anywhere, just leave it on the ground, near the bin or anywhere (for the foxes to spread about overnight).

Should the councils provide a bigger bins? If they did, where would it end ... before people turn up at the park and bring even more rubbish with them, like furniture and mattresses?

The bottom line is it's down to education (and some only learn by being caught out and / or fined), empathy / selfishness.

We were following some 'yout' down the road the other day and he just dropped his drink can on the pavement. I would have loved to have given it back to him ... taped to a baseball bat ... ;-(

Do these people mind if their front gardens are fill of rubbish ... or would they only notice when they were wading though it?

A neighbour (who often picks up street litter, as a few of us do) has caught a few other (often 'new' / younger) neighbours leaving crap out on the pavement (old domestic appliances) and just littering in general (putting their coffee ups on the pavement before walking the

10 yards 'home' or clearing the car door pocket of tickets and tissues and just dropping them on the road) and has pulled them up on it. In all cases so far they have ... first denied it, then agreed they had, then apologised and when pressed, sheepishly promised they wouldn't do it again.

What is it in their heads that allows them to do it in the first place?

Rant over. ;-)

Cheers, T i m

[1] Anyone comment on other 1st world countries that are notably clean / dirty, compared with here?

p.s. The above was fuelled from the point is that it's often simply this personal waste / litter that gets into our waterways and hence out to sea. Round here, as all the floodwater runoff subsides you can see a 'tide line' of plastic bottle, bags and cans that have been left behind on the banks. ;-(

p.p.s. I have encounter quite a few people who litter because (they say / think) it 'keeps someone in a job'. The problem with that is those people could be doing something 'better' than picking up other peoples fly tipping and therefore not such a burden on the local ratepayers.

[Tim Lamb]

And push for packaging to be in *clean burn* plastics.

[T i m]

<snip>

Ok, I'll admit to buying a bottle drink when we are out and have been caught out but 1) we often re-use the bottle several times and 2) will always recycle them properly. Even to the point of not trusting that the likes of McDonalds sorting their waste and taking it home so that we can be sure we have done it properly (rather than just throwing it out the window of their car at some point on their way home ... where they typically have a bin outside their own house?).

If we do buy a plastic bottle of drink it's rarely just water out of principal. Do they say bottled water is 1000 times more expensive than tap water and often not as well tested as tap water?

I often see people heaving huge multipacks of water into the shopping trolleys or car boys and think they must be mad or something?

I often buy the Salisbury's 2% lager that has recently gone up to £1.25 for 4 cans. How can 4 cans of lager, that is mostly water, be less than a bottle of plain water?

The answer of course is that some people buy bottled water because they think it's better for them, are too lazy to re-fill an existing bottle or think it tastes better (when where they have done blind tests, 'most people' prefer tap water). ;-)

What a mad world we live in ...

Cheers, T i m

p.s. Since I saw it mentioned here, we care saving crisp / snack packets as I believe Walkers will take them is 5kg batches. We are looking for a good way to store them as they can take up a bit of room unless compressed somehow (and we don't want to knot them up as I'm not sure how they re-process them).

[Chris Hogg]

And incinerate in a waste-to-electricity plant.

[Chris J Dixon]

I do buy a little of Sainsbury's cheapest fizzy water. The amount we use is so low that pratting about with Sparklets is not a sensible or economic option.

Chris

[newshound]

How long does it take to collect 5 kg of crisp bags? And do they really recycle them, or just burn them?

[whisky-dave]

It's also a big problem with the meal deals in supermarkets which I use almost every day, and so do many students.

I've not been in McDonalds since 1993 and even then it was only because a GF likked a McDonalds breakfast. 2003 was the last time I went in a chain burger bar (burger king), and not been in a KFC type place since around 1987.

It's what they say, but few people buy tap water anyway. Most bottled water is spring water or other types. I do drink the water from the dispenser in the graduate centre hallway which is cooled water, about 500ml a day.

yes I do wonder about that too, but have you seen the price of it, so cheap relatively that is. Even lemonade in aldi was 16p per litre.

Is it, I wondered who buys such stuff now I know ;-) Unless of course you actually like the taste not that I've tried it. I'll just have one or two bottles of spitfire, abbots ale, bishops finger or similar a week.

or that it actually does taste better.

but NEVER when it's straight from the tap, they have NEVER done that test. Sure put in in a bottle with the top off to let the cholrine evapourate then cool it. Another thing to remmber is that the water is tested BEFORE it goes through the pipes to our homes. Even my cat won;t drink frest tap water she'll wait 15 mins then go and drink it, this could be down to temperature as I've noticed she is more likely to drink warm water.

That's the reason that I havent bought walkers crisps for over a year now. In fact I haven't bought any crips during since then. My brother told me that there's a reccyle shop that accepts walkers crisp bags but it's a 15min walk from the tube station.

yopu might find a place near to you.

'local' one isn't on this map above, which too ages to load.

But I do eat crisps sometimes. I had some brussel spout flavoured ones before xams. I'm having some now left over from a student function/event yesterday, and tried a sandwich too, but the bread was crisper than the crisps !

I'm also cutting down on my meat intake oooo err misses. Have been since may, not sure if I can go veggie let alone vegan. But I did have a vegan choclate bar today, but of course that was wrapped in plastic with a cardboard sleeve which has gone in the correct recycle bin. Now whether or not it gets recycled I don't know. But it was noted that all the recycled paper and card went into the same truck as standard waste a year ago.

Still not sure what I can do about electrical waste, as in electroncis and no longer used wall marts.

[spuorgelgoog]

The USA has a far lower population density and a lot more places they can just hide the problem in landfill.

We used to be a much tidier country before all these environmental regulations put six different types of recycling bin on every corner.

Owain

[Brian Gaff (Sofa 2)]

Yes a whole new sphere of research. Indeed some bacteria have been found only to exist on certain substances already, so nature finds a niche, and exploits it. Brian

[Brian Gaff (Sofa 2)]

Like most things, there is truth and falsehoods everywhere. The snag is we do not know the long term issues since we have not had the amount of plastic long enough to actually do the research yet. Brian