Plastic is just about everywhere, and there’s going to be a lot more of it. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development expects global plastic use to triple by 2060. So what are we to do with all the waste?
Tossing empty iced coffee cups, peanut butter jars and blueberry containers into a recycling bin might seem like the obvious solution. But while the plastics industry has been working hard to promote recycling as a fix since the ’70s, it turns out our recycling systems are not equipped to handle the various plastics we use.
“Think of your own home. On top of your washing machine, you probably have a bright orange, hard plastic detergent bottle. And then in your refrigerator, you might have a squeezable clear ketchup bottle. Those two plastic containers cannot be recycled together,” said Judith Enck, founder of Beyond Plastics and former regional administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.
On the show today: the fundamental problems with plastic recycling and the ubiquitous chasing-arrow symbol, and what we should do about it.
Then, we’ll discuss Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo’s visit to China, and why it may be time for Chinese officials to make a visit of their own. And is Yahoo is making a comeback?
Later, we’ll hear some listeners’ thoughts on robotaxis. And this week’s answer to the Make Me Smart question comes from one of the economists behind our favorite nerdy econ game, Tradle.
Here’s everything we talked about today:
- “Plastic Recycling Doesn’t Work and Will Never Work” from The Atlantic
- “Toward a circular economy: Tackling the plastics recycling problem” from The Conversation
- “The recycling myth: A plastic waste solution littered with failure” from Reuters
- “Decades of public messages about recycling in the US have crowded out more sustainable ways to manage waste” from The Conversation
- “The Plastics Industry’s Long Fight to Blame Pollution on You” from Tahe Intercept
- “What a reporter learned after cataloging her plastic use for a week” from Marketplace
- “UN Agency Provides Path to 80 Percent Reduction in Plastic Waste. Recycling Alone Won’t Cut It” from Inside Climate News
- “U.S. Does Not Want to ‘Decouple’ From China, Raimondo Says” from The New York Times
- “How Yahoo is coming back from the dead” from Axios
We want to hear your answer to the Make Me Smart question. You can reach us at makemesmart@marketplace.org or leave us a voicemail at 508-U-B-SMART.
Make Me Smart August 29, 2023 Transcript
Note: Marketplace podcasts are meant to be heard, with emphasis, tone and audio elements a transcript can’t capture. Transcripts are generated using a combination of automated software and human transcribers, and may contain errors. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting it.
Kai Ryssdal
Like nope, I’m not playing it. Everybody, I’m Kai Ryssdal. Welcome back to Make Me Smart, where none of us is as smart as all of us.
Amy Scott
I’m Amy Scott in today for Kimberly Adams. Thanks for joining us. It is Tuesday, August 29. And that means it’s time for the weekly deep dive. Today we’re talking about something I’m fascinated by which is plastic what we do with all of that waste? Can we recycle it as much as we think we’re doing? Turns out our systems are far from perfect.
Kai Ryssdal
So we’re gonna talk about this for the next I don’t know, 10, 12ish minutes with Judith Enck. She’s the founder of the environmental group beyond plastics, also the former regional administrator of the EPA. Thanks for coming on the podcast.
Judith Enck
Great to be with you.
Kai Ryssdal
So look, let’s cut to the chase here. Are we doing plastic recycling, right?
Judith Enck
No, not at all. And it’s not our fault. I mean, I want to encourage all of your listeners to keep recycling your metal, paper, glass, cardboard, if you can compost yard waste and food waste. But plastic recycling has been an abysmal failure for years. And the very nature of the material means that most of it won’t ever get recycled, no matter how hard we as individuals try.
Amy Scott
That is so upsetting because I can’t tell you how many plastic items are in my recycling bin right now. Why doesn’t it work? And am I better off just throwing it in the trash?
Judith Enck
No, first don’t be upset. We can we can work through this. So so a couple of things. There’s the iconic chasing arrows, the recycling symbol, we all saw growing up. If it has number one or number two in it, please do put that in your recycling bin. So number one is Polyethylene terephthalate. Number two is high density polyethylene. That is virtually the only plastics that actually get recycled that have reliable markets, the rest should not go in your recycling bin. You know, number three is polyvinyl chloride, PVC plastic, we are trying to urge the federal EPA to actually ban vinyl chloride. And let me just spend a minute explaining why plastics are fundamentally not recyclable. So so think of your own home. On top of your washing machine, you probably have a bright orange hard plastic detergent bottle. And then in your refrigerator, you might have a squeezable clear ketchup bottle, those two plastic containers cannot be recycled together. There are too many different types of plastic resins. There are 1000s of chemical additives added to plastics and also many different colors. And so unlike an aluminum can that can be recycled into a new aluminum can easily with plastics there, there are too many different types of plastics and then they if they do succeed in recycling them, it gets recycled, typically not into the same product, but into things like plastic lumber, and plastic fleece clothing, which unfortunately will shed microplastics when you put it in your washing machine, I’m filled with good news. But just major major message is keep recycling number one and number two, but not the other numbers. And then you know, as someone who works for a nonprofit project called Beyond Plastics, I urge people to do everything humanly possible to avoid plastics.
Kai Ryssdal
Okay, so let’s, can we get to the recycling thing? Because, because we’ll get to the the rest of it in a minute, but that’s so dumb. It’s so dumb. I mean, come on. It’s like we’re making it harder for ourselves.
Judith Enck
Well, the plastics industry has known this for decades, and yet they have spent millions of dollars I’m sorry to say lying to the public saying “Don’t worry about all of your single use plastics, just toss it in your recycling bin.” And they know better than anyone that that just is not true. They got a free pass for a while they would export plastics to other countries, most notably China. And then in 2018, China said stop sending us your plastics because most of it is not recycled. Well, and also it’s mixed in with other garbage. And so what happens now a lot of United States and EU plastic gets exported to countries like Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam, and now Africa. So exporting plastic is a huge problem. And And again, we should just not fall for the myth that plastics are recyclable because most of them are not.
Amy Scott
So this seems like a public policy failure too, I mean, why are they able to label these products as recyclable if they are not, in fact, getting recycled or even able to be recycled?
Judith Enck
Yeah, perfect question, Amy. The state of California has the only state law on the books that says you cannot label something recyclable if it’s not, we want other states to follow. Also, this is an area that the Federal Trade Commission, the FTC regulates, in their updating something called the green guide. But it’s been a very, very slow process. But basically, you know, we’ve got the California Attorney General launching an investigation into deceptive advertising. Because you and I are busy consumers, you know, we race in and out of the store at record speeds. And if something has the recycling logo on it, we can assume that it’s recyclable, but most of the time, it’s not.
Kai Ryssdal
Alright, so look, what are we supposed to do? Because plastics are everywhere. You know, I just did a I just did an interview with a woman who works for the Los Angeles Times, she’s an environment reporter there. And she was given the assignment by her editor of keeping a plastics diary for a week, and within the first, like, 15 minutes, she was completely overwhelmed, because everything that surrounded her was plastic. And so what do we do about this?
Judith Enck
Well, we change the law, because there’s only so much you can do as an individual. So my organization beyond plastics is working on new laws and regulations that actually create environmental standards for packaging. We want to start with packaging, it’s about 40% of plastics. And also that’s what shows up on city streets and parks and gets littered and eventually gets into rivers and oceans. So environmental standards for packaging, just like we have environmental standards for cars. And you would not be able to sell the majority of plastics on the market. If you can’t reuse it, refill it or recycle it. It’s that simple. That that is being vigorously opposed, not only by the plastics industry, but fossil fuel companies and chemical companies, because fossil fuel companies see their market share for transportation products and electricity declining. And so they have pivoted to plastic production. Plastics is the plan B for the fossil fuel industry. And the only way to reduce the amount of plastics in commerce is to pass laws to require the reductions.
Amy Scott
So with the understanding that there is only so much an individual can do, this is really a systemic issue. What can you know, those of us who want to reduce our plastic consumption do? What kinds of choices can we make? What kind of convenience are we going to have to trade off to get less of this stuff out there in landfills?
Judith Enck
Well, what I urge people to do is look at your take a little tour of your kitchen, and take a look at what you’re mostly using plastics for. So if you have that unnamed little coffeemaker with the plastic pods. And you and you drink a lot of coffee in your office or at home from that, consider a switch in terms of the way you produce your coffee, because there obviously are alternatives. And that company, by the way, was sued for deceptive advertising and had to stop advertising those pods as recyclable. In our household, my husband drinks a lot of orange juice, even though I tell them it has too much sugar in it. So rather than buying plastic, that’s like the only thing we argue about. Instead of, that’s a joke. Instead of buying orange juice in plastic bottles every week, we switch to frozen concentrate juice. You know, bring your own bags to the supermarket. If you drink a lot of coffee away from home hat, get a really good reusable coffee mug that you enjoy sipping your beverage from and do that substitute. So I do want to encourage people to reduce their dependence on plastics. But it’s really hard once you get past some of the basic things. And so at that point, if you really want to reduce plastic, you need to become an environmental advocate and work with environmental groups and local governments to pass laws like to ban plastic bags, ban polystyrene bags, polystyrene packaging, plastic straws only upon request. And then the big win is what’s called extended producer responsibility, which requires a reduction in in plastic packaging.
Kai Ryssdal
Alright, so just to recap here and then you can get on your day. If it says one or two on the bottom, then you’re good to go. Otherwise, everything else should just go in the garbage can.
Judith Enck
Yeah, sadly. And that’ll get you thinking, are there alternatives to things that are marked number one and two. This change is only going to happen with political action. We all want to be you know, good stewards, we all support recycling. But plastics recycling is a hoax. And we need to be you know, wide eyed about what can and can’t be recycled. Because for instance, if you put non-recyclable plastic into your recycling bin, it’s going to mess up the recycling process. Right.
Kai Ryssdal
That’s a little depressing, I gotta tell you. A little depressing.
Amy Scott
It actually does more harm than good.
Judith Enck
No, no, no, it’s not depressing.
Kai Ryssdal
No it is. No, no, no, no, no, it is. It is here. I thought I was being, Here I thought I was being the good doobie all these years and I’ve been throwing my threes and fours and eights in the blue bin outside. And that’s not good.
Judith Enck
You’re not alone.
Amy Scott
Is eight even a thing Kai?
Kai Ryssdal
I don’t know. I may I made eight up there. There’s probably an eight I don’t know.
Judith Enck
It stops at seven.
Kai Ryssdal
Man I should have said seven. Judith Enck. She’s the veteran of the environmental group Beyond Plastics. Also the former regional administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. Judith, thanks a lot. I appreciate your time and your wisdom.
Amy Scott
Yeah it’s really helpful. I keep thinking about blueberries Kai.
Kai Ryssdal
What about blueberries? They come with plastic things.
Amy Scott
I love blueberry. Oh, and they come with a plastic clamshell.
Kai Ryssdal
What number are they?
Amy Scott
I think they’re five. Right?
Kai Ryssdal
Wait. All right. Wait, hang on. You’re in your house. Right? How far are you from your kitchen?
Amy Scott
A few steps. You want me to go check?
Kai Ryssdal
Alright, go look, I’ll kill some time here you go look. Right. And while Amy does that, I will just say if you’ve got thoughts on plastics, whether you like them or hate them or want to recycle them or if you didn’t even know that only it was ones and twos, let us know. Our phone numbers is 508-827-6278. 508-827-6278, which is 508-U-B-S-M-A-R-T. Those are all letters that I point out because Amy Scott is in the guest chair today or you can email us makemesmart@marketplace.org. And as soon as Amy comes back and gives us a report on blueberry clam shells. Here she is. And the answer is
Amy Scott
All right I’ve got the big the big clam shell here looking for a number that’s different than the usual and we get.
Kai Ryssdal
Might not even have a number.
Amy Scott
Yeah, I’m not Oh, wait, is that a number?
Kai Ryssdal
And therein lies the problem.
Amy Scott
Oh, now there it is. Okay. So faint. Is that a one? Is it a one? It’s a one. Yay. But it’s a clam shell. I’ve heard you’re not supposed to put these clam shells in there. They like gum up the work.
Kai Ryssdal
We literally just had an expert on and said one is okay.
Amy Scott
She did. She did. I should have asked her about the clamshell.
Kai Ryssdal
We will be right back. You can go put your blueberries back in the fridge so they don’t get gross. We’ll be back on in a second.
Amy Scott
I’m gonna eat them.
Kai Ryssdal
I’m waiting on you, the rundown says Amy Scott time for some news. Or was your mouth full of blueberries?
Amy Scott
Sorry. I was not prepared for the break.
Kai Ryssdal
It’s all good. It’s all good. Don’t worry about it. It’s all good. So this news we’ll do some news and I’ll go first while you have a blueberry or two. So I just want to point out Gina Raimondo the Secretary of Commerce is in Beijing and Shanghai. Really interesting article in The New York Times today about her trip. I just I just want to just add a little subjectivity to all this great reporting from Ana Swanson and Keith Bradsher at The New York Times. So Raimondo was now the fourth cabinet level Biden administration official to go to China since like, springish, late spring, early summer. Right Blinken Yellen, John Kerry. And then and now Secretary Raimondo. And what’s, what’s interesting to me about it are three things. Number one, they are all, well all three of them who are not environmental people, right. So, so Blinken and Yellen and and Raimondo are all unbelievably on message. We do not want to decouple from the Chinese economy, we will not compromise on national security, even if it costs us economically. And all three of them have said that loud and clear. They’re all meeting with the same people, which is really interesting. So this message is getting through. That’s number one. Number two, so I was on the Yellen trip in in July. And it was really interesting, because they clearly respect her, they value her as an intermediary with the President. They respect her experience. And and they respect her technical knowledge, right. I mean, she’s a woman of some economic renown. But it’s it’s, so I’ve interviewed both of them Yellen and Secretary Raimondo. And it’s interesting because I think Raimondo was a little more in your face, Janet Yellen, very skilled negotiator, very skilled economist. But she’s really not like an in your face kind of person. Secretary Raimondo is like in your face. And it’s really interesting. And I wonder how that’s going over in China. I just, I wonder a little bit just to be a fly on the wall. And then lastly, so this is the fourth cabinet level person who’s going over to China, U.S. trying to reset the relationship which has been strained in large part because of what happened in the previous presidential administration. I think it’s time for somebody from China to come here. Just interests of diplomatic fairplay. And I’m not sure how many more Biden cabinet officials can go over there without it becoming a little bit weird. That’s what I think.
Amy Scott
Awkward. Right. Exactly. Exactly. Not reciprocating at all. Yeah, that’s interesting.
Kai Ryssdal
It’s like, it’s like, you know, when. Sorry go ahead.
Amy Scott
Do you think that’s in the works?
Kai Ryssdal
I don’t know. But it’s a little bit like, you know, when when your neighbors invite you over to dinner, like three or four times or, you know wind up going over there? And you never have them over. It’s a little weird.
Amy Scott
Weird. I’ve totally been there. Sorry to everyone.
Kai Ryssdal
Sorry to all of Amy’s friends. All right. Alright. What do you?
Amy Scott
Yeah, so do you remember this company called Yahoo?
Kai Ryssdal
I do yes. My wife worked there back in the day we were. We were paper millionaires.
Amy Scott
Oh that must have been nice. But yeah, how many people really think about Yahoo on a daily basis, the company was sold by Verizon a couple of years ago, to Apollo Global Management, a private equity firm for $5 billion, just a fraction of what it had been worth at its peak. But Axios has a story today basically saying that the company is having a bit of a renaissance. It was all but left for dead. According to this article after a series of bad business decisions, like a missed opportunity to buy Google, for to example. It botched an acquisition of Flickr if you remember that photo sharing site. But under its new leadership, a guy named Jim Lanzone who was formerly of Tinder and CBS interactive. Yahoo has been buying up a bunch of companies just today it said it’s acquired a media startup called StrictlyVC to add to its TechCrunch news business. And that was the fourth deal this year. Last week, there was a platform called CommonStock that Yahoo bought under its Yahoo Finance arm, a sports betting app called Wagr so it’s buying all these companies to add to legacy platforms that are apparently still pretty profitable, including I should say AOL, which still brings in hundreds of millions of dollars. You know, who would have thunk. And overall Yahoo’s fifth on total traffic, mobile and desktop traffic behind Google, Microsoft, Facebook and Amazon which is amazing. It’s amazing, right? That is amazing. That’s well, yeah, so not dead yet, as they say.
Kai Ryssdal
Fair enough. That’s totally fascinating. I had no idea that yeah, I was even still a thing.
Amy Scott
I know, right?
Kai Ryssdal
Yeah absolutely. Absolutely. All right. We gotta go. News Now mailbag. Jay hit it.
Mailbag
Hi Kai and Kimberly. This is Godfrey from San Francisco. Jessie from Charleston, South Carolina. And I have a follow up question. It has me thinking and feeling a lot of things.
Kai Ryssdal
Alright, we talked about self-driving cars last week what the future with them might look like. Obviously, the big news in San Francisco is that they’re doing more more widespread and round the clock pilot testing. Anyway, we got this.
Beth
Hi, this is Beth in New York, I don’t really understand why our solution to dangerous roads is individually operated robotic cars instead of perhaps better infrastructure. Cyclists are killed all the time, because we have insufficient bike lanes to keep people safe. So it’s interesting and it’s exciting, but it’s also a little disappointing that we’ve all been so carbrained that we still think the solution to traffic safety is individualized solutions rather than collective public transportation solutions. Thanks so much for making me smart.
Kai Ryssdal
Yeah that’s fair. Can’t really ague with that
Amy Scott
That’s a great point. Totally. We got one more Robo taxi comment.
Terry
Hello, this is Terry from Colorado. I personally am a huge fan of driving, I kind of have a passion for it. However, that said, I’m also looking forward to driverless cars. While I may enjoy the automotive experience, I’m also extremely busy, and I can’t wait to have the opportunity to save some extra time and get some extra things done once we can drive on autopilot or whatever you want to call it. Thanks for listening. Bye.
Kai Ryssdal
Also fair, I like to drive but you know, you could use that time in the car to do something else for sure. Or as Bethany or said you could use the time on the bus just you know, whatever.
Amy Scott
That’s true.
Kai Ryssdal
All right. As we do every week, we will leave you with the Make Me Smart question. What is something you thought you knew but later found out you’re wrong about? This week’s answer comes from Gilberto García-Vazquez, I interviewed him about about Tradle the other day. He’s the chief economist at Datawheel.
Gilberto Garcia-Vazquez
What’s something I thought I knew, but later I found out I was wrong about … English. I studied English in Mexico, but it wasn’t until I moved to the US that I realized how far I was from coming across just as a functioning adult. One Sunday evening, my wife and I were driving When suddenly part of the muffler fell off. I realized we needed help approaching a group of people chatting outside I said the best way I could excuse me, sorry to interrupt. But my muffin fell under the car. Can I borrow your cat? The expressions of shock were telling. Confused by the lack of response, I returned to the car and recounted the experience to my wife. That’s when I learned the correct terms were muffler and jack. A far cry from muffin and cat. In Mexico. We call a car jack, gato. The experience taught me that feeling intellectually competent in one context, while being completely out of my depth in another can be both bearable and enriching, especially when faced with a sense of humor and a willingness to adapt and learn.
Kai Ryssdal
Yeah, that’s great. Context is everything. Contextual familiarity.
Amy Scott
Totally been there and it was an interesting feeling to come across as less intelligent just because of a word choice. I love that.
Kai Ryssdal
That’s a good one. That’s a good one.
Amy Scott
We want to hear your answers to the Make Me Smart question, our number is 508-827-6278. You can also dial 508, the letter U, letter B, SMART.
Kai Ryssdal
Also try Tradle, it’s fun just type T-R-A-D-L-E. Make Me Smart, which is this podcast is produced by Courtney Bergsieker. Ellen Rolfes writes our newsletter. Today’s program was engineered by Jay Siebold. Juan Carlos Torrado is gonna mix it down later. Our intern is Niloufar Shahbandi.
Amy Scott
Ben Tolliday and Daniel Ramirez composed our theme music. Our senior producer is Marissa Cabrera. Bridget Bodnar is the director of podcasts. Francesca Levy is the executive director of Digital and Marketplace’s Vice President and General Manager is Neal Scarbrough.
Kai Ryssdal
I wonder how Neil feels about only being in the Tuesday. Everybody else gets it every day and the boss man only gets it on Tuesday.
Amy Scott
Oh, really?
Kai Ryssdal
I’m just saying somebody’s gonna be getting a phone call. It’s not going to be me because I’m just the talent baby.
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