Der Wahn vom „fortgeschrittenen“ Kunststoffrecycling

The world is drowning in plastic. The plastics industry is peddling a “solution” that works like magic. Don’t be fooled.

The industry is heralding nothing short of a miracle: an “advanced” type of recycling known as pyrolysis — “pyro” means fire and “lysis” means separation. It uses heat to break plastic all the way down to its molecular building blocks.

As they consider limiting production, the industry is pushing hard to shift conversations to wonders of chemical recycling. It’s buying ads during cable news as U.S. states consider laws to limit plastic packaging & lobbying federal agencies to loosen the very definition of what it means to recycle.

Pyrolysis is a “fairy tale,” said a science and policy director at environmental justice network Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives. He’s been hearing pyrolysis claims since the ’90s but has yet to see proof it works as promised.

“If anyone has cracked the code for a large-scale, efficient and profitable way to turn plastic into plastic,” he said, “every reporter in the world” would get a tour. If I did get a tour, I wondered, would I even see all of that stubborn, dirty plastic they were supposedly recycling?

Abridged (shortened) article thread ⏬ 18 min

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