Plastic Recycling - Cause And Effect

Plastic recycling is considered to be the most effective solution in decreasing plastic waste in the environment

. Plastic waste is considered to be the main cause of water and soil pollution and therefore the recycling process is of great importance. This process, by which breaking down the scrap and waste plastics to recover useful materials, requires less energy to manufacture new plastic than creating original plastic from scratch. New fibres are created after numerous chemical structures and resins in the plastic are melted down.

Plastic is used for so many products we use everyday, people may not even realise and most do not give a second thought about what happens to the plastic once they place it in their chosen recycling disposal scheme. Here are some items we use daily, but are not always thought of as being recycled: The soles of some shoes, such as tennis sneakers The mouse and keyboard of computers are mainly plastic The hose you use to water your plants and many more...

Harmful effects of plastic in the environment: Plastic bags do not look good littered throughout the environment. Some plastics are not biodegradable. Plastic materials can cause animals harm, from choking and ingestion.

Benefits of recycling plastic to environment: Landfills can be recovered: One of the biggest problems being faced today is the fact that there are fewer places to dump plastic waste (landfills) due to them being almost full. An effective solution for this is to go for recycling. Leads to oil conservation: Compared to making new, original plastic, plastic recycling helps in saving 4 barrels of oil.

Here is an example of the procedure of recycling plastic milk jugs. The jugs are first split up from other plastics and are cleaned then ground down. After this process the jugs are melted down and go through an extruder to mould them into an oblong shape. When the plastic comes out of the extruder, the make-up of this recycled plastic is similar to play dough. Jets of water are used in a cooling chamber to make sure the plastic doesn't rise like bread dough. This is repeated again to make sure the plastic is okay for the next step after being air-dried for a while. Once this is done, the plastic lumber that remains can be made into several items.

Though this process has many advantages, it is a complicated process. The sorting of plastics according to colour and type etc can be more tedious and is not as profitable as the materials to start with are worth less. Even though there are these negatives, people should still be encouraged to recycle plastics as the advantages far outweigh them.

If you found this article about plastic recycling useful, you may be interested in Max Marston's other article about paper recycling found here - http://remade.info/2010/07/16/recycling-isnt-just-for-glass-and-plastic-recycle-paper-too/

by: Max Marston

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