12mo ago

You have to remove the plastic label if you want to recycle this plastic bottle.

157 comments

Not this one, every one. The only difference is that they bother to put this info on the label.

Nearly all containers (glass or plastic) need to have their label removed to recycle properly. And you must rinse them out, too.
Some can be recycled with the label on, but only if the plastic used is the type that can be recycled. Confusing and frustrating, yes.
The crappy thing is that some labels really don't come off easily because they've been glued in place... those are awful to recycle because it requires quite a bit of extra effort, soaking, adhesive remover, etc... 😂
- And you must rinse them out, too.
  This step right here has to end. Recycling facilities should have cycling filtered graywater loops to do the rinsing. Using clean drinking water to rinse out containers is an absolute waste.
  
  I work for a plastic recycling plant manufacturer, specifically for the sorting, shredding, cleaning and drying steps of plastic recycling (after that you usually have melting and extrusion before ending up with small plastic pellets that can be used to make other stuff).
  I can confirm you, we have "cycling filtered grey water" cleaning. You don't need to clean up your plastic containers, just empty them. Also various chemicals will be used in the process, when necessary.
  We also make de-labelers to remove the labels from plastic bottles, although this kind of label in the picture is extremely hard to remove and, afaik, either requires human labor (aka poor countries with labor conditions you don't want to think about) or just becomes waste. So yeah, this is some of the worst shit.
  
  At least in Germany that step is not necessary as far as I know.
  
  I agree, but rinsing at home addresses multiple concerns.
  I think the issue is that some people throw out containers with their lids on and completely covered in food matter.
  a) it makes it difficult/impossible to actually recycle when it finally gets there. b) it attracts wildlife to your recycling bins.
  It's just best practice, really.
- It would be so much easier if drink companies just used standardized containers instead of making their own homemade special designs to try and look fancy.
  Orange juice was fine in a 2L cardboard box. We just recently got a jug of Tropicana or some shit and it's some fancy moulded pitcher shape with a spout and flip up plastic lid. That just makes everything more difficult, especially recycling because it will be a pain to rinse out I bet.
  
  I'd be 100% ok if all containers were mason jars. Most of the time, I can't even reuse glass jars because of their stupid, non-standard lids!
  Cereal should just come in a biodegradable plastic, no box.
  But standardize everything. Never mind hassling consumers not to use plastic bags when companies are putting layer upon layer of plastic on their products. If a manufacturer can't use a standardized package, they shouldn't be allowed to sell the product without a massive environmental tax added onto their product.
- Some can be recycled with the label on, but only if the plastic used is the type that can be recycled
  Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't that only true if the plastic uses for the label is in the same category (same recycling symbol) as the bottle?
  
  In my experience, some labels are quite detailed and will say whether you need to separate the label or lid from the container, or not.
  But generally speaking, yes, assuming the material class is the same, it should be fine to recycle them together.

Oh I'm so fucking sorry this manufacturer gave you clear instructions on how to recycle properly
Your life must be truly horrible 😂
- Nah, get the fuck outta here with that bullshit.
  Ignoring the fact that hardly any plastic is actually recyclable in the first place, your argument is that conscious consumers should accept additional responsibilities on the off chance that it MIGHT actually get recycled?
  We figured out how to print on basically any surface a long time ago. How about we hold companies to a standard of responsible packaging, instead of yet again passing the buck to the end user.
  
  We need both. We need companies to do more to make things out of easier to recycle or compost materials, and we need consumers to do more to separate things to make them easier to recycle. It's far too late to push responsibilities around, we all need to be responsible.
  
  hardly any plastic is actually recyclable
  Almost every thermoplastic is recyclable easily, though not necessarily profitably (because the new materials are so cheap).
  Recycling that PET bottle into a different usable object would involve cleaning it, cutting it into a shape appropriate for your chosen remanufacturing process (filament or flakes), heating it to melted but not too hot, then forming (fdm, molding, etc.).
  My guess would be that getting a durable graphic printed on PET is more difficult since we don't see that, and adhesive or wrapped labels are almost certainly more expensive than printing would be if it were easy.
  Edit to add: I agree that more responsibility needs to be on the manufacturer, but don't buy into the misinformation that plastic can't be recycled. Make it more expensive to use new plastic than recycled material.
  
  this user probably thinks it’s too hard to collapse a cereal box before sending it to recycling
- Tell me you don’t understand what community you’re in without actually telling me lmao
- Look at the sub name. Now reread your comment. You're missing the point.

You need to separate most materials in order to recycle them. The plastic of a lid is different from that of a bottle which are both different from a wrapping. Separating materials is key to successful recycling. A lot of times stuff can't get recyled because people don't separate it before throwing it away.
Or you could just use, you know, reusable materials.
- Separation requirements vary. In the UK, plastic bottle caps are generally tethered to the bottle now to prevent people from separating them.
  
  Why?! I dont get it. What kind of psychopath doesn't put the cap back on when empty. Who opens a bottle, throws the cap away, and chugs away?! How is this a problem? I'm just so baffled this was/is a problem.

You mean you have to remove the plastic label before you throw the bottle into a recycling bin which gets dumped into a landfill never to be seen again.
- Shhhh, if they don't know they still feel good about it
  
  But, but, but, they're going to eventually mine all the plastic out of the landfills because at some point will be swimming in so much energy and time that turning it back into the little bit of oil that was used to make it Will be our sacred duty as humans. Tomorrow us will definitely mine all that back out and turn it back into oil right?
- And that's if they're lucky. There's also a decent chance it will end up piled up on some foreign beach/riverbank to slowly leach into the ocean.

Okay. So they do this in Japan. The plastic used in the wrapper is different than the plastic in the bottle. They require different processes to recycle. It’s also far more efficient for regular people to just rip it off and throw one in one bin and the other in another bin in their own homes than it is for a sorting facility to go through mountains of this stuff trying to get it right every single time. Frankly I wish more places did it this way.
I hope this explanation will make things even less infuriating.
- Recycling in Japan is a very involved process. You end up with like, 4 different bags of recyclable types, depending. I appreciate it.
  
  Most European countries I've visited have at least 3 bins/bags : paper, plastic, everything else. Most cities also separate glass and aluminium. Some townhalls offer bags/containers for bio trash, that's turned into compost.
  
  Minnesota is like that, too. At least near St. Paul/Minneapolis
  
  Many cities just burn a lot of it. Technically “recycled” according to the definition and generates some energy, but plastic is just not great no matter how you look at it.
  Source for some cities burning non-pet plastics in Japan: https://youtu.be/sAu3LVktMwE?si=30PgjrPFFiFFF7Tt&t=55s
- It's like this in Europe too, it's just one, ahem, country that's a decade behind everyone, every time
  
  I don't have different plastic recycling bins, but only one.
  Where in Europe do you have different ones?
  Never have encountered those, at least I didn't realize it (in Spain, Portugal, Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland - although with some countries I'm maybe not completely up to date)
- Truth is, it doesn't matter anyway, because over 90% of plastic isn't being recycled.
  This whole thing (the removable label to supposedly make the bottle more recyclable) is an exercise in futility and virtue signalling to the "green" demographic for profit, aka greenwashing.
  Edit to be clear: the answer is to abolish capitalism, which is why all of this is happening in the first place.

It all gets dumped in the ocean
- nah, we put ours in the hillside. trash hill's getting chonky
  
  Future archeologists will be confuss
  
  Trash hill got back

Which once removed and put into the recycling, the plastic bottle will then go live a long life in the landfill.

This brand is all cartons where I am, more efficient and environmentallly friendly.
- Cartons have plastic too, yeah? Cause plain cardboard isn't staying mess free for long if you fill it with milk. That said, it's probably less plastic, though this is also less plastic than just making the whole jug non-recyclable. Why they don't just make the label recyclable too is beyond me.
  
  The problem is plastic is great for food safety. The way it makes air and water-tight seals, that can easily be broken, is hard to replicate. If cans could open, on their own, the way sealed plastic bottles do, then we could have easier recycling via metal containers. But the self-open cans make sharp edges and nobody's invented a way around that yet.
  
  I think they used to wax the cardboard. Maybe they still do?

They should teach AI how to sort garbage and do it for us instead of making it create videos of pirate ships in a cup of coffee
- But the pirates can sort the garbage.... Right??? Please tell me I am right.....

Milk should come in bags, there I said it
- CANADIAN
- We used to get it in glass bottles, and the bottles would be reused (not melted down).
  Just a shame getting it that way costs about 3-4 times as much as a big four pint plastic jug from Tesco.
  
  That's just dumb. It's supposed to cost a little more, where the extra money is returned upon returning the bottle.
- Oh, hello there fellow Canadian
  
  I’ve heard this a couple times now. Where in Canada are they doing this?
- So, do you just throw the bag in the fridge? How is it stored?
  
  Throw the 4L bag in the fridge. Remove one of the three inner 1.3 L bags, and place it in the dedicated milk bag holder that every household has:
  
  Snip the corner, pour yourself a glass, and enjoy!
  https://www.cbc.ca/radio/costofliving/we-answer-your-burning-questions-about-things-like-milk-bags-tariffs-condo-insurance-and-printer-cartridges-1.5409407/here-s-why-milk-comes-in-bags-in-parts-of-canada-1.5409420
- Are the bags plastic?
  
  Leather
- water too
- This is almond juice, not milk.
- Or don't drink milk.
  
  we got a lactose hater here

2 different kinds of plastic.
Not all plastic is recyclable. John Oliver (nsfw) has a good bit on it here:
https://youtu.be/Fiu9GSOmt8E
- Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
  https://piped.video/Fiu9GSOmt8E
  Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
  I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.

Imagine the massive inconvenience of separating your plastics so that your recycling facility can actually recycle more plastic waste instead of if ending up in a landfill 🤦
- Imagine the massive inconvenience of having to separate plastics to recycle when you literally work at a plastic recycling plan.
- i'm pretty sure most plastic isn't even recyclable
  edit: relevant link
  
  It's not that the plastic isn't recyclable it's that you cant mix plastics and recycle them. So if there is a doubt at all what a plastic is then it's thrown away or if it can't be separated from other materials or contaminated with oil or something.

Do people not enjoy ripping the paper off of plastic water bottles? This looks like the same kind of fun to me.

Plastic is better off just going in the trash. The ability to recycle it is largely a lie. Especially plastic that touched food as it needs to be clean to recycle.
- It could be recycled, it’s just that the world is too cheap to bother with it.
  
  Recycling only works when the price of the material is high enough to justify the reclamation process. It doesn't work for plastic because of the insane subsidies given to the petroleum industry. If we had a significant enough carbon tax, you'd start seeing more actual plastic recycling.
  
  Recycling has always been a lie to make you feel good about consumption. If it’s not a valuable commodity, it just goes to the dump anyways.
  
  It can be IF its
  clean
  dry
  its the same type of plastic
  its not a bag/foil/film
  all the other materials are clean and dry in the same lot.
  Even after all that, it's really only useful in downcycling.
- This is absolute nonsense.
  In Germany, between 38-48% of plastic is recycled (source). Sure, that‘s far from all of it, but still far, far better than nothing.
  The recycling rate might be lower in other countries, but just giving up and putting everything in the regular trash is probably the worst thing you could do.
  
  Still there is the issue, that recycling plants seem to pollute their surroundings with microplastics by just washing the plastic
  Obviously recycling is good, but with plastic it seems we're not in a place to handle it reasonable in any way...
- What kills me is that just a couple morons can contaminate a large batch of recyclables, that could've otherwise been perfect. But I guess humanity will always have this sort of problem, until it kills us.
- Stop spouting this nonsense please. It might be true for the USA, but other countries have their shot together and in fact do recycle plastic.

At least yours has a perforated line to try and tear before giving up and just getting a knife. My family keeps buying the bottles with no perforation and isn't a smooth bottle. Tedious getting them ready for recycling.

Imagine doing something slightly inconvenient, let alone something that can take a whole second.
- I think the point was, you're removing plastic from plastic to recycle plastic. The plastic you removed won't be recycled. So...what's the point? It's terrible package design.
  
  The plastic you're removing can't be recycled. if left on the bottle, some recycling centers (maybe most actually) just throw out the bottle because it's more cost effective then preparing the bottle for recycling.
  Any and all plastic bottles experience this problem (plastic bottle caps are bad too). This is a company making it more likely your bottle will be recycled, by making it easier to remove the non recyclable materials.
  
  In a world where 'more brands = more freedom' for some reason companies just compete on fancy packaging, and we support by buying them (bcs of lack of alternatives).
  We don't need oil based plastics at all, only if we let the market innovate.
- Welcome to Mildly Infuriating.
  
  Yeah, I guess you are right.
  The whole system is (intentionally) super infuriating & inconvenient.

Oh no ! Anyway .

very relevant article: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/feb/15/recycling-plastics-producers-report

Just watched https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/documentary/plastic-wars/?

I could be wrong, but I would assume they're part of a bottle exchange; where they wash the bottles and reuse them
- Can you name your country? Because, uh... No. If that actually exists where you live though, then that's awesome. We should have that here.
  
  Pretty much every northern European country has had it since the 80s. Nowadays we melt it into new packaging though, supposedly it requires even less energy. And you get money for turning them in :)
  
  We used to, here in Finland, but I think now they crush them and reform them into new bottles. The things cost 20c/piece, so everyone returns them.
  
  Australia does it too.
  
  Some dairy deliveries have that. We get milk, lemonade, creamer all delivered in glass quarts pints or half pints. Rinse and give it back the next week with the next delivery. I wish more grocery stores have this

Standard practice in Germany but I think there's no recycling in the USA (assuming you're there) so quite pointless in this case
- Bahaha oh mein freulich

I think you are on to something, mr Whistleblower. Keep digging and call Greta when you have drawn conclusions! In the meantime, move stealthily, they may be watching! :-)

Quicker to just throw it in the fire place... ya know?

157 comments