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Comment by nradov | Hacker News Reader

We need to focus more on reuse than on recycling. I'd like to see regulations and tax incentives to encourage beverage companies to use glass bottles that can be washed and reused, rather than disposable aluminum or (even worse) plastic.

It's a common sight in Silicon Valley offices to see greasy empty pizza boxes in the recycling bin. People just don't seem to realize that greasy cardboard can't be recycled, and might even contaminate other material.

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> People just don't seem to realize that greasy cardboard can't be recycled

I think a lot actually do realize it. At least where I live, the garbage bins at residences are about 1/2-3/4 the size as the recycle bins (glass has a separate bin). A lot just use it as a garbage bin, because the recycle bin is usually "free" and some pizza boxes don't even fit in the actual garbage bin (without taking time to break it down). A pizza box can take up a lot of room in the actual smaller trash bin, and they'd rather fill it with other trash. I'd attribute it more to laziness and convenience.

We need to focus on reducing production, with reuse as a secondary and complementary measure. We have a ton of disposable crap and packaging in our lives, much of it is inherently garbage. Reuse what we can, but reduce the production of things that become waste.

Does reducing production fit with our brand of capitalism?

It can. For example, instead of buying bottled water or olive oil or vinegar at a few grocery stores near me, you can bring in your own bottle and fill up.

Instead of buying pre-cut veggies and fruit, you can get the individual ones and do it yourself.

Unfortunately, what this thread sees as waste consumers often see as a benefit: buying items in sealed containers lets you have peace of mind against spoilage or in-store contamination (anyone can open up those pour-your-own tubs of olive oil and sneeze into them).

Additionally, packaged things stack up better, so you can offer consumers a wider variety- laundry detergent scents, drink flavors, and so forth. Offering pour-your-own means maintaining and cleaning goods and equipment that are exposed to both product and air, which is more expensive for grocers.

Finally, packaging (especially the clamshell variety) is often used for protection- from damaging the contents in shipping / handling to acting as a mild anti-theft device.

So, yes, there is a market for reduced-production goods. Produce, grains, soft drinks at gas stations, and some other goods are already there.

If there is a reasonable way to protect goods, ensure their freshness, offer a unique variety in a low maintenance fashion, there's money to be made. If you can't do that and still want to reduce production, you're going to either end up creating more waste through some side effect of the tradeoffs involved.

It would be a great way to differentiate retail.

Get your authorized Tide refill at Target instead of having Amazon ship it. People don’t like glass because of the energy used to produce it, but it’s always seemed like a no brainer to me.

It is common in Japan to sell refills of shampoo and detergent in plastic sleeves:

https://www.irisplaza.co.jp/IMAGE/PET/PRODUCT/P523917.jpg

It is still some plastic, but I assume it is less waste than a hard bottle.

> Get your authorized Tide refill at Target instead of having Amazon ship it

You write that as if Target didn't used to sell Tide refills but gave up because nobody bought it.

You can compost many greasy pizza boxes though. Thta's the guidance up here in Seattle.

They don't know because most recycling is the "feel good" type of mentality. People don't actually know what can and cannot be recycled.

So let's start with better education maybe? In Japan each ward/city office publishes online manual with detailed explanation and, probably more important, with illustrated examples.

Telling users to RTFM seldom works here.

But as the article suggest, most glass is contaminated and thrown away.

It's tough to recycle glass. That's why I suggested we focus on reusing glass bottles. Use deposits to encourage consumers to return bottles to retailers, then send them back to bottling plants to be washed and refilled. That actually used to be common in the US but doesn't happen much anymore.

There is a slow turnaround happening in this area with milk, at least in the cities I’ve lived in the last several years. You can buy milk in glass jars, (as a bonus, produced within the state) and take the the empty bottles back to the grocery store for a $2 credit.

But, the impact of glass wastage is just landfill volume.

I get milk delivered from a farmer in resusable glass bottles. We lose like 1% a year, which represents probably 95% less waste than buying disposable plastic or cardboard containers.

With single-stream recycling.

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