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Comment by blitzar | Hacker News Reader

> Bottle caps are often discarded and littered.

So the problem is really people are pieces of shit; open the bottle, chuck the cap on the ground and walk on.

I guess now at least the cap and the bottle will be discarded together rather than seperately - halving the amount of littering.

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At least in Australia the lids are considered too small to recycle as they are too light and blow around so you’re supposed to put them in the rubbish. They had also traditionally been a different plastic which sometimes was an issue.

So it does truly potentially help in the recycling regard. Note however the professing facilities and requirements for this vary wildly from state to state and country to country and also they often ask for a lowest common denominator of all the recycling plants. So it’s not that some places potentially can’t but not all.

Leaving them on also causes issues because if the bottles are air right they don’t compress as well.

My understanding is that plastic is almost never recycled in America. Does Australia actually have a working plastic recycling system?

Far from perfect but apparently yes: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-04-06/plastic-recycling-ind...

> They had also traditionally been a different plastic which sometimes was an issue.

In Poland we set the caps aside then dump into dedicated containers, set up by charity organizations. This specific plastic is supposedly valuable enough to warrant separate recycling logistics.

Its all marketing, paid by EU Eco funds. Caps land in the landfill.

Always blame the individual not the corporation...

For littering? Absolutely

Why not allocate blame & cheer to the individual & corporation as appropriate.

So in this case.. littering = bad individual, anti-littering product changes = good corporation.

The structural problems that I imagine are at play here:

- apparently people buy bottles without the intent of resealing them, maybe offering cups as an alternative would fit them better?

- maybe some people litter due to a lack of conveniently accessible bins

- maybe littering can be reduced by educational programs

- why are people buying cola at all? Drinking from the tap or a drinking fountain would be much more environmentally friendly and healthier.

-- Drinking fountains are rare in most countries

-- In some countries tap water isn't great for consumption

-- Coca Cola spends a lot of money convincing us to buy it

-- Sugary drinks have a certain appeal to our senses

I probably missed a couple. But while Coca-Cola is responsible for some of them, at least as many of them are about public infrastructure driving the choices of individuals.

This was likely introduced due to producer responsibilty laws which would make the corporation responsible for the cost of cleanup.

Its funny how corporations can come up with solutions when they are the ones that are paying to clean up the waste. Much cheaper to blame the individual but they can only get away with for so long.

This isn't the argument. People vote with their wallets. If the corp makes recyclable glass bottles, customers will buy a competitors plastic ones. It is still mostly down to the customer to either buy something more sustainable or to recycle it at least.

Always blame the corporation that sold the person a bottle of coke, and not the piece of shit sitting on a bench, next to a rubbish bin, who drinks it then throws the empty bottle in the river infront of them.

For dealing with the bottles Germany has a bottle deposit, (up to 0.25€ depending on bottle and kind of drink, for partially weird reasons)

Aside from many people returning bottles, that makes it "lucrative" for some people to collect thrown away bottles and returning them. (while I find it questionable to have a situation where people search through trash for that little money ...)

It's indeed socially unideal to have people rummage in trash, but it's because it's not "little money" to them. It's what they need to get by. Searching in other people's waste makes the difference of enough money to buy a fruit and a bread roll.

Yeah definitely not little money. Here people travel to the country and buy tickets to large music festivals with the only purpose being collecting bottles and cans. While a calculated hourly pay would be bad compared to most salaries here, it still end up being much more than it is possible to make many other places.

Yes, it's not little money for them. That's not what I wanted to imply. It is little money for most parts of society, but to them it is enough to warrant digging through dirt. Which, in my view, shows that there is something wrong as we like to praise our social system. (but then things are more complex ...)

Thanks for making the distinction clear!

> while I find it questionable to have a situation where people search through trash for that little money ...

Living in a post-soviet country... Yeah, I don't see that often today (but I do), but 10+ years ago I would constantly see (poor) people collecting glass bottles and depositing for up to 0.06€, to get another drink... Nowdays plastic bottles go for 0.1€.

And it is not littered where I live - but they would get out that stuff from bins too. Anyway, it still is a thing.

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