Plastics

By Luca

Is plastic recycling good for the environment and is there a better way?Yes recycling is good for the environment. Recycling prevents landfills filling up. Landfills are bad for the environment and they are filling up.

Landfills allow poison to leak into the soil. There are 7 kinds of plastic. Most plastic items are given a number depending upon their type. Recycled plastic is separated into the same type.

1,2,4 and 5 (only they can be recycled) are sorted, squashed and chopped into tiny pieces.

The pieces are melted down and formed into spaghetti like strands. They are cut into little pieces called pellets.

The pellets are melted down in factories to make new products.Recycled plastic can be made into many things. Plastic can be burned for fuel or electricity.

How is Plastic MadePlastic is made from oil or natural gas. Oil is mixed with chemicals and is heated. The mixture becomes a soft liquid. The liquid is poured into moulds to make things like food containers or long threads to make big things.

Which plastics can be recycled and why ?Recycled milk bottles can be made into plant pots, pegs, carpet or clothes hangers. Soft drink bottles can be made into things like fibre to fill sleeping bags.

Plastic shopping bags take 20 years to break down. Styrofoam and polystyrene never break down.

Plastics from Gardens Centres

I decided to investigate how garden centres managed plastics because we had a lot of plant containers and not all of them were recyclable. I prepared some questions to ask the manager of a garden centre.

Interview at PalmersHello my name is Luca. I am from Takapuna Primary. We are studying Sustainability and I have chosen to research how plastic can be recycled and if not how it can be reused.Are your plant pots recyclable? Yes but we don’t encourage recycling. Some people bring them back, they get washed shredded up and melted down. It costs quite a lot to wash them as they need to be sterilised.

Interview at PalmersDo people know that plant pots are recyclable? Yes. 10 years ago we used signage to make people aware that they could return pots but we ended up with a mountain of pots that we couldn’t deal with.

Does your plant centre make people aware that plant pots could be recycled? Not any more and there is no signage.Would you consider using signage to make people aware that they could recycle them? Yes it is something we could reconsider and think about. We are trying to become more environmentally conscious because we now collect our rain water and store it in large tanks.