New Report Exposes the Limits of Plastic Recycling

(StatePoint) Have you tossed plastic into a recycling bin recently? There’s a large chance that material won’t be recycled. That’s according to a new report, which finds that after decades of being touted as a solution to pollution, plastic recycling is not all it’s cracked up to be. The report also highlights the growing scientific consensus on the health risks and economic costs of plastic pollution.

“Merchants of Myth,” the Greenpeace USA report, uncovered that less than a quarter of the most commonly produced types of plastics – found in items like bottles, jugs, food containers and caps – is actually recyclable. Moreover, plastic recycling rates in the United States have been cut in half since 2014, from 9.5% to roughly 5-6% today, due to recycling access gaps, as well as infrastructure and technical limitations at recycling facilities. Up to 43% percent of U.S. households lack access to basic recycling services, and participation in recycling is actually decreasing. Meanwhile, only 12% of national municipal recycling facilities are even capable of processing common consumer plastics. Despite the small amount of plastic recycling actually taking place, the public pays to collect and sort plastics, while most of it ends up burned or dumped in landfills.