Some environmentalists claim that attempts to create a recycling economy for plastics are sure to fail, but the arguments can be not true.
In 1980, Disney World in Orlando. Florida, started to work on a new way to generate power for the theme park, cutting its use of oil, the price of which had increased. The Solid Waste Energy Conversion Plant took rubbish, including plastic, and used a method called pyrolysis (热解) to turn it into burnable gases. It opened in 1982, but closed a year later, as the cost of running it went up.
Today, environmentalists are mentioning the Disney story to damage the reputation of a set of new technologies, well known as advanced recycling, which take plastic waste and turn it back into brand new plastic.
Their argument is false. The failure of Disney's plant had more to do with a later fall in oil prices than technological or environmental problems. Pyrolysis has improved a lot since the 1980s. And in any case, Disney's plant was designed to produce fuel, which isn't classed as advanced recycling.
As we report "the incredible new tech that can recycle all plastics forever", advanced recycling is a game change r that could help to solve the global plastics crisis. It has the possibility to take millions of tonnes of thrown-away plastic, most of which ends up in landfill or the environment, and turn it back into a clean, fresh version by breaking it down to its molecular constituents (分子成分). The goal is a recycling economy. In this case, there is no longer any need to make "virgin" plastic from oil.
It isn't a magic recipe. There are problems around such plants generating toxic (有毒的) waste, their energy use and the continuation of traditional plastics ahead of newer, greener alternatives (替代物). Environmentalists are right to argue that we would be better off gradually getting rid of plastics altogether. But practical considerations mean they aren't going away any time soon, and most advanced recycling technologies are better for the environment than the alternatives.
There is a serious discussion to be had around advanced recycling, not least whether it should be factored into an upcoming global agreement on plastic pollution. Let's just make sure it is based on the facts, not Disney stories.
