2023-05-02
As European citizens, we are told to separate our household waste, and many of us do dutifully. The ketchup bottle you rinsed and threw in the right bin at home might disappear from your life with the local waste truck.
In return for your separation efforts, you could expect a circular waste system, where packaging waste is recycled and used again and again. This is what plastic producers and politicians want you to believe. But this image of how waste is dealt with in Europe, one of the richest places on earth, is an illusion.
About 60 per cent of your packaging waste is not recycled. It gets either burnt in incinerators, shipped out of sight or dumped in landfills – legally or illegally. And while piles of waste become bigger and oceans and landscapes more polluted, the production of plastic is on a steep rise. It's expected to have tripled by 2060.
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- Wasteland – Europe’s plastic disaster, Investigate Europe, 27/04/2023;
- Europe’s circular economy is leaking, Investigate Europe, 27/04/2023;
- Burning questions remain over Europe’s waste incinerators, Investigate Europe, 27/04/2023;
- In numbers: Europe’s mounting plastic waste problem unpacked, Investigate Europe, 27/04/2023;
- Warum Europas Plastikberge schneller wachsen, als sie recycelt werden, Der Standard, 27/04/2023;
- Vi har eit kjempeproblem. Noko av det eksporterer vi. Resten brenn vi, Firdaposten, 27/04/2023;
- Desmontando Reciclos: un sistema de reciclaje ilógico y abierto al fraude, infoLibre, 27/04/2023;
- España se queda cada vez más sola dentro de Europa en su rechazo al sistema de retorno para reciclar envases, infoLibre, 27/04/2023
- Coca-Cola, Mercadona y Dia impulsan en Portugal un sistema de reciclaje que rechazan en España, infoLibre, 27/04/2023;
- Europa w plastikowej pułapce, frontstory.pl, 27/04/2023;
- Ein Recyclingkreislauf voller Löcher: Europa versinkt in Joghurtbechern, Milchtüten und Shampooflaschen, Tagesspiegel, 27/04/2023;
- Big Oil fiuta l’affare, corsa alla chimica: “È il piano B”, Il Fatto Quotidiano, 27/04/2023;
- In Ue Italia e Spagna contro la “cauzione” sulle bottigliette rese, Il Fatto Quotidiano, 27/04/2023;
- Plastica boom: la produzione aumenta e il riciclo è una beffa, Il Fatto Quotidiano, 27/04/2023.
PODCAST
- Europe's plastic disaster, Investigate Europe, 01/08/2023.
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