This doesn't surprise me, almost no municipality in the US will recycle number 5 plastics. Why Starbucks says they're "widely recyclable" is a mystery but it certainly seems an effort at deceptive greenwashing.
This doesn't surprise me, almost no municipality in the US will recycle number 5 plastics. Why Starbucks says they're "widely recyclable" is a mystery but it certainly seems an effort at deceptive greenwashing.
Starbucks says it because a retailer- and packaging-industry-backed organization says it: https://greenblue.org/2024/01/04/the-how2recycle-guide-to-re...
There is no actual oversight from the FTC or related organization for recyclability product labels.
Starbucks HQ city Seattle, WA accepts all plastic numbers in the curbside bin.
Most municipal recycling programs accept a lot of materials they do not currently recycle because retraining people is harder than sorting materials on their end, and not necessary since they sort it anyway.
After sorting they look for buyers of the raw materials. This varies depending on the market and quality of the material. Everything left over is sent to the landfill.
Do you have a source for this? I'd like to learn more and educate myself on this topic rather than stay ignorant
If you've got 20 minutes this has a good interview of someone who runs a municipal recycling program: https://www.npr.org/2019/07/12/741283641/episode-926-so-shou...
But does Seattle actually recycle all the plastic numbers? There are a number of places where all plastic numbers are accepted in the bin, but some (and sometimes all, depending on market conditions) of them are thrown into the trash later. The logic is that, overall, plastic recycling can be increased by not requiring people to decipher the codes.