Plastic makes me a sad panda

Soldato
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Surely if you factor in all the fertilisers used to grow food for the cow/bull etc then to have a fair comparison you must also account for the same fertilisers used to grow food for the people who work in the Quorn factory?

(Yeah really really picky but hey, I'm bored :D)

Well yea if you want. But then you have to factor in the farmer who rears the cows, his labourers, the butcher, lorry driver etc etc etc, you can go on forever! It might be interesting to see how many people actually work to produce a kilo of quorn versus a kilo of steak and do a comparison that way but i have no idea how you'd go about it.

If you look at it logically then theres no point whatsoever in Quorn.

If you want something that looks and tastes like meat then eat meat.

We've already established that both processes are wastefully inefficient in production of the final product.

If you don't want to eat meat then don't eat it.

Therefore a single meat producing process thus halving the environmental impact. Simples.

Proof that hippies are killing the planet by their unnatural urges. :p

Awful lot of assumptions in this post.

If you want something that looks and tastes like meat but doesnt have any of animal welfare issues then eat quorn.

We've already established that both processes are wastefully inefficient in production of the final product but we have no actual figures, just assumptions that because its an industrial process it must be extremely environmentally damaging. Yoghurt is essentially processed but i dont hear many people complaining about that!

As for the rest of it, read my OP. I do still eat meat. I love meat and ive just started this journey. Eventually the aim might be to do away with quorn, however for now even a meat substitute is better than no meat. At least quorn is produced in this country, bringing the food miles down.


A general note to everyone though. The semi vegetarianism was never the point of this post, i can see now why the writer of fake plastic fish created a separate vege blog rather than combining it with her hatred of plastics. The point was to tell people about plastics and try and give some people ideas on how to reduce their usage, as well as to show people the damage they do. Perhaps this link will help:

From the Photographer Chris Jordan said:
These photographs of albatross chicks were made in September, 2009, on Midway Atoll, a tiny stretch of sand and coral near the middle of the North Pacific. The nesting babies are fed bellies-full of plastic by their parents, who soar out over the vast polluted ocean collecting what looks to them like food to bring back to their young. On this diet of human trash, every year tens of thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway from starvation, toxicity, and choking.

To document this phenomenon as faithfully as possible, not a single piece of plastic in any of these photographs was moved, placed, manipulated, arranged, or altered in any way. These images depict the actual stomach contents of baby birds in one of the world's most remote marine sanctuaries, more than 2000 miles from the nearest continent.

~cj, Seattle, October 2009

http://www.chrisjordan.com/current_set2.php?id=11
 

mrk

mrk

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In American "marts" they use brown paper bags to haul their shopping home. Why can't they do that here in every super market? Are British shoppers to lazy to carry?
 
Soldato
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From the previous page: :p

Hahahah, the usual suspects spouting the usual uninformed or misinformed garbage :D


The energy and resources in a paper bag are higher than those that go into a plastic bag. Although a plastic one won't biodegrade or oxo-degrade unless it has certain additives it is the better option, environmentally. If it's re-used then it's even better again. Use it as a binbag and it's even better.

Sadly true. There are scores of lifecycle analyses backing this up.

I removed your signing comment since I'm not a hippie but probably know a lot more about the subject than most :)

Basically its better to reuse plastic, or even better to use unbleached cotton bags than to simply throw away paper.
 
Caporegime
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As for meat, dont get me wrong, I love a nice big juicy steak. I cook all the time and would hate to lose all my meat. But I have started substituting half of my meals with a quorn alternative meat or no meat at all. Again, I implore you to just buy some and try it. Quorn ham slices are really tasty in a toastie and quorn chicken is impossible to differentiate in a curry.
Except it isn't does it. Quorn tastes bland and plastic, ironically enough.

Our council collects plastic every 2 weeks from everyone to recycle. It is surprising how much we buy in a fortnight!

The worrying thing is that of the plastics you stick in the recycling bin nowadays though, less then 50% of it is actually recycled because of the cost of doing so. I spoke to a council representative recently who told me exactly what is recycled in Cambridge, and what ends up in landfill.

The sad fact is that it isn't financially viable for these companies to buy large amounts of recycling refuse as they get paid less to recycle it - so it ends up in the ground.
 
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Surely the best solution is to recycle as much as is possible. That way we can change our wasteful ways more slowly, and have less of an environmental impact. How recyclable are all types of plastic? I imagine almost anything can be recycled with the right facilities.
Any type of plastic can be recycled. A large amount isn't though, because it isn't financially viable.
 
Soldato
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If rocks & stones eventually degrade into sand then buried plastic will erode to nothing purely by abrasion so' last forever' is a myth

Actually that's not strictly true. I watched Tropic of Cancer recently and the presenter had travelled to Hawaii where there is a beach that just faces out to thousands of miles of open ocean but is almost entirely plastic right down to the fine grains of what has now become plastic sand. That was certainly quite an eye opener.
 
Soldato
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Except it isn't does it. Quorn tastes bland and plastic, ironically enough.

Not to my tastebuds. Quorn chicken curry made from scratch (I never ever buy jars of sauce) tasted loads better than a ready meal. Yes the texture was different but chicken is fairly tasteless anyway and in a curry you're letting the spices do the work far more than the meat flavour. Of course I know there are exceptions to this and I'd never buy quorn steak but for me it is a fairly tasty alternative!

This highlights a problem I often find with environmental issues. People always see alternatives or changes in black and white. If I say oh ill half the amount of meat I eat, people say, well why dont you go the whole way then? Or id never ever give up my meat! Or when you say I recycle more, or buy less plastics people react with, but it cant all be recycled, theres no point anyway or I cant live without my laptop/tv/car dashboard. Look people, its not about changing everything 100%, its about making small changes which have the potential to make a BIG difference! You dont have to do away with all pollution or with all meat or with all plastics. Im sensible enough to realise all of these things are an unfortunate but NECESSARY part of modern life. I accept that you cant simply eradicate plastic or pollution but that does not mean you cant reduce it slightly.
 
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Actually that's not strictly true. I watched Tropic of Cancer recently and the presenter had travelled to Hawaii where there is a beach that just faces out to thousands of miles of open ocean but is almost entirely plastic right down to the fine grains of what has now become plastic sand. That was certainly quite an eye opener.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8639769.stm
 
Caporegime
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Not to my tastebuds. Quorn chicken curry made from scratch (I never ever buy jars of sauce) tasted loads better than a ready meal. Yes the texture was different but chicken is fairly tasteless anyway and in a curry you're letting the spices do the work far more than the meat flavour. Of course I know there are exceptions to this and I'd never buy quorn steak but for me it is a fairly tasty alternative!
Pardon? You're doing something wrong if you think chicken to be tasteless :p. I also never eat ready meals.

This highlights a problem I often find with environmental issues. People always see alternatives or changes in black and white. If I say oh ill half the amount of meat I eat, people say, well why dont you go the whole way then? Or id never ever give up my meat! Or when you say I recycle more, or buy less plastics people react with, but it cant all be recycled, theres no point anyway or I cant live without my laptop/tv/car dashboard. Look people, its not about changing everything 100%, its about making small changes which have the potential to make a BIG difference! You dont have to do away with all pollution or with all meat or with all plastics. Im sensible enough to realise all of these things are an unfortunate but NECESSARY part of modern life. I accept that you cant simply eradicate plastic or pollution but that does not mean you cant reduce it slightly.
If we paid 250% taxes we could probably afford to recycle all plastics.
 
Soldato
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By tasteless i mean relative to a steak or lamb in a curry. To me spices in a curry have far more flavour than the chicken itself. I wouldnt use quorn chicken if i was only trying to do a chicken breast, but in a strong sauce it makes little difference.
 
Soldato
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I find it extremely wasteful the amount of energy and resources that go into unnecessary packaging, i have often wondered to myself how it's sustainable when chucking it in the bin, i mean when you think about all the processes a simple box goes though its a lot but the amount of things plastic bottles, crisp packets and so on do with their often excessive decoration it must be huge.
 
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I find it extremely wasteful the amount of energy and resources that go into unnecessary packaging, i have often wondered to myself how it's sustainable when chucking it in the bin, i mean when you think about all the processes a simple box goes though its a lot but the amount of things plastic bottles, crisp packets and so on do with their often excessive decoration it must be huge.

If you get upset about wasted packaging don't go to a co-op store, they chuck out absolute tonnes of plastic and cardboard daily and then claim to be environmentally friendly
 
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Any type of plastic can be recycled. A large amount isn't though, because it isn't financially viable.
It can be recycled but it usually downgrades each time into an inferior material of little use. Like I said earlier there's only a certain amount of low grade plastic we can use and we'd be best off recycling however many times we can before using it for energy recovery.

Of course, the sensible option would be to switch to using plastics that do recycle more readily, but this is mainly down to educating designers in their material choices.

This highlights a problem I often find with environmental issues. People always see alternatives or changes in black and white. If I say oh ill half the amount of meat I eat, people say, well why dont you go the whole way then? Or id never ever give up my meat! Or when you say I recycle more, or buy less plastics people react with, but it cant all be recycled, theres no point anyway or I cant live without my laptop/tv/car dashboard.
I get 'accused' of being a hypocrite all the time. This is the other common great one. An environmentalist but yet own a car, eat meat, own energy using products, earn money etc...

I find it extremely wasteful the amount of energy and resources that go into unnecessary packaging, i have often wondered to myself how it's sustainable when chucking it in the bin, i mean when you think about all the processes a simple box goes though its a lot but the amount of things plastic bottles, crisp packets and so on do with their often excessive decoration it must be huge.
It depends on the product. Take something like a laptop where the resources that go into making the product are huge: if that product gets smashed in transit then you've made a huge loss in terms of energy and resources. In this case packaging becomes critical in preserving resources in transit.

Now go to supermarket products where people will only buy the item if it is in 100% tip top condition and shiny. It just gets chucked away if it reaches its date which is a massive waste. Maintaining the product so it actually gets bought requires a lot of packaging.

As for plastic bottles... The main problem is carting around tonnes and tonnes of water in trucks, not the plastic, when there is already a perfectly adequate water supply running everywhere in pipes. It's cultural and behavioural in this case. A massive waste but consumer led.
 
Caporegime
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It can be recycled but it usually downgrades each time into an inferior material of little use. Like I said earlier there's only a certain amount of low grade plastic we can use and we'd be best off recycling however many times we can before using it for energy recovery.
Yes burning plastics for energy recovery is being mooted on a large scale, however it has quite harmful emissions.
 
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