I was watching the documentary “Buy Now! The Shopping Conspiracy” on Netflix and heard this comment when discussing waste generated from consumerism.
It made me realize, yes we don’t throw garbage “away” because away doesn’t exist … we just pass it on for someone else to deal with. Sometimes that next person might not deal with it right away but eventually someone has to deal with it.
Alternately, properly managed and centralized trash disposal eliminates pollution from multiple spread out trash holes. Assume the composition of the trash is the same, and it clearly makes sense to centralize the trash collecting and minimize the area impacted by it. The problem is the plastic composition, not the existence of landfills
Yeah, we’re not arguing against landfills as a general concept. But they’re still basically the least bad solution, when all the good solutions don’t apply or got ignored.
Not producing that garbage in the first place is the big one. Most products in supermarkets are wrapped in trash, even though lots of them could be sold in reusable containers, or at least in biodegradable or recyclable containers. But burying trash underground is assigned a lower price than sending reusable containers back to manufacturers, so that’s what every company does.