I wouldn't consider computation output accurate if the computer is also composting into pieces as it operates, and I wouldn't want to run the risk of a container being 'eaten' spilling/spoiling its contents before it reaches its destination.

That doesn't excuse us from what we did to nature in creating and dumping plastics and associated by-products though. Single-use throw away stuff still does my head in. Just because we can doesn't mean we should, we did anyway, and we're only now beginning to understand the repercussions of our collective actions.

If this problem becomes 'oversolved' we break civilisation as we know it, as anything made of plastic deteriorates much more quickly/readily than its original expected lifetime, and we have a massive plastic dependency issue.

I think it’s helps to look at wood as an analogy. Dead wood could not be broken down for a long time. That’s why we ended up with dead trees turned into coal and oil.

Then bacteria arrived which could break these materials down. But still today we have a lot durable things built out of wood.

I think similarly we will find ways to protect our important plastics.

We could, but we don't seem to readily learn from past similar situations.

Ideally the container would serve its purpose for as long as needed and breaks down accordingly - there's a high level of variance though, and our ability to refrigerate extends that. So because the expected 'lifetime' of a perishable good transported in plastic is highly variable, its not a simple time-matching problem.

Who knows - maybe our dumped plastics become compressed into the future equivalent of diamonds...?

But yeah, humanity generally has a way of finding workarounds / treatments etc. etc. For some reason I was recently reading wikipedia about how "Anodizing was first used on an industrial scale in 1923 to protect Duralumin seaplane parts from corrosion" and now its commonplace, extending durability everywhere.

Generational thinking is something most of us are bad at but it's something we need to strongly emphasize going forward.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gray_goo

Cellulose metababolism is unusually hard given all the plants around.

So, we create bacteria that can eat plastic. The bacteria starts to eat our food packages and spoils the food. We create eating-plastic bacteria-resistant plastic. Full circle.

I cant stop thinking about goats after reading this, they eat everything, do they share these types of microbes in cow stomachs, do they differ, are they 'stronger' microprobes, can they perhaps process more different types of plastics?

Just put a return value on plastic. Have governments pay out for plastics returned to them. £20 a kilo? £200 a kilo? At some point it you can make it worth while taking a ship to sea and fishing plastic out to make money.

Where does the government get the money to pay for plastic recycling? Tax the plastic producers.

There are solutions to most of our problems, it's us not voting in a government that will address these issues.

1. It's more expensive

2. Plastic bags aren't smooth and have a slightly rough texture

3. Plastic can't be made shiny and has a dull look

There is a new generation of folks trying to make a biodegradable plastic chemically without using corn:

https://fortune.com/2021/06/30/emma-watson-twitter-co-founde...

However from what I read it's far from mass production:

I've asked people in the know can the plastic made from corn be improved? Modern plastic made from corn (PLA) technology is over twenty years old. To their knowledge no one is working on it. They said it was a hard problem. My personal opinion is that it's a problem worth working on.

If you want it to compost it’s by definition going to start breaking down at about 130-140 degrees F