Re:Microbes discovered that can digest plastics at low tempe...
by sytelus on Wednesday May 10, 2023 @05:21AM
(#35885313)
For past two decades, this news shows up every year as if some new ground breaking discovery is made. We have seen no impact of any kind so far. It seems some research group releases this to media whenever they are due to apply for funding.
Re:Microbes discovered that can digest plastics at low tempe...
by arbitrandomuser on Wednesday May 10, 2023 @06:05AM
(#35885524)
It's also kind of sad , for all of human history we never had this wonder material like plastic , light , strong , moldable , cheap and very importantly resistant to chemicals , pests and microbial destruction and in the few decades that we have had it we are scrambling to look for bacteria that will digest them because we over did it .
Re:Microbes discovered that can digest plastics at low tempe...
by jaclaz on Wednesday May 10, 2023 @09:41AM
(#35887219)
I have no idea of the actual data, but I believe that percentage in waste plastics of those kinds (PE+PUR+PBAT+PLA) are something like:
95.0% PE
3.9% PUR
1.1% PBAT+PLA
so, even if these newly found microbes are effective and come into use they probably won't make in practice much a change, and - as you say - every year it comes out some article about research on these microbes (including some with potential for "eating" PE) but no news about them being used industrially.
TLDR: Someone invents catalyst able to encode any material with programmable expiry date. Every country adopts it to ensure steady employment across planet. Pants? 3 months and revert back to dust, wrist watch? 1 year, car? 2 years, etc.
95.0% PE
3.9% PUR
1.1% PBAT+PLA
so, even if these newly found microbes are effective and come into use they probably won't make in practice much a change, and - as you say - every year it comes out some article about research on these microbes (including some with potential for "eating" PE) but no news about them being used industrially.
TLDR: Someone invents catalyst able to encode any material with programmable expiry date. Every country adopts it to ensure steady employment across planet. Pants? 3 months and revert back to dust, wrist watch? 1 year, car? 2 years, etc.
Can only find Polish copy https://web.archive.org/web/20170722210628/http://zajdel.dza... google translate doesnt like this particular web.archive link so you would have to manually copy text to translate
A recycling bacteria got out of control and ate the infrastructure and the machines.