Dean Atkinson Jr

English 102
10 July 2014
Mini Research Paper
Recycling Problems
Recycling and going green is spreading through the United States at a very rapid pace.
People and companies both are trying to seek new ways that they can re-use any material they
have laying around and use it for a different task then it was intended for rather than throwing it
away. However the big one is companies trying to save plastic on water bottles that companies
produce. They all say that they are saving a ton of plastic and helping to stop waste on the
beaches and in the mainland of the United States. But is all this work for saving plastic really
saving the earth? Or is saving this plastic actually producing more waste and pollution than
before? And just becoming a burden on the factories with the wasted bottles that dont get placed
into a recycle bin. Factories need to find a better way to save plastic without producing more
pollution on water bottles and to find a way to get people to recycle all of their water bottles.
Many companies that focus on recycling state that they have saved so much plastic that it
can cover the earth so many times, sure that may be the plastic they save but what about this
machines that melt down the plastic to re-use them? Do they recycle the bottles without
producing any pollution what so ever, Coca-Cola stated that they are actually not really making a
difference with their recycle plant, too many water bottles are being thrown away to the point
where Coca-Cola had to shut down a few of their factories due to the expenses of them and no
product coming out of them. When Coca-Cola released facts about people wasting bottles and
compared them to what they can do if everyone throws their bottles in the recycling, All of

those little bottles are adding up to a pretty big environmental nuisance. Nearly 3 million bottles
are going into the trash every day. That adds up to more than 1 billion plastic water bottles a year
or enough to make 74 million square feet of carpet or 16 million sweaters, the report found.
Recycled plastic can be turned into fibers for making carpet or clothing. What they are trying
to say is that many people are not really on board with the recycling campaign yet; large
companies need to take the recycle project to the next level to get everyone on board.
Coca-Cola is not they only company in the United States that is struggling to accomplish
their goal on trying to recycle, a factory facility out of Atlanta stated that they did not even come
close to what their goal was of the number of pounds of plastic that they recycled, they said like
Coca-Cola that too many people throw them away, Today, the troubled facility highlights the
Atlanta beverage giant's struggles to build a recycling business in the U.S. Last year the plant
produced only about a third of its targeted 100 million pounds of plastic recycled from PET, or
polyethylene terephthalate. If companies such as this one cant even reach their goals on
recycling plastic, eventually the movement on recycling could be diminished if the people dont
contribute to helping these factories do what they were created to do.
With melting down plastic can be used for many different materials, it still needs to be
collected and transported to the plants so the plastic can be recycled. As well as with people not
placing a lot of bottles in their recycle bins it almost is a waste of money for the trucks to collect
the plastic. Industry truces would not solve recycling's volatile economics. Virgin plastics are
made from oil, recycled plastics from trash, so logic would suggest that recycled materials would
be cheaper. But it is costly to collect, transport, sort and clean discarded plastics. And every time
oil prices fall -- and they fell by more than one-third last year -- recycled plastic loses value.

This article in the New York Times states that a lot of money is being used to collect these
materials but with so much money going into it eventually the value of plastic will drop itself.
Recycling is not a bad thing; there are many good things that come out of recycling.
However with plastic bottles not really being worth to try and collect to re-use many factories
and companies have to start relying on a new material that can be recycled into different
materials.

References
Esterl, Mike. Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition [New York, N.Y] 19 Aug 2011: B.1
Bustillo, Miguel. Los Angeles Times [Los Angeles, Calif] 28 May 2011: B.1.
Deutsch, Claudia H. New York Times, Late Edition (East Coast) [New York, N.Y] 30 Mar 2002:
C.2.