The Myth About Recycling Food Plastic Everyone Needs To Stop Believing - Tasting Table

"Recycling can be a complicated business, and plastic recycling makes it even harder. The biggest issue for most Americans is that recycling laws vary greatly between different cities and states - not just how you recycle, but what you can recycle. Plastics further complicate things, because the thousands of different potential chemical compositions greatly affect how recyclable they are. So, you might have been making the assumption that as long as your food plastic had a recycling symbol on it (the one with the triangle of arrows), it was recyclable. Well, think again."

"In the United States, there are seven different categories of recycling labels for plastic, easily identified by the number 1 to 7 inside the triangular symbol. Yet many of these categories cannot be regularly recycled, despite the label. In practice, the only widely recyclable plastics are those with labels 1 and 2, although it is becoming more common for collectors to accept plastic No. 5 as well. In general, the higher the number, the tougher the plastic is to recycle, hence why some people try to avoid food packaging made out of plastic No.7."

"That's because, to the plastic industry, those codes don't actually mean recycling; they are known as resin identification codes (RIC). An RIC simply identifies what type of plastic was used in the container and is a way of communicating that to recycling plants, not a promise of recyclability. If that seems confusing, you are not alone. A survey from the Consumer Brand Association in 2019 found 68% of Americans believe anything with the symbol is recyclable, and the labeling system has been criticized for using symbols that can seem actively misleading."

Recycling rules in the United States vary by city and state, including which materials are accepted. Plastic recycling is harder because many different chemical compositions affect whether plastic can be processed. Plastic containers may show a triangular recycling symbol with a number from 1 to 7, but these numbers do not guarantee recyclability. In practice, plastics labeled 1 and 2 are widely recyclable, and plastic labeled 5 is increasingly accepted. Higher numbers are generally more difficult to recycle, leading some people to avoid certain packaging. The numbers are resin identification codes that communicate plastic type to recycling plants rather than promising that the item can be recycled. Many Americans mistakenly believe the symbol means the item is recyclable, contributing to more plastic waste.

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