permaculture

[Rain Tenaqiya <raincascadia@yahoo.com>]

I too once tried composting some corn-based biodegradable plastic cups.  I 
decided to indulge myself, for once, and try some out for our commitment 
ceremony four years ago.  The cups can still be found in the compost pile.  I 
probably should have tried recycling them.  They are supposed to degrade in 
six months.  It's possible that in a climate with year-round moisture (I'm in 
California) or irrigation and mild temperatures, this would be true, but I 
doubt it.  
 
I got excited, recently, when I heard about polyethylene being made from 
sugarcane ethanol in Brazil.  It would be great to still have water tanks and 
pipe after fossil fuels are depleted, but probably only the rich will be able 
to afford it.  Corn-derived plastics are probably a gimmick, as Larry 
mentioned.



>From jocecampbell@gmail.com  Sat Aug  1 19:36:42 2009
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Date: Sat, 1 Aug 2009 16:36:34 -0700
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From: Jocelyn Campbell <jocecampbell@gmail.com>
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Here's a brief article on "compostable plastic" which includes a few other
excellent links
http://blog.oregonlive.com/pdxgreen/2009/03/just_the_facts_about_compostab.html.
The link labeled "biodegradable conundrum" mentions plastic bags among many
other items that supposedly biodegrade. Another link is a flier by
Portland's Bureau of Planning and Sustainability asking residents NOT to put
biodegradable plastics in with yard waste recycling, and NOT to try
composting them at home. A lot of these conversations are more about plastic
containers and forks than bags, though all seem to be saying that only
industrial composting facilities get hot enough to compost these new
plastics.

On Sat, Aug 1, 2009 at 3:46 PM, Rain Tenaqiya <raincascadia@yahoo.com>wrote:

> I too once tried composting some corn-based biodegradable plastic cups.  I
> decided to indulge myself, for once, and try some out for our commitment
> ceremony four years ago.  The cups can still be found in the compost pile.
> I probably should have tried recycling them.  They are supposed to degrade
> in six months.  It's possible that in a climate with year-round moisture
> (I'm in California) or irrigation and mild temperatures, this would be true,
> but I doubt it.
>
> I got excited, recently, when I heard about polyethylene being made from
> sugarcane ethanol in Brazil.  It would be great to still have water tanks
> and pipe after fossil fuels are depleted, but probably only the rich will be
> able to afford it.  Corn-derived plastics are probably a gimmick, as Larry
> mentioned.
>
>
>
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