this post was submitted on 13 Dec 2023
209 points (94.8% liked)

Ask Lemmy

26239 readers
1936 users here now

A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions


Rules: (interactive)


1) Be nice and; have funDoxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them


2) All posts must end with a '?'This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?


3) No spamPlease do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.


4) NSFW is okay, within reasonJust remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either [email protected] or [email protected]. NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].


5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions. If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email [email protected]. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.


Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.

Partnered Communities:

Tech Support

No Stupid Questions

You Should Know

Reddit

Jokes

Ask Ouija


Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu


founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

Plastic seals food, sterile medical implements, medicine, beverages, etc... it's seems like plastic is used as a way to seal things safely. Post pandemic rising, I see even more. My work used to be have plastic utensils in the cafeteria, for example, an already wasteful thing. Now, post-2020, every fork, knife, and spoon is individually wrapped in a plastic wrapper. I feel like the more my desire to escape plastic intensifies, the more plastic I see all around me everywhere.

How can we get away from plastic as a safety layer?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 27 points 9 months ago (7 children)

So many things are unnecessarily wrapped in plastic. We use bubble wrap in situations where paper would be a perfectly fine buffer for shipping. We use plastic bags when paper and reusable bags work perfectly well.

I get so frustrated about it not even because I'm scared of the environmental impact of all this plastic floating around, although that does suck, but because plastic is currently absolutely crucial for modern medicine. One day maybe we'll find alternatives but until then I think a rational society would be preserving the limited life-saving miracle material for uses that aren't as basic as "use it to take home groceries, then throw it away."

[–] [email protected] 9 points 9 months ago (6 children)

the same issue is happening with helium. its crucial for a lot of forensic processes and scientific research but we are rapidly running out of helium. but haha balloon go up!

[–] blanketswithsmallpox 9 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (3 children)

This has never been true. The 'great helium shortage' was just complaining about not being able to get cheap helium.

We are more than capable at capturing it from fracking and other sources. We just didn't want to since it costs money lol.

Why the news ran with it for years is beyond me when it was one google search away from being debunked lol.

https://www.innovationnewsnetwork.com/how-helium-gas-obtained/32109/

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I thought fracking was extremely harmful to the environment. Whatever other sources there are might be ok though?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

It's not particularly worse compared to any other form of hydrocarbon extractions

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments (3 replies)
load more comments (3 replies)