End of Life Plans

[lunamoth]

Not for people, but for products. I read this idea in a fiction novella. Every product must be accompanied by an end of life plan for how it (or any packaging) is disposed of/recycled/returned to the manufacturing stream. Mandated by law that anything manufactured and sold includes an approved plan, and that consumers abide by the plan.

Seems like a good idea. Would it work?

 

[angellous_evangellous]

It would work if that were the only way that we could purchase goods.

 

[lunamoth]

It would work if that were the only way that we could purchase goods.

That was how it was in the novella - illegal to buy or sell anything without an ELP, illegal to not comply with the ELP after your bought something. Obviously much more advanced systems of recycling/recovery/detoxification/disposal were also in place.

 

[sandandfoam]

We've something like that here. If we buy an electrical item like a TV there's a mandatory charge and the retailer has to take your old one off you if you want.

 

[lunamoth]

We've something like that here. If we buy an electrical item like a TV there's a mandatory charge and the retailer has to take your old one off you if you want.

That sounds like a good start. It would be something that evolves, but there will not be evolution in this direction unless either we have intent ahead of necessity (to avoid future suffering), or present suffering presses it upon us.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

That was how it was in the novella - illegal to buy or sell anything without an ELP, illegal to not comply with the ELP after your bought something. Obviously much more advanced systems of recycling/recovery/detoxification/disposal were also in place.

After I wrote that, I thought that if we could have an infrastructure rebuilt to handle this project, we can demand that manufacturers make their product easy for recycling/recovery/detoxification/disposal. That is, all the parts in a computer that go to different recycling places (wiring, screen, etc) can be removed and thrown in the recycling bin to be sorted at the plant.

Heck, we should just be able to throw anything in the recycling bin and workers at the plant can sort.

The government would simply have to mandate that everything be made of 100% recyclable material by a certain year.

 

[lunamoth]

After I wrote that, I thought that if we could have an infrastructure rebuilt to handle this project, we can demand that manufacturers make their product easy for recycling/recovery/detoxification/disposal. That is, all the parts in a computer that go to different recycling places (wiring, screen, etc) can be removed and thrown in the recycling bin to be sorted at the plant.

Heck, we should just be able to throw anything in the recycling bin and workers at the plant can sort.

The government would simply have to mandate that everything be made of 100% recyclable material by a certain year.

Makes sense to me.

What keeps us from doing this?

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Makes sense to me.

What keeps us from doing this?

Laziness.

Companies would have to find new materials and new manufacturing techniques, both of which could cost a LOT of money. And these costs would be passed on to the consumer. Both of these points are good reasons why companies demand to keep doing what they are doing and we listen to them.

The sad part about all this is lack of innovation. Companies are trying to do what they do better rather than radically seeking new ways of conceptualizing their product, which is not a good set-up for discovery.

That is, if companies did seek to make their products 100% recyclable, they might find new materials they could substitute for other items - like plastic, for example.