Reduce wrapping, reduce waste: Cut plastic to save money and the environment

For a decade now, the metal, glass and plastic that New Yorkers put in blue recycling bins at their homes for pickup by the Sanitation Department has been taken by truck or barge to the privately-run plant in Brooklyn on the Sunset Park waterfront operated by Sims on a long-term contract with the city.

The facility is open for tours and it is a fascinating process to watch, with the only smell being a slight sweet odor. The automated plant sorts and separates the refuse by smashing glass, using magnets to pull out ferrous metals and sorts the different densities, compositions and colors of hard plastics (look on the bottom of a container to see the various designations) with lasers and precisely aimed blasts of air. The recovered metal, glass and plastic is then sent to its next stop on the way to be reused.

The main waste product of the Sims plant are bales of filmy, thin plastics, like dry cleaner bags. It can’t be recycled and is designated for expensive landfills to be buried forever. That is bad for the city’s budget and bad for the environment.

With the welcome citywide expansion of organic collection (brown bins) joining with paper (green bins) and metal, glass and plastic (blue bins), the remaining black bag garbage will be made of nonrecyclable items like those same thin plastics that Sims rejects that are used for wrapping or bags. There’s a bill in Albany to encourage manufacturers to curb their use of this plastic packaging material and it should pass.

Sponsored by majorities in both houses (34 of 63 senators and 76 of 150 members in the Assembly), the Packaging Reduction and Recycling Infrastructure Act should be approved before the Legislature ends its session June 6.

Mayor Adams and the City Council don’t always agree, but they are united on backing this bill and the mayor’s sanitation commissioner, Jessie Tisch, has been pushing for its adoption. The projected savings for her agency is $150 million. Maine, Oregon, Colorado and California have similar laws in place

One of the arguments against the legislation is that it would be the end of individually plastic-wrapped slices of American cheese. Whether the orangey squares are labeled “pasteurized prepared cheese product” or “pasteurized process cheese product,” they can use a thin sheet of paper to separate the singles, and unlike a plastic wrapper, that paper can be thrown in the brown organic collection bin.

The consumer doesn’t suffer while the Sanitation Department sees reduced costs and is spared tons of waste being trucked to distant landfills.

More than a half century ago, in 1967’s “The Graduate,” the opening scene party guest Mr. McGuire pulls aside hero Ben Braddock.

McGuire: I just want to say one word to you. Just one word.

Ben: Exactly how do you mean?

McGuire: There’s a great future in plastics. Think about it. Will you think about it?

Mr. McGuire was right; plastics are great, but not all plastics are the same. Pass this bill and let’s cut back on some of the plastics that we don’t need.