For this debrief of the Cash Investigation number “Waste: the great illusion (replay), Elise Lucet is surrounded by Claire Tesson who carried out the survey, Gregory Huet, the journalist who got hired in the sorting center, and Sophie Le Gall to the editor-in-chief.
Gabriel (Marne)> Is sorting your waste still useful today?
Elise Lucet> Yes, Gabriel, sorting your waste is essential. This gives new life to plastic. And even if you sort certain packaging that is not yet recyclable, manufacturers thus have the materials available to experiment and develop, in the future, large-scale recycling solutions. But recycling is not the silver bullet. What is needed is first to reduce our waste at the source. When shopping, replace plastic with glass when you can, avoid over-packaged products, and buy in bulk.
Emma (Puy-de-Dôme)> Which plastics are really recyclable ?
Claire Tesson> If we are talking about plastic food packaging, there are three main families that are currently recycled. Do you want a little tip to find your way around? When you do your shopping, thanks to this little logo with a number, you can know what type of plastic it is and, therefore, whether or not the packaging you buy will really be recycled once it is put in the trash. yellow.
First there is polyethylene terephthalate, PET. Its symbol is the number 1. These are bottles of water, soda or milk, for example. Then high density polyethylene, HDPE. It is the number 2. It is found on detergent bottles or shampoo bottles. And finally, polypropylene or PP. It is the number 5. It is about the punnets of butter, in particular.
> The winning trifecta for recyclable plastics is therefore 1, 2 and 5. And for other plastics?
Sophie Le Gall> Be careful with the number 4. These are food films and some plastic bags. For the moment, there is no recycling channel. Finally, there is the famous polystyrene in our yoghurt pots, it is the number 6. And as we saw in our survey, its recycling in France is almost non-existent. So, a little advice: keep an eye out when you do your shopping!
GM (Saône-et-Loire)> Why not use glass packaging for yoghurts?
Claire Tesson> In fact, the best waste is the one that is not produced, and even if glass is endlessly recycled, it is a material that is heavy. Its transport has a significant carbon footprint. That is to say, it emits a lot of greenhouse gases. The best solution is therefore to make your own yoghurts. It’s ecological and it doesn’t cost a lot. For that, you need a liter of milk, a yogurt from a previous batch or a store-bought yogurt. Mix everything and pour into your yogurt pots. And hop, eleven o’clock in the yogurt maker. After a few hours in the refrigerator, you can enjoy.
Clement (Chinon) > Why not force us to work in a sorting center for a week? Perhaps having our noses in our own waste would make us think about the subject?
Gregory Huet> It is true that spending seven hours a day in front of a sorting belt, I hallucinated. First on the mass of waste we had to deal with. It makes you think about our consumption of packaged or overwrapped products. And then I was also very surprised to see that we found everything and anything on the sorting mats: baby diapers, animal corpses or dangerous objects, where we should only have packaging. The machines do a first sorting, but they are not infallible and the workers are there to correct mistakes. So, sorting your waste well is an ecological gesture, but it is also a civic gesture for the workers who collect our waste at the end of the chain.
Khédoudja (Carpentras)> Is it true that our plastic waste is sent to Asia to be recycled?
Elise Lucet> Yes, it has been for a long time. But in recent years, Asian countries have become much more careful about the waste entering their territory. As a result, it is now to Turkey that poor quality, non-recyclable plastics from Europe are exported. A figure: in 2018, according to the United Nations, plastic waste sent to Turkey increased by nearly 70%.
> And is this waste recycled?
Sophie Le Gall> Unfortunately not all of them. As with the waste that was sent to Asia, it is often burned in illegal dumps. It is a disaster for the environment and for the residents, because toxic fumes can present serious health risks.
Angélique (Pas-de-Calais)> Bravo for the Besançon composting initiative. Why does this not exist everywhere in France?
Elise Lucet> The initiative of the City of Besançon made more than one react. Why is it not generalized? It is above all a political choice of local elected officials. The Besançon experience has also been followed. Other municipalities have been inspired by it, such as some in the Gard or Vendée, which are also in the process of implementing this levy which encourages citizens to reduce the weight of their bins.
> What are the others waiting for?
Sophie Le Gall> Often, municipalities have invested heavily in incineration. It is therefore complicated to backtrack. Between construction, maintenance and regular upgrades, an incinerator is expensive. This is so much less money for the prevention and reduction of upstream waste.
Gégé (Hauts-de-France)> Leaks are numerous on methanizers, what about their impact on greenhouse gases?
Claire Tesson > It is true that methane leaks are frequent. We were able to see it during our shooting in Germany, with this engineer during an inspection. Look at these images, shot with an infrared camera. You can clearly see the methane leaks. These are the areas in red. And methane is a powerful greenhouse gas. It has an impact on global warming at least 25 times greater than CO2. According to the calculations of Daniel Chateigner and his team, 4% of leaks in a methanizer would therefore be enough to cancel out the ecological interest of the installation.
Extract from “Waste: the great illusion”, an investigation by Claire Tesson broadcast Thursday, November 11, 2021 on France 2.
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