this post was submitted on 21 Jul 2024
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Discussion of climate, how it is changing, activism around that, the politics, and the energy systems change we need in order to stabilize things.

As a starting point, the burning of fossil fuels, and to a lesser extent deforestation and release of methane are responsible for the warming in recent decades: Graph of temperature as observed with significant warming, and simulated without added greenhouse gases and other anthropogentic changes, which shows no significant warming

How much each change to the atmosphere has warmed the world: IPCC AR6 Figure 2 - Thee bar charts: first chart: how much each gas has warmed the world. About 1C of total warming. Second chart: about 1.5C of total warming from well-mixed greenhouse gases, offset by 0.4C of cooling from aerosols and negligible influence from changes to solar output, volcanoes, and internal variability. Third chart: about 1.25C of warming from CO2, 0.5C from methane, and a bunch more in small quantities from other gases. About 0.5C of cooling with large error bars from SO2.

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Does ‘compostable’ plastic actually break down? Here’s what to know. (www.washingtonpost.com)
submitted 4 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[–] [email protected] 16 points 4 months ago (3 children)

Certainly not in your home composter. You need heat >~145F for extended periods, your typical home composter only hits those temps for a short period of time because of how small they are. I've seen anecdotal home experiments on those really loud Sun Chip bags that are supposed to be compostable and they last for 1-2 years in home composters.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 4 months ago

I thought this was meant to be the difference between biodegradable and compostable?

Biodegradable will degrade in an industrial composter, compostable will do so in the compost bin in your back garden.

Pay/reg walled from the article so didn't actually read it....

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

I put a “compostable” plastic cup in my home composter once and watched it go round and round through the thing over and over again for years, still virginal in its plastic cup shape with everything else decaying around it into dirt

I have no way of knowing whether my composter was unable to achieve the right conditions or the claim was just a bunch of shit, but I know which is my feeling

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago (3 children)

What is this 'home composter' you speak of? Like a bin with soil and worms?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Probably something like this:

https://lomi.com/

The reviews I’ve seen on YouTube show it breaking down biodegradable plastic. So I guess it makes a difference which electric composter you buy.

If your city has curbside composting, I bet the straws would do just fine. And I’m sure they degrade better than petroleum plastics in the landfill. “Don’t make perfect the enemy of good.”

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

Wow I had no idea such a thing existed. We do have city compost pickup but I've been wanting to make a worm compost bin just haven't looked into it

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

You can do it that way, but it's not optimal.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

We have one of these at home