How can we dispose of plastic without burning it ?

[4MyEgo]

I live in a rural area where everyone burns everything, i.e. no garbage disposal yet because no one wants to pay for it, yep, I know.

 

Anyway, we separate our stuff best we can and the wife takes the rubbish and recyclable stuff to her land up the road, her dad burns the rubbish in the 44 gallon drum and sells the recycled stuff, that said, I want to do my part in stopping them from burning the rubbish in the plastic bags that they collect from within the house, i.e. kitchen, bathrooms and now empty the contents of the plastic bags that the rubbish is in, into a big black bin to be carted to the land, emptied into the 44 gallon drum and then burnt, I know it defeats the purpose, i.e. burning rubbish, but it's a start, i.e. no burning of plastic in any form or shape.

 

I am interested to hear of any positive information that may assist in reducing the burning of plastic and or rubbish for that matter and at the same time be educating our kids on this.

 

Back home the garbo's would collect it and it would go and get dumped in a huge hole and when full, filled over with soil, and grass laid, this could be a solution, naturally without the plastic or plastic bags going in, or am I dreaming ?

Edited January 6, 2020 by 4MyEgo

[Expat Brad]

I too live in a rural area of Chiangmai so, l understand your pain. The Pu Yai has after 2 years managed to get a rubbish collection service up and running. The sad thing is that out of nearly 200 homes, only 60 have signed up for it. The reason given that they cannot afford it, at 80 baht per month!!! That means that those remaining 140 will continue to burn everything including plastics or dump it in the hills or as one local proudly stated to me "l dump mine in the river"

At our home we keep our plastic and glass and sell to someone. Kitchen waste we compost. 

Pu Yai also tried setting up a parcel of land for them to dump green garden waste to be then processed into mulch. Unfortunately the locals dumped everything else there as well so, project failed. 

How to educate this lot...... No answer!!!

I once placed fallen leaves around some trees in the garden as mulch. I went out, came back...... all gone and burnt!!! I asked why? and they said "dirty" 

I don't know what they will do when this years burning ban comes in. More than likely mass dumpings in the hills!!!!

[4MyEgo]

4 minutes ago, Expat Brad said:

I don't know what they will do when this years burning ban comes in.

Thanks for your input, a sad story, but a common one no doubt.

 

Could you elaborate on the burning ban, I thought it was already in place everywhere, but everyone just does as they please, especially as night falls ?

[TigerandDog]

Surely there is a recycling centre in your district where you can take the plastic & other recyclable items and get paid by the kg to drop them off. Where I am we have recycling centres springing up all around our district and get paid reasonable money per kg to leave it with them. 

[Black arab]

Same problem phu yai told everyone to burn their rubbish.

We recycle as much as we can and sell it , but plastic bags wraps tissues etc is burnt. All our food peelings or waste is given to the dogs or the ducks.

[4MyEgo]

1 minute ago, TigerandDog said:

Surely there is a recycling centre in your district where you can take the plastic & other recyclable items and get paid by the kg to drop them off. Where I am we have recycling centres springing up all around our district and get paid reasonable money per kg to leave it with them. 

The father in law takes the recycle items and rubbish we give him on my wife's land, he burns the rubbish along with his families stuff in the 44 gallon drum and sells the recyclable stuff to the man when he comes by, but he doesn't want everything, he is selective, that said, plastic bags, sister in laws babies nappies x 2 kids, etc etc have to be disposed of, and I don't want them burnt, so what we have done is now collect what the recycle guy does not take and are looking at other ways of disposing them as opposed to the father in law just burning them, it is not a proper solution, it's just laziness, especially with the nappies, one kid is 6, seriously still on nappies and drinking milk from the bottle at night, what is wrong with people.

 

The above said, I think it best we get a tractor in to dig a hole deep enough to throw that kind of stuff in while we try our best to reduce purchasing plastic items moving forward as it just adds to the already bigger worldwide problem, got to start somewhere and teach the kids at the same time.

 

I know it's not a bullet proof solution, but waiting for someone to come up with an ingenious idea, but Google hasn't found anyone, maybe they are hiding here on TVF, step up man ????

 

[HHTel]

1 hour ago, 4MyEgo said:

Thanks for your input, a sad story, but a common one no doubt.

 

Could you elaborate on the burning ban, I thought it was already in place everywhere, but everyone just does as they please, especially as night falls ?

I don't believe there is a national ban on burning.  The bans we hear about are local bans, Chang Mai for example, at certain times of the year.  

There is a ban on lighting fires within a distance from a highway, 100 metres I believe.

 

29 minutes ago, TigerandDog said:

Surely there is a recycling centre in your district where you can take the plastic & other recyclable items and get paid by the kg to drop them off. Where I am we have recycling centres springing up all around our district and get paid reasonable money per kg to leave it with them. 

The problem is that 'single use' plastic (less than 36 microns) cannot be recycled in Thailand which is why it becomes flotsam finishing up in the klongs and eventually in the sea.  Recycling those bags requires special machinery and there are none in Thailand.

[samuttodd]

I wonder if it could be shredded and then used as inert material in compost or just as fill?

[Scott Tracy]

Pyrolysis is a way of disposal of plastic. It can be an expensive method, but has benefit of producing fuels. Composting of organic matter is important, as landfill can produce methane, a greenhouse gas and a constituent of cooking gas.

Old cooking oils can be used and turned into biodiesel. Bio char is another use of organic matter.

Incomplete combustion causes most smoke and polution, this is due to lack of air to the fire. A proper burn bin, with a blower connected will eradicate that. 

[farmerjo]

2 hours ago, Expat Brad said:

The reason given that they cannot afford it, at 80 baht per month!!!

They must of heard a lot of country cousins are only paying 10 baht a month for their service.

[marquis22]

3 minutes ago, farmerjo said:

They must of heard a lot of country cousins are only paying 10 baht a month for their service.

A few pay 0

[unblocktheplanet]

The whole cycle of public responsibility, caring for our communities, starts with...hm, EDUCATION! Bear in mind, there are effective alternatives to plastic, such as cloth bags, cloth nappies & washing them YOURSELF!

 

These are far too inconvenient for most people. Plastic bags are gone but take-home food still comes in plastic boxes! (Damned convenient for leftovers, I might add! In our house, they get reused dozens of times until we fill them with something to potluck with friends.)

 

Thais (and the rest of us who live here) are going to die of suffocation & microplastics. Those are terrible ways to croak. But, honestly, the earth is better rid of us! (Yeah, gripers, starting with me!)

[Expat Brad]

22 hours ago, 4MyEgo said:

Thanks for your input, a sad story, but a common one no doubt.

 

Could you elaborate on the burning ban, I thought it was already in place everywhere, but everyone just does as they please, especially as night falls ?

Our village does not have a ban at present. They did last year though.

[Expat Brad]

20 hours ago, farmerjo said:

They must of heard a lot of country cousins are only paying 10 baht a month for their service.

The 80 baht included the cost of the large black plastic bags for the rubbish.

[farmerjo]

Well one thing is there not making it as robust as before.

Opened my eyes what to store stuff in now.

 

 

[tgw]

On 1/7/2020 at 2:07 PM, Expat Brad said:

I too live in a rural area of Chiangmai so, l understand your pain. The Pu Yai has after 2 years managed to get a rubbish collection service up and running. The sad thing is that out of nearly 200 homes, only 60 have signed up for it. The reason given that they cannot afford it, at 80 baht per month!!!

well, those lottery tickets aren't for free you know...

[Lacessit]

CSIRO in Australia has come up with a pickup-mounted unit that converts plastic into diesel fuel. I suppose the only thing preventing its distribution in Asia is  - it wasn't invented here. Face strikes again.

[canopy]

On 1/7/2020 at 4:59 PM, unblocktheplanet said:

The whole cycle of public responsibility, caring for our communities, starts with...hm, EDUCATION!

I have been in rural Thailand long enough to recognize awareness and education don't work here. If you don't think so try educating one person, show them the light, and see what happens. Will they become a glimmering light of hope and an example of what can be achieved or will they blow smoke in your face and say what a fool you are behind your back? Thailand needs to bypass the awareness and education song and dance and go straight to the end game of tough laws that are enforced vigorously. There is no other way. The sooner people recognize this the better.

 

Bear in mind, there are effective alternatives to plastic, such as cloth bags, cloth nappies & washing them YOURSELF!

 

Food containers are the majority of what takes up space in landfills and in our generation these containers are all plastic and we have no control over this. Laundry detergent comes in a plastic bag now, not a cardboard box. Eggs come in plastic containers, not papyrus. And so on and so forth. Education and awareness won't change this either. There needs to be a law that anything sold in stores must come in packaging that is either recyclable or compostable. That means generally there will be no waste needing picked up. And oversize packaging trying to fool the consumer into thinking they are getting more should be banned completely. The way things are now we have no control over the major problems and it's just going to get worse in our lifetime.

 

I am also in one of those villages with no garbage service and the village chief just loves burning his plastic like everyone else. Speaking for myself

whatever I can't compost or recycle I haul to public dumpsters 50km away. I don't expect this to catch on with anyone and I don't care. I do what I think is right but have no illusions the masses will continue their polluting ways as they please throwing the trash everywhere and burning everything. Enforcement, not education is the only way to solve this and it would go away real quickly.