The Styrofoam takeout container scam

The other day I went to 677 Prime with work, and had a very nice steak dinner that I managed to choke on and take a big piece of cowboy steak home in a doggie bag, or whatever those fancy restaurants call it. I was given a takeaway container made out of non-blown soild polystyrene, Number 6 plastic, the lawful alternative to blown Styrofoam containers that have been banned in recent years in the state as part of the many green initiatives, of mixed virtues.

I glanced at the resin code, as I often do, before chucking things into the fire the other night. Number 6, though watching the now garbage container melt and burn, there was the distinctive smell and black smoke of poorly combusting polystyrene. The hydrocarbon rich black smoke, the inevitable dioxins and furans. While I am sure the politicians like to pretend that polystyrene is recycled, not that it happens that often all.

Most garbage gets smashed into earth, landfilled as the euthanism is said. Produced, used up quickly discarded. Inevitably some of it gets burned in municipal furnaces, burn barrels and other trash fires, but let’s be realistic. I don’t get take out food very much, actually almost never, but it still is popular. Recycling except for very few materials like certain metals and a handful of plastics is mostly a lie. But I did enjoy the remaining Cowboy steak with eggs for dinner, even if I didn’t totally agree with the fake polystyrene container being more green then the generic Styrofoam containers now banned.