As a kid, I went door to door collecting cans to earn some pocket change. Today, I still take pride in recycling. I slice cardboard boxes down to size each Sunday, and make sure every viable plastic container winds up in my family’s recycling bins. Sometimes I even pull cellophane windows out of paper envelopes, just in case it’ll save a tree someday.
In other words: I’m nearly the perfect customer for Clear Drop’s Soft Plastic Compactor, a gadget that turns all your unrecyclable plastic shopping bags, mailers, food packaging, and bubble wrap into a 3-pound brick that doesn’t need to be trashed.
By bricking your plastic, the company claims it’ll no longer jam recycling equipment the way individual plastic bags often do. Just feed your plastics into this 61-pound bin and watch them magically disappear into its whirring slot. Wait for it to spit out a brick weeks later, drop it into a supplied bag, and let the US Postal Service whisk your guilt away.
If only it were that easy!
I’m Sean Hollister, and I’ve spent over a month with the Clear Drop system. My colleague, senior science reporter Justine Calma, has interrogated what happens to the bricks after that. Neither of us is fully convinced. The machine is clunky, the service pricey, and it may not even be a net positive for the environment.
Like Juicero, the ill-fated $700 juice squeezing machine where humans could squeeze the juice pouches with their bare hands instead, I fear they haven’t thought this trash-squeezing machine through. Justine and I worry these tools might even encourage people to consume more disposable plastic — like Ryan A, a “verified buyer” of the Clear Drop, suggested three months ago:
“Now I can get some products I’d otherwise avoid because if [sic] packaging and its like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders.” Image: Clear Drop website
But unlike Juicero, this isn’t a solution in search of a problem. The problem exists. For a month, I really did have a way to keep plastic out of the landfill, and I feel guiltier than ever now I’m throwing that plastic back in the trash.
The slot where you insert plastic.
How Clear Drop worked for me
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