We always believe that design is an "arbitrary door" to solve real problems, have the illusion of the present and the future, and lead to a better world "...

Crossing the ocean is a very romantic word, but it would be a bit scary if crossing the ocean on cruise ships, hiding in seafood, sea salt or even sea water and turning into particles to "enter" plastic garbage.

Fortunately, since the "garbage ban" 2018 by China, the Philippines and Malaysia have also refused to accept "foreign garbage" one after another, thus opening the veil of "civilization" in developed countries such as Britain, the United States, Australia and Japan. Their external windows are bright and clean, and they are based on the environmental pollution of other developing countries.

But without the invasion of foreign garbage, will the world become cleaner?

No.

On the one hand, even if there is no threat of foreign garbage in developing countries, there are still chronic diseases of local garbage; coupled with their relatively backward production technology and the quality of residents who need to be improved, local garbage is doomed to be more difficult to eradicate.

As for the developed countries, without the industrial chain of dumping garbage to developing countries, it is difficult for capitalists to cut meat in a short period of time; what should they do, the garbage can't be left alone all the time? Therefore, there is no way to dump garbage into the ocean, just like so-and-so dumping nuclear pollution into the ocean.

After such a circle, both developing and developed countries are "clean". Who is "dirty?

Landfill, incineration, dumping, oil leakage......

After all, the earth can't speak yet!

Of course, this is only the worst result; after all, global warming and frequent geological disasters have urged us to protect the environment; and based on the further awakening of individuals, organizations, systems, and national environmental awareness, we must have more about humans and ourselves. Confidence.

The implementation of the "Regulations of Shanghai Municipality on the Management of Domestic Waste" next Monday is a microcosm of the "bright sword" of human beings to garbage.

However, "garbage classification" is inevitably one-sided. We need to use a more macro and far-reaching perspective to win this "garbage war", a by-product of economic development ".

Below, we will start from "plastic waste" and "kill Munich" from the three perspectives of yesterday (production), today (production) and future (recycling) of waste ".

(1)
Garbage cut off supply
○

In 1907, the "father of plastics" American Belgian chemist Leo Beckland invented the first high-temperature resistant pure artificial synthetic material: phenolic plastic; after more than 20 years, a variety of plastics from all over the world The emergence of laboratories, polystyrene for packaging, nylon for silk stockings, polyethylene for plastic, etc.

Due to its low cost of production and strong plasticity, this new material quickly invaded our daily life after the Second World War. 9% recycling, 12% incineration, nearly 80% landfill and sea, 400 years of degradation; Plastic waste has been everywhere.

Faced with such an extreme situation, how can we effectively reduce the "supply" of garbage?

First: Accelerate the development of new materials, or find alternative materials as soon as possible.

The research and development of new materials may not be a one-day plan, but alternative materials can seek breakthroughs.

Central St. Martin Materials Futures Master @ Mi Zhou consulted soap craftsman Yanhao Shi and soap industry expert Luis Spitz to replace disposable plastic packaging with bottles and cans made of soap.

Second: Supervise and encourage relevant manufacturers to implement "green" production as soon as possible

According to the Sun, in September this year, Coca-Cola's Sprite will give up its 58-year-old iconic green bottle and replace all the iconic green bottles with transparent plastic bottles that are easier to recycle. Make the recycling of snowy bottles easier.

At the same time, Coca-Cola also promised to use 50% recycled plastic in Sprite plastic bottles by early 2020.

Third: put an end to excessive packaging, even to the convenience of the structure itself

Professor Chen Haoran of Fudan University Law School mentioned the phenomenon of "packing 120 grams of tea with 2.5 kilograms of redundancy", although a bit extreme, it is by no means an example. We need to further standardize.

However, how to "redesign" the structural packaging of the goods after over-packaging is a good test of the designer's skills. The above is a small design "spin self-locking" structure on Corona cans.

Fourth: Increase the publicity of garbage plastics and urge everyone to reduce the frequency of use.

The Spanish artist Pejac showed the "art of the end" on the Seine River in Paris last October, garbage surrounded the sea.

Pejac's doomsday art may be a bit obscure, and the WWF environmental poster is much more straightforward: you ate a credit card in a week.

We should not only use artistic means, but also use science to remind everyone of the harm of plastic waste.

②
Garbage interception
○

Whether it is new materials, new manufacturing, new packaging, or new publicity, it is the use of substitutes, green materials, new concepts or environmental awareness before plastic waste is produced, it is an attempt to "eliminate" the production and export of plastic waste from the source.

When users "hate plastic", businesses will naturally use new materials or green materials, and designers will rack their brains to find more exquisite "poor garbage packaging".

What should I do with the garbage that has been generated?

One is more diversified plastic packaging paid recycling, and policies to encourage entrepreneurs to recycle garbage.

The other is to increase the price of plastic packaging, which makes users feel that it is not cost-effective, just like plastic bags with 3 cents and 5 cents in supermarkets. Or set up some "obstacles" for plastic packaging so that users can voluntarily abandon excess plastic packaging.

Just like an independent grocery store in Vancouver called "East and West Market" decided to print "adult color film hypermarket" on the bag and take the initiative to black itself.

However, these methods can be superimposed, as long as the publicity is proper, it is not excessive. Targeted recycling & unique packaging & higher prices can be a win-win situation.

As for the garbage that has already flowed into the ocean, we can use more cleaning equipment like System 001 (invented by Boyan Slat, then 18).

A little further, just like Liu Cixin's "Chinese Sun" has a "mirror farmer", why can't the ocean today have a "sea scavenger" and turn cleaning up marine garbage and rescuing marine life into a profession, or even an interest?

Of course, in the coming 5G era, low latency can even help us control remote devices thousands of miles away to clean up garbage. On this basis, open source and competition encourage everyone to manufacture and program to generate more "excellent" intelligent machines. Isn't it more thoughtful than letting robots fight.

(3)
Garbage open source
○

Although not every kind of garbage is a misplaced resource, most garbage has room for recycling.

For example, toys made of plastic waste, furniture, park benches, amusement park facilities and even fashion.

The above is H & M's new environmental protection outfit introduced in 2017, 30% marine garbage and 70% plastic bottles. When the supermodel is NataliaVodianova, it looks like a perfect artwork.

Of course, it is inevitable that the fashion industry will promote "environmentally friendly new clothes", but after the fashionable "golden finger", who said that recycling garbage is a kind of "inferior" material?

After correcting this discrimination, plastic waste can glow with a "second spring" in the hands of designers ".

Of course, the above is to pour into the new soul and body after trying to "molecular" garbage, which seems to return to the original state of garbage production, but this time it can choose to "be a good person".

So, is there any other social effect of garbage?

Today's cultural relics are not only the reality show "National Treasure", but also the spokesperson they have delineated. So why can't the garbage industry have its own "talk show" and preacher?

For example, open an official number on the tremolo to "step on the snow to find plum" for all kinds of garbage. Or select city civilization ambassadors, streets, community ambassadors or something; Moreover, we can also place some bulletin boards in the community, which list the lowest-ranking residents of the month. We don't need to name the photos, but only need to mark the floor and house number. There are negative and positive, the civilized pacesetter.

Naturally, this punishment and reward is not for "humiliation", but to cultivate the residents' awareness of community civilization and use collective supervision to enhance everyone's awareness of garbage delivery. The most important thing is that after this bulletin board comes out, we can improve the civilized quality of residents in a targeted way (raise the head and eliminate the tail); Moreover, we need to investigate the reasons for "not changing after repeated teaching, and help them" correct "their behavior.

In this way, there is also an invisible advantage: the things that residents do not need and cannot eat are likely to be shared in time; it can virtually "condense" everyone's neighbors into a whole.

And this is perhaps the most glorious "mission" of garbage ".

It took us more than ten years to complete the feat of garbage not falling to the ground. It is too anxious to complete garbage classification in three months.

But now that we have begun to "declare war" on garbage, we cannot be lenient; "garbage sorting" is just a flare, it is only the beginning, not the end; we need to use more, more three-dimensional, and more efficient auxiliary means to help this policy Implementation.

This requires us to curb garbage yesterday when it has not yet been produced, divide it today when garbage has been produced, and then train it tomorrow after garbage collection. Only in this way can we realize the "poor garbage society" earlier before the developed countries and communism ".

So far, only in the name of design, I have presented a hymn to a beautiful world.

PS:

The header diagram comes from the Pugiotto with the Behance author @ Alessandro

Part of the material comes from @ colossal @ Top Copy @ Digital English Network @ Tiger Smell