> Instead it is very energy intensive to produce and transport, much more so than plastic.
Have you checked how much energy it takes to produce plastic? You can start with sourcing and refining oil. Economies of scale help it be cheaper, but so they would for glass.
Have you checked recyclability of plastic? It can only be recycled a few times, and it degrades every time becoming unsuitable for use in, say, food packaging much earlier. Glass, on the other hand, has virtually infinite uses, which if factored into the cost brings it down even further.
For transportation, sure. I have made the same argument, if it is more expensive to transport then it will cost more. However, many products are not transported large distances and are made somewhat locally, and even if I only look at products (e.g., drinks) made in the same (pretty small) country still 99% of them are bottled in plastic.
> broken glass is a mess to clean up
You beat me here, (micro/nano) plastic definitely isn’t a mess to clean up.
Did you read it? I did, in fact I remember encountering it back when it was originally published.
Article’s conclusion is that glass “may be equally as detrimental to the environment as plastic”, not “plastic wins”.
Their primary sources are something about regulation-violating mining of silica in India, and a UK paper that seems to claim glass may be more harmful because it takes more energy to produce and recycle (their “environmental impact” includes “potential to deplete fossil fuels”, I suppose they didn’t consider that green energy can be used). Funnily enough, even by such standards the UK paper admits on page 59 that glass bottles would be less harmful than plastic if they were reused (which single-use plastic bottles simply can’t be) in addition to being recycled.
Have you checked how much energy it takes to produce plastic? You can start with sourcing and refining oil. Economies of scale help it be cheaper, but so they would for glass.
Have you checked recyclability of plastic? It can only be recycled a few times, and it degrades every time becoming unsuitable for use in, say, food packaging much earlier. Glass, on the other hand, has virtually infinite uses, which if factored into the cost brings it down even further.
For transportation, sure. I have made the same argument, if it is more expensive to transport then it will cost more. However, many products are not transported large distances and are made somewhat locally, and even if I only look at products (e.g., drinks) made in the same (pretty small) country still 99% of them are bottled in plastic.
> broken glass is a mess to clean up
You beat me here, (micro/nano) plastic definitely isn’t a mess to clean up.