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The-Last-Lion-Turtle t1_isjsov4 wrote

Reply to comment by Hawk---- in Australian research finds cost-effective way to recycle solar panels | Recycling by DrDaleks

China is having an ewaste crisis with heavy metal pollution in their ground water, because their "recycling" is really just getting paid by other countries to dump it somewhere else.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25242606/

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lacergunn t1_isk8yp9 wrote

If it's in groundwater, you can harvest the metals back up by engineering plants with genes from the ZIP family.

ZIP genes are responsible for metal uptake in plants, and with proper modification they can be made to pull raw metals out of groundwater, both repairing the local ecosystem and allowing the metals to be harvested for further use.

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I really need to put a lab together.

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WetNoodlyArms t1_iskas89 wrote

Can I come work in your lab when you're up and running? Sounds fun.

I'm off to research ZIP genes

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The-Last-Lion-Turtle t1_iskiwrb wrote

Heavy metals or just typical ones like iron and copper?

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lacergunn t1_iskj67n wrote

Heavy metals, yeah. Silver, mercury, lead, nickel, cadmium, there's even a few naturally occurring species that can pick up Uranium

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kmcclry t1_isjzq76 wrote

And that's why they closed importing recycling from other countries so many places in the US are getting rid of their recycling containers because it's all going to a landfill anyways.

"Reduce" and "reuse" are the only parts of the motto that are relevant anymore.

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The-Last-Lion-Turtle t1_isk06gy wrote

Recycling is definitely relevant, it's just the primary problem is infrastructure not getting individual people to use a different colored bin.

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St0nks_Only_Go_Up t1_isq1arw wrote

Plenty of people recycle. In fact too many people recycle. Plants are over loaded and cannot process all the recycled waste so they send it to a landfill. Many things are impossible to recycle anyways like plastic film and Styrofoam.

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