Is burning plastic trash bad for the environment?

Depends on whether you're burning it in a firepit in your back yard (in which case, yes), or burning it in a trash incinerator (in which case, yes, unless the incinerator is recovering energy from the combustion). The reasons not to burn plastic yourself is that some plastics generate harmful materials when burned. read more

Yes any plastic that burn is bad for our environment, it causes a lots of effects to our nature, society and our health. the burning of plastic release styrene that can be absorbed through skin and lungs. Not only you will be exposed to these kind of pollutants but also your neighbor is in risk. read more

The result, detailed in July in the journal Environmental Science & Technology, suggests that burning trash isn’t just bad for human health -- it could pump more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere than had been realized. read more

While environmental activists and the waste management industry disagree about whether the U.S. should burn or bury its trash, all agree that recycling is still the No. 1 disposal option. The EPA promotes a waste reduction hierarchy that encourages reducing waste at its source, then recycling. read more

An estimated 40 to 50 percent of the garbage is made up of carbon by mass, which means that carbon dioxide is the major gas emitted by trash burning. Those emissions are dwarfed by others sources on the global scale, such as cars and power plants, amounting to just 5 percent of total global carbon dioxide emissions. read more