Good article on plastic downcycling.
The inconvenient truth is that plastic can never be truly recycled. A more accurate statement is that plastic can be downcycled. Downcycling is the process of converting waste materials or useless products into new materials or products of lesser quality and reduced functionality. For example, clear drinks bottles and food packaging made of polyethylene terephthalate can be downcycled into fabrics such as fleece, strapping and carpets; but cannot be recycled into clear drinks bottles or food packaging of the original quality.
