Most plastic waste is contaminated. Our new 'nano' recycling tech embraces this messy reality

Phys.org

March 4, 2026

A plastic drinks bottle is one of the most "recyclable" objects in the modern waste stream. It is lightweight and collected in huge volumes. Yet even for this item, the reality of recycling is messy: labels, inks, caps, food residues, colorants and the occasional wrong plastic all get bundled together. The chemistry may be simple, but the waste is not.