Extrusion Basics: What Thanksgiving Leftovers Can Teach Us About Plastic Scrap

I hope you’ve saved the insides of the pumpkins you carved for Hallowe’en and will use them to replace other foods. That’s my way of saying SOS: Save our scrap. Plastic material — pellets, powder, or scrap product — is the “food” of our processes, and saving waste is seldom debated. But the economic angle must be remembered — it’s not just “out of sight, out of mind.” It must be stored cleanly and used wisely, just like pumpkin innards and holiday leftovers. Hallowe’en is over, and with it the topic of ghosts and sugar-excesses managed or avoided, so we can look forward to Thanksgiving. We have a lot to be thankful for, but I remind you each year to be grateful for what you don’t have, be it disease or other troubles. If you’re a power-user — you feel more secure when you get people to do things for you — hold off for a day. We power-doers — more secure the more we can do for ourselves — may be helpful anyway.