Is Streaming Music Better for the Planet than Collecting Plastic Discs?

Discussion in 'Audio Hardware' started by gss, Feb 19, 2019.

Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.
  1. gss

    gss Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    New Jersey
    I don't consider myself unnecessarily concerned about the environment, but the amount of plastic pollution that our world generates should be staggering to everyone. Sometimes, I'll look at my record/CD collection - or, walk into a record store - and think, wow, that's a lot of plastic there. Certainly, we all have our listening preferences, but occasionally I'll wonder if streaming music isn't the most responsible way of listening to music in the 21st century.

    However, the answer might be more complicated than you initially think: How streaming music could be harming the planet

    What do you think?
     
  2. docwebb

    docwebb Forum Resident

    CDs and vinyl are recycled....passed on from one music lover to another. Very little winds up in landfills. Oppo and others should keep that in mind.....best to keep making players so discs can continue to be played!
     
    jay.dee, formu_la, longdist01 and 5 others like this.
  3. Optimize

    Optimize Forum Resident

    Location:
    EU
    Each hour there is a lot co2 pollution by servers and giant data centers around the globe polluting.
    So when I go to bed and look at all my physical media as record collection I can sleep well. With knowing that they do not contribute to any pollution while I sleep.
     
  4. Dillydipper

    Dillydipper Space-Age luddite

    Location:
    Central PA
    That all depends...do any of them say, "Nickelback" on it?

    Because unlike collecting pop bottles in my youth...you do not get that nickel back from those. :shake:
     
  5. Spitfire

    Spitfire Senior Member

    Location:
    Pacific Northwest
    I don't think most end users are going to spend any time at all worrying about this
     
    klockwerk, dalem5467, nm_west and 4 others like this.
  6. Rolltide

    Rolltide Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vallejo, CA
    Oppo players are made out of toxic PCB, and manufacturing them definitely has a high carbon footprint.

    (This is a game that can be played forever without end)
     
  7. Apesbrain

    Apesbrain Forum Resident

    Location:
    East Coast, USA
    Well, technically not true.
     
  8. Laibach

    Laibach Forum Resident

    Unfortunately none of them is good for the planet.

    Music streaming (or movie streaming for that matter, or the simple storage of files) consumes energy to power the servers where such content is hosted. Even reading your email, as trivial as it may seems imposes a heavy burden on the planet's ressources as more and more energy is necessary to power, run and manage inmense servers distributed across the planet.

    On the other hand you have CDs manufactured in the thousands and in the long run in the millions of copies. Some of those CDs will never sell and most likely end up destroyed. If you produced only the necessary CDs that people would actually buy and store at their homes or offices you could eliminate waste and prevent most of that plastic ending up in the high seas but it's never been the industry's motivation to accomodate demand -rather, its primary purpose was economies of scale, so the more the better even if it meant most of it was never actually consumed.
     
    rebellovw likes this.
  9. heathen

    heathen Forum Resident

    Location:
    Colorado
    Every time a record/CD is played, energy is needed and most of that comes from the electrical grid. Also there's the actual transportation of physical media. Raw materials have to be transported, component parts transported (maybe the printer is off-site), the media has to be transported to stores or shipped to a person's home. That's got to add up too.

    When I can get the music I want in a downloadable DRM-free lossless file, that's what I do.
     
  10. Jwest97

    Jwest97 Bass Player for Luxury Furniture Store

    Location:
    Las Vegas, NV
    Top 40 CD's are terrible for the environment. At best they wind up at Goodwill, but no one will want to keep them for longer than 2 years, so they end up in landfills and kill the planet. Only put enjoyable music on CD's, be environmentally conscious!
     
    nosliw likes this.
  11. Blue Gecko

    Blue Gecko Peace

    Location:
    Wisconsin
    IMO...

    The cost and energy consumption of playing a CD on your own equipment has to be an order of magnitude (or more) LOWER than streaming music over the internet.

    Ask anyone who owns and uses an in-home NAS system, what their fixed and maintainance costs are (including drives and backup). Compare that to the cost and energy consumption of a CD player.

    Consumerism is directly proportional to energy consumption. The bigger the support infrastructure, the greater the energy consumed.

    Perhaps someone will chime in with economies of scale, if so, please also consider the overall size and energy of putting together server farms to access and store the data, including your personal data with every song streamed.
     
  12. rockindownthehighway

    rockindownthehighway Not interested

    Location:
    Gone
    This is a really good point and not a joke. Data centers pollute in the form of heat and gasses, and the power requirements are gigantic. Sure, some of them use green power but most of them do not. Nobody should feel guilty for owning media.

    Decades ago a woman in my office flipped out on me and accused me of poisoning the environment when she saw me use a styrofoam cup in the office for coffee. I told her, now that the cup has been made, there is nothing to do but drink from it. ;)
     
  13. gss

    gss Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    New Jersey
    Passing on - and reselling - CDs and records (or, cassettes, et al.) is really recycling at its finest.

    It's sensible and meaningful: that's physical media.
     
  14. heathen

    heathen Forum Resident

    Location:
    Colorado
    Before reading this thread I'd never considered the impact of data centers. It sounds ridiculous to admit now, but it's true. This is definitely eye-opening.
     
    Eric_Generic, JulesRules and gss like this.
  15. gss

    gss Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    New Jersey
    Agreed: the whole premise of that article was very foreign to me, hence my sharing it here.
     
    heathen likes this.
  16. Schoolmaster Bones

    Schoolmaster Bones Poe's Lawyer

    Location:
    ‎The Midwest
    Are you sure of that?

    If I had to guess, I’d say 99.99999% of all physical media ever made is already there.
     
    TheVU, heathen and Rolltide like this.
  17. docwebb

    docwebb Forum Resident

    Well, I have never thrown a CD away.. I give ones I don't like to Goodwill. Below are instructions on what to do with old CDs. My post was half facetious....my point was I am hoping makers of players continue to provide them so huge numbers of discs don't get thrown away.

    These media are made of plastic, but not the same kind of plastic as bottles and food containers. In fact, they are a mixture of different plastic resins. CD cases are polystyrene (#6 plastic), while the discs themselves are polycarbonate (#7 plastic). The casing of tapes is polypropylene (#5 plastic), and the tape itself is polyethylene terephthalate (#1 plastic).

    1. Donate your old CD, DVDs and tapes to a secondhand store or music reseller for reuse. Even if the items are scratched, it’s likely they can be repaired and resold. This obviously won’t be an option if you’re getting rid of blank or burned CDs and VHS tapes.
    2. Use them for a DIY art project.
    3. Mail your media to a company like the CD Recycling Center of America or GreenDisk. Make sure to remove any paper sleeves, as these can be recycled with other paper. CD jackets are office paper, and VHS tape sleeves are paperboard.
    4. Find a drop-off location for CDs and tapes near you using the Recycling Locator.
    https://earth911.com/recycling-guide/how-to-recycle-cds-tapes/
     
  18. punkmusick

    punkmusick Amateur drummer

    Location:
    Brazil
    If you listen to music peacefully at home, whether streaming or playing your records and CDs, instead of engaging in the every day omnipresent hateful power struggles, you're contributing to a better Planet.
     
    ukrules, Man at C&A and heathen like this.
  19. Blue Gecko

    Blue Gecko Peace

    Location:
    Wisconsin
  20. Dennis0675

    Dennis0675 Hyperactive!

    Location:
    Ohio
    Physical Media needs to be physically transported many times from moving the raw materials to the factory and then moving the physical product from the factory through distribution and retail channels and then finally to your home. A given cd or lp could have traveled thousands of miles via a combustion motor before you play it. Advantage streaming.

    Also...the energy being considered by servers was happening anyway. It’s not like they only exist for streaming media. It’s tough to pin all that engergy on streaming music.

    If anyone is really worried about this just play an acoustic guitar in a dark room. That’s a very light carbon footprint.
     
    Brando4905 and Rolltide like this.
  21. Bob_in_OKC

    Bob_in_OKC Forum Resident

    Location:
    Dallas, Texas
    The plastic in the one CD collection of my entire life can’t compete with the bottles at the Dallas Stars hockey game last night.
     
  22. jupiterboy

    jupiterboy Forum Residue

    Location:
    Buffalo, NY
    Similar issue with books. Seemingly, paper pulp production is destructive, but paper is renewable. If a digital device had an extremely long life, ebooks might actually be green. In reality, the device churn is high. Maybe it is the devices and the production of them and the resources that run them that is the issue. Maybe a record or CD or book that is cared for and stays in circulation is the better choice.
     
  23. Dennis0675

    Dennis0675 Hyperactive!

    Location:
    Ohio
    There are plenty of books that are hundreds of years old, getting ten years from a device is asking a lot.
     
  24. DaleClark

    DaleClark Forum Resident

    Location:
    Columbus, Ohio
    Maybe somebody should ask our Recycle service. They have been dumping trash and recycles in same truck and take to same landfill
     
    Dennis0675 likes this.
  25. townsend

    townsend Senior Member

    Location:
    Ridgway, CO
Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.

Share This Page

molar-endocrine