This is so great and so bad at the same time. We’re gonna have to go back to using tar and shit for things we actually want to last. That’s not going to be cheap…
I mean, wood already biodegrades quite readily, yet we are able to make some pretty long lasting things out of it anyway. Having a bacteria that can break down some variety of plastic doesn’t really imply that all plastic things are going to rot away like old fruit.
Is the rate at which wood rots indicative of how quickly plastic would rot?
Also plastic tends to be very thin. Like if bacteria can denature 0.1mm per year that’s lots of years for a timber beam but a few months for plastic packaging.
Dry wood will last centuries without any oiling. Which is good news for timber frames because those are left untreated. As long as your house is water-tight, the frame will be fine because wood rot simlly can’t metabolize in typical indoors humidity evels.
What we typically protect wood from is water, mechanical wear, UV, and stains. But even a furniture piece will not always get treated on internal parts where wear and wood expansion are no concerns.
And how do you keep the wood from being exposed to moisture without petroleum derivatives? Like technically it is possible but to build enough homes to that standard for even 1/1000 of the population is unreasonable
The house I’m sitting in right now is made out of bricks, with the roof being a untreated wood frame covered in ceramic shingles. No hydrocarbons involved (except for the insulation but that came a good sixty years after initial construction). There are other construction methods besides the American “just wrap it all in vinyl” approach that aren’t necessarily more expensive, such as covering the outside insulation layer with clay/mortar.
The problem isn’t air moisture, at 60 % air RH wood is like 10 % humid and won’t rot. What causes wood to rot is pooling water, something that’s easily avoided by decent house building.
This is so great and so bad at the same time. We’re gonna have to go back to using tar and shit for things we actually want to last. That’s not going to be cheap…
Tar is very problematic health-wise. Banned in some countries for this reason.
I mean, wood already biodegrades quite readily, yet we are able to make some pretty long lasting things out of it anyway. Having a bacteria that can break down some variety of plastic doesn’t really imply that all plastic things are going to rot away like old fruit.
Is this a false equivalence?
Is the rate at which wood rots indicative of how quickly plastic would rot?
Also plastic tends to be very thin. Like if bacteria can denature 0.1mm per year that’s lots of years for a timber beam but a few months for plastic packaging.
We also cover wood in hydrocarbons to stop it from being broken down, if a bacteria can break down long hydrocarbon chains we are kind of fucked
Dry wood will last centuries without any oiling. Which is good news for timber frames because those are left untreated. As long as your house is water-tight, the frame will be fine because wood rot simlly can’t metabolize in typical indoors humidity evels.
What we typically protect wood from is water, mechanical wear, UV, and stains. But even a furniture piece will not always get treated on internal parts where wear and wood expansion are no concerns.
And how do you keep the wood from being exposed to moisture without petroleum derivatives? Like technically it is possible but to build enough homes to that standard for even 1/1000 of the population is unreasonable
What?
The house I’m sitting in right now is made out of bricks, with the roof being a untreated wood frame covered in ceramic shingles. No hydrocarbons involved (except for the insulation but that came a good sixty years after initial construction). There are other construction methods besides the American “just wrap it all in vinyl” approach that aren’t necessarily more expensive, such as covering the outside insulation layer with clay/mortar.
The problem isn’t air moisture, at 60 % air RH wood is like 10 % humid and won’t rot. What causes wood to rot is pooling water, something that’s easily avoided by decent house building.