First sustainable Lego pieces to go on sale

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2018/mar/02/first-sustainable-lego-pieces-to-go-on-sale?

by vs2 • 8 years ago

42 70 8 years ago

I'm skeptical of PE as a substitute for ABS for the application. It would be interesting to see if someone more familiar with the process could weigh in.

bllguo2• 8 years ago

The article says "production has begun on a range of Lego botanical elements or pieces such as leaves, bushes and trees". Pieces which are more flexible and, practically speaking, don't necessarily need to meet the same standards as the other pieces

ghostbrainalpha5• 8 years ago

I wish they would focus these on the Duplo Lego sets for Toddlers.

A Lego death star built by an adult might need to last twenty years. But a Toddler plays with a Duplo set for maximum of two years, they lose most of the pieces, and if they break it isn't that big a deal.

Then they move on to more permanent durable lego sets.

ars9• 8 years ago

But a Toddler plays with a Duplo set for maximum of two years

Do you actually have Toddlers when you say that? They play with them till age 7, and often even later.

And do families have just 1 kid now? Do people not give toys away to grandkids or just friends?

dragonwriter4• 8 years ago

But a Toddler plays with a Duplo set for maximum of two years,

Lego and Duplo are compatible, so as long as someone is free building (rather than just following instructions on a set) with Lego, there is no reason not to use Duplo as part of that. Unless their parents gave them away, most kids I've known that kept playing with Lego kept their Duplo too.

they lose most of the pieces

Duplo pieces are pretty large and distinct, so if they are used indoors, the recovery rate is pretty high. I kind of doubt this, especially on a two-year time frame.

and if they break it isn't that big a deal.

Broken shards of rigid plastic around toddlers is, in fact, a big deal, for the same reason people tend not to let toddlers play with steak knives and scissors.

takk309• 8 years ago

Keep in mind that the plant "bricks" have always been flexible and not made from ABS. The only thing Lego is changing is the raw material for the plastic, not the plastic itself.

M_Bakhtiari2• 8 years ago

Now that I think of it, I seem to remember the plant parts as having a waxy feel to them compared to the regular bricks, consistent with PE, so maybe the only thing they changed was the feedstock.

dsr_• 8 years ago

They aren't substituting for ABS. ABS continues.

This is a substitute for the existing non-ABS, non-rubber parts. (You probably know that LEGO makes more tires than anyone else in the world.) Certain small parts are molded in a softer, non-ABS plastic, and PE is the replacement for that. Look for rubbery-feeling parts in existing sets.

bradleyjg3• 8 years ago

A little off topic, but I recently found out that you essentially can't buy plain old legos+ anymore. I wanted to buy some as a gift and I ended up having to buy knock offs because the lego company effectively doesn't sell them anymore.

+ I.e. full height 2x2, 2x3, 2x4

enriquto• 8 years ago

I don't know where you come from, but in france you can easily buy sets that contain lots of basic bricks (full height 2x2, 2x4, etc), and you can buy them individually, in large batches. It has never been easier than today to find those pieces.

ghostbrainalpha5• 8 years ago

Is this what you are looking for from Toy's R Us?

https://www.toysrus.com/product?productId=45199456&source=CA...

bradleyjg3• 8 years ago

That's the closest I found, but it still has plenty of wheels, doors, windows, half height pieces, round pieces, eyes, knobs, flat on top pieces, etc, etc, etc. The child I was buying for has some sets like that, but I wanted to buy just a large number of regular lego blocks for freeform play. I couldn't find anything on their website like that other than individually picking out single blocks.

bitwize• 8 years ago

There's a Lego store near me where I can buy pieces by the spadeful. I'm not sure what you're on about.

giarc• 8 years ago

https://shop.lego.com/en-CA/LEGO-Creative-Supplement-10693

This looks pretty basic.

devmunchies• 8 years ago

Go to any LEGO store and they have bins where you can pick and choose single pieces.

Adamantcheese• 8 years ago

You can buy individual bricks off Bricklink. It's basically Ebay but exclusively for LEGO.

DanBC• 8 years ago

That's a painful way to buy half a kilo of Lego standard blocks though.

Maybe parent poster could buy a couple of kg of Lego from Ebay, then sort and wash it. The wheels, doors, etc can be donated to local charities / goodwill etc.

52-6F-62• 8 years ago

You can visit the online Lego store and pick out any number of any colour of the plain (or any other) bricks that you want.

https://shop.lego.com/en-CA/Pick-a-Brick

There's a search filter.

You can filter by colour and by name, for ex: 2x4

dragonwriter4• 8 years ago

little off topic, but I recently found out that you essentially can't buy plain old legos+ anymore.

Sure you can. If you just want non-themed sets heavy in classic pieces, they are sold as Lego “Creative Box” or “Creative Set” in various sizes [0]; if you want specific pieces in the common sizes, you can go into a Lego Store and handpick want you want from bins in the wall and pay by the bag.

[0] e.g., https://shop.lego.com/en-US/LEGO-Large-Creative-Brick-Box-10...

ars9• 8 years ago

polyethylene – a soft, durable and flexible plastic that can now be made with ethanol extracted from sugar cane material and, Lego claims, is as durable as conventional plastic. As a bio-plastic, it can be recycled many times, though it is unlikely to be 100% biodegradable.

As a bio-plastic? polyethylene? What different does it make if your atoms were cycled through a living plant, or a dead plant in the ground (oil)?

From a chemistry point of view it makes no difference.

This is 100% greenwashing, and it relies on gullible reporters not to call them out on their nonsense.

You can make polyethylene from air. Are we calling it atmo-plastic now?

typetypetype• 8 years ago

Because atoms that come from a renewable resource that can be sourced locally are preferred over atoms from non-renewable resources that come from distant lands.

ars9• 8 years ago

Why? What difference does it make? We don't have a shortage of atoms.

From your reply and others I can see why they did this. People actually believe it makes a difference.

The environment is doomed. I'm sorry, but if people can't even tell the difference between something that helps the environment, and something that makes no difference, then I don't see how we'll ever make things better.

kaybe2• 8 years ago

I actually support any use of oil that does not include burning it. (within reason)

Better make all of it into Lego and then bury it into a landfill when it breaks, if it can be done on renewable energy.

eropple5• 8 years ago

I am not an expert in this area, but polyethylene made from living plants takes rather fewer millenia to sustainably source than polyethylene made from petroleum.

ars9• 8 years ago

What?? No.

It makes no difference. What matters is the ENERGY. Not the atoms.

We have absolutely no shortage of atoms, we have an unlimited supply of those.

What matter is the energy inherent in the oil. And I see absolutely nothing in this press release about where the energy comes from.

mrob• 8 years ago

There's a difference in that the plant-sourced polyethylene is sequestering carbon from the air. But I agree it's mostly greenwashing, because we don't know the total atmospheric carbon balance over the whole manufacturing process.

oldcynic2• 8 years ago

The earliest Lego was cellulose, which is biodegradable.

They'd do better simply going back to that. Though I'm not sure how cellulose is for longevity.

quink• 8 years ago

I have some cellulose acetate LEGO bricks.

It's no good for longevity. They've all changed colour and deformed a bit in various ways.

gamblor956• 8 years ago

As a bio-plastic? polyethylene? What different does it make if your atoms were cycled through a living plant, or a dead plant in the ground (oil)?

From a chemistry point of view it makes no difference.

There are many types of polyethylene. This particular type used by Lego apparently can be recycled more easily than other types of polyethylene for reasons not explained in the post. As for why it matters whether the plant is living or dead, there is a vast order of magnitude difference in the energy extraction cost from living plants vs finding, drilling, refining, processing, and transporting dead plants. Oil extraction is expensive and the various processes required to extract and use it come with significant environmental externalities.

You can make polyethylene from air. Are we calling it atmo-plastic now?

Citation needed. As 1/3 of the most common polyethylene molecule is carbon, and 2/3 is hydrogen, you would need some very special air to make polyethylene.

gus_massa2• 8 years ago

To get Hydrogen, just add some water. Moreover, perhaps you don't need liquid water because air has some water vapor, but I'm too lazy to do the stoichiometric calculation now.

Someone already though it: "Exclusive: Pioneering scientists turn fresh air into petrol in massive boost in fight against energy crisis" http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/exclusive-pio... [spoiler alert: they use electricity too]

lykahb• 8 years ago

I have fond memories about building stuff with Lego and still remember what they were about. Depending on how this change is reflected in the themes of the Lego sets, it could have more positive environmental impact from educating kids about sustainability than from the direct changes of manufacturing process. More people who prefer sustainable choices over disposable plastics will make a difference.

agumonkey• 8 years ago

They could make a recycling plant set :)

jagger27• 8 years ago

It's hard to fault Lego for using fossil fuels to make their ABS bricks. The bricks just don't get thrown out and they are kept out of landfills and held onto for decades. I'm sure by 2030 they'll find sustainable precursors for their ABS production line.

konschubert• 8 years ago

In fact, by turning it into plastics, aren't they effectively preventing the carbon from being oxidized and released into the atmosphere?

hsivonen• 8 years ago

Has the ABS for the usual non-flexible bricks changed in a documented way over the years? White bricks from the 1980s get yellowish, but white bricks from the 1990s don't. Current bricks seem shinier and have a bit different feel than bricks from the 1990s (even ones that aren't particularly worn).

jonathankoren• 8 years ago

I think you just need to wait, or expose them to more sunlight. The actual yellowing is due to a flame retardant.[0]

[0] http://www.instructables.com/id/Restoring-yellowed-Stormtroo...

oldcynic2• 8 years ago

Additives and anti-oxidants have got better I think. Pretty much all plastic from the 60s - 80s is prone to hardening and yellowing. In the worst cases the surface can start crumbling. See old computer cases for instance.

juanmirocks• 8 years ago

Regardless of whether this is greenwashing or not, I congratulate Lego for being always on top of innovation. They now hop on the train of environment-friendly and win good publicity with it. They are constantly reinventing themselves.

acd• 8 years ago

Producing sugar cane uses a lot of water and draws a lot of nutrients from the soil.

WWF information on sugar cane production. https://www.worldwildlife.org/industries/sugarcane

beavis2• 8 years ago

I'm guessing it's cheaper. Why else would they?

First sustainable Lego pieces to go on sale

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