why don't we build a shaft right down to the core where it is hot and tip all the plastic where it would melt

Question

so it would be gone straight away also we could use the heat for something

Answer 1

One of the problems about this solution is that there is already plastic all over the place on the surface of Earth, and so most of it is unlikely to get trucked over to wherever the hole would be dug. And we don't really understand the inside of the Earth that well yet. Did you ever read Arthur Conan Doyle's story "When the world screamed"?

Answer 2

For starters, nobody has thus far been able to artificially breech the Earth's crust, let alone penetrate to the core. The technology and power required to transport anything to the core of the Earth would almost certainly not be the most efficient way in which to dispose of plastics, if it were even possible.

Answer 3

The earth becomes molten magma just a few hundred of km deep, way short of the 6378 km to reach the center (or event the 2900 km to reach the core). You cannot really dig in a liquid, can you?

Answer 4

The outer core is 1,825 miles down. Imagine the costs involved, and how long it would take to complete the project.

Answer 5

robert, nothing is "gone all the way"..its atoms remain till and in this case, the plastic would still still pollute...case in point, all the water on earth is all the water there ever has been

Answer 6

yes but it would be reabsorbed into the planet and nothing would survive. The earth would stop being furtile, which woulod mean no food = no life

Answer 7

Glad to see you have a grasp of science.

Answer 8

Your shaft would melt - nasty!

Answer 9

because it's impossible - and even if it wasn't, it woudl cost too much money and be very very very dangerous.

Answer 10

it doesn't just disappear wen it melts