AirTags key to discovery of Houston's plastic recycling deception

One Houston resident was suspicious of the city's "all plastic accepted" recycling program, and used AirTags to discover where the plastic waste actually ended up.

Brandy Deason, who regularly recycles her packaging and other waste, began to have doubts about the city's plastic recycling program. Houston's program boasted of being able to accept even types of plastic that aren't normally considered recyclable.

Curious as to where the plastic was going, she bought a set of AirTags, and included them in various bags of her plastic recycling. Of the bags she tracked, nearly all of them went to a company called Wright Waste Management, located in nearby Harris County.

The company is not approved to store plastic waste, and has failed three fire inspections.

CBS News correspondent Ben Tracy referred to Deason as "the James Bond of plastic recycling" for her initiative. Aerial footage showed that the facility had large piles of plastic waste as tall as 10 feet high.

Deason said she thought that the company simply storing the unrecyclable plastic waste was "kind of strange." She later contacted Houston's Director of Solid Waste Management Mark Wilfalk, to ask about the discrepancy.

When shown the drone footage, Wilfalk admitted "it's not the most desirable-looking site." He promised Deason he'd investigate the problems that caused Wright Waste Management to fail the fire inspections.

Wilfalk later acknowledged that the city had collected some 250 tons of plastic since the end of 2022. He revealed that none of it had been recycled as of yet.

"We're gonna stockpile it for now," he admitted. "We're gonna see what happens."

By contrast, Apple has been an industry leader in reducing its use of plastic. It uses paper for packaging, and metal rather than plastic for its computer line.

It does use some plastic for products such as its AirPods earbuds. It has invested in robotics to help recycle old Apple products.

Houston, as it turns out, is waiting on a promised sorting facility to open, where the stored recycling will be sorted and treated. The company behind the sorting facility, Cyclix, says it has developed a method to create recyclable pellets out of the plastic waste.

However, only a fraction of these pellets can be made into new plastic. Most will be melted and turned into fuel that is burned, adding to carbon emissions.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta has been investigating Cyclix owner and plastic manufacturer ExxonMobil's claims regarding plastic recycling in that state. He has characterized Cyclix's claims of plastic recycling are largely fictional.