“These bales on average are about 900lbs ((400 kg)); and they can range anywhere from 600lbs ((270 kg)) to 1500lbs ((680 kg)) in this configuration. This is accumulation of nearly 10-15 weeks of delivery.”

Not far from the Clear Path Recycling is a huge storage area for the plastic objects. They enter the recycling center to begin the process that will change them.

“This is where the whole bottles enter the whole bottle wash. It’s just like your front-end loading washing machine at your house. It’s just a lot longer, and a lot bigger.”

Hot water washes paper labels off the drink bottles and removes dirt. The plastic is broken up into what the plastics recycling industry calls “PET flake.” Another center will buy the flake to melt and mold into something else. The flake fills trucks and is sometimes stored in silos like farmers use to store grain.

“These silos hold roughly 300 metric tons of PET flake, and the one we’re standing on now, we have about 150 metric tons of flake, and there’s three of these.”

Add up the numbers -- almost one kiloton of plastic flake waits to be changed into something new.

Plastic bottles spend their lives on the move. Machines mold and fill them with our favorite drinks. When we are done drinking, machines destroy the bottles and make them into new bottles. Their journey never ends. But our trip has come to an end in Wilson, North Carolina.