Who is Brandy Deason, the ‘James Bond of plastic?’

While many people are concerned about humanity’s impact on the environment, rare are heroes like Brandy Deason, who worked alone to find the truth about plastic recycling in Houston.

Like many cities across the United States, Houston has been promoting its recycling program as a solution to the growing problem of plastic waste. The city’s “all plastic accepted” policy seemed too good to be true to Brandy, a climate justice coordinator with a background in environmental sciences. 

Brandy’s journey into waste management began with her education at the University of Houston — Downtown, where she focused on environmental sciences, sustainability, and ethics. Her academic background and work as an air analyst in the environmental lab industry provided Brandy with the perfect skill set to tackle the mystery of Houston’s miraculous plastic recycling program. Her suspicions led her to conduct an investigation that would soon make headlines.

Brandy Deason singlehandedly exposed the plastic hypocrisy of the Houston government

Taking a page out of James Bond’s book, Brandy decided to use Apple AirTags to track the journey of her recycled plastic. She placed these small tracking devices in various bags of plastic waste and deposited them at recycling drop-off points around the city. What she discovered was far from the eco-friendly process that residents had been led to believe was taking place.

The AirTags revealed that instead of being recycled, much of the plastic was being transported to Wright Waste Management, a facility in Harris County that was not approved to store plastic waste. Even worse, this facility had failed three fire inspections, raising concerns about the safety and legality of its operations. Plus, aerial footage showed massive piles of plastic waste up to 10 feet high at the site. 

Brandy’s investigation didn’t stop with the tracking. She took her findings to Houston’s Director of Solid Waste Management, Mark Wilfalk, confronting him with the evidence she had gathered. Wilfalk admitted that the situation at Wright Waste Management was “not the most desirable-looking site” and promised to investigate the fire inspection failures. 

The impact of Brandy’s detective work was significant. It came to light that Houston had collected approximately 250 tons of plastic since the end of 2022, none of which had actually been recycled. The city was essentially stockpiling the material, waiting for a promised sorting facility to open. This facility, run by a company called Cyclix, claims to have developed a method to create recyclable pellets from plastic waste. However, only a fraction of these pellets can be made into new plastic, with the majority being melted and turned into fuel that is burned, contributing to carbon emissions.

Deason’s innovative approach to citizen investigation has earned her the moniker “the James Bond of plastic recycling.” Her actions have exposed the shortcomings of Houston’s recycling program and highlighted the broader issues of transparency and effectiveness in waste management systems across the country. This “James Bond” may not have a license to kill, but Brandy Deason has certainly shaken and stirred the conversation around recycling and waste management in America’s cities.