As everyone should by now be aware, the recycling of polyethylene terephthalate, "PET", plastic, from which the ubiquitous soda pop, and other beverage, containers are made, has become a truly big national deal; with some cities even installing collection bins for items made of the plastic on their street corners.
Reclaimed PET can, in fact, be recycled back into beverage containers; but, the necessary cleaning, purification and clarification steps which are required by mixed batches of reclaimed PET consumer products make it uneconomical to do so; and, virgin material is almost always used for that purpose.