>>536657802
>and just want to instantly run back to deposit it.
Its not going anywhere. You can just not loot and keep trucking on with your already full backpack. Nothing is worse than being out on a progression expedition and deciding to return back to base for a pit stop, only to go back where you were and find a new shortcut back home, or even worse, a roadblock that requires you to go back home again and craft an item to pass. Once you make some hard progress and finish areas it becomes a lot easier to go back through and loot after you open it up a bunch, but its hard to make good progress when youre constantly looting.

When working through a new area and trying to make progress I only loot new things, stuff I know Im actually out of, and stuff that is immediately useful(like ammo). From there you can make further judgment calls. Like for Manufacturing. Cement is new but it doesnt stack very high and is heavy as shit. Pick it up and look at the new recipes it unlocks and decide how many inv slots you really want to commit to it and leave the rest.
Theyre not going anywhere,
unless you pick them up and then drop them.
Then theyre gone for good.
Theres nothing wrong with focusing on the task at hand and letting materials lie until a time more convient for gathering. Exploration is a lot more productive when youre not carrying 40 bags of cement, and looting is a lot more productive when youre not stressing out about the infinite possibilities behind this door you haven't gone through, or what could have been down that side route you need to go back and check because this is a dead end.

Both exploration and looting become a lot easier when you take the hakuna matata approach. Explore until you make the game force you back to your base(because it often will), not your inventory. Then if that road block requires a loot run, go do it. Its all espresso, bby.