Okay, since this is supposed to be a feel-good blog post, I’m not going to bury you in plastic statistics the way we are ourselves being buried in the real thing, but I will shed a dash of light on it by repeating a few plastics facts you may already be privy to:
- In the 70 years since plastics entered the consumer market, almost 9 billion tons have been created, 92% of which was not recycled and still exists on the planet in some form;
- two million single-use plastic bags are distributed worldwide every minute — that have an average working life of a mere 15 minutes — are distributed worldwide every minute;
- the straw you got with your drink at lunch will live for hundreds of years in the ocean, and 500 million of them are used everyday in America alone, enough to circle the world twice ;
- one million plastic bottles are purchased every minute and only about 30% of them will be recycled;
- at our current rate of production, by 2050, there will be more plastic in the ocean than fish, much of it as microplastics which break down from the original due to photodegradation.
The point of repeating these stats is that we can’t cover our eyes any longer. The overuse of plastics is a global problem that requires immediate attention. Yes, yes, every telemarketer that ever calls…
Continue reading at Pam Lazos’ Eco-Blog Green Life Blue Water.
Pam Lazos is an environmental attorney serving as Senior Assistant Regional Counsel at the at the USEPA Region 3 office in Philadelphia where she works enforcing matters under the Clean Water Act and USEPA Region 3 office in Philadelphia where she works enforcing matters under the Clean Water Act and Safe Drinking Water Act. She is also an author, a blogger for the Global Water Alliance, creator of the Safe Drinking Water Act. She is also an author, on the Board as VP of Communications for the Global Water Alliance, creator of the literary eco-blog www.greenlifebluewater and serves on the editorial board of the wH2O Journal.
Three Worlds One Vision 
I’ve always disliked plastic as a material, but only in recent years become aware of the danger that it is
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You are not the only one, Derrick. We humans became accustomed to using plastic products long before we were aware of their danger. As Pam Lazos notes in a recently published article, “Here, There, and Everywhere: The Problem with Microplastics in Water and What Women Scientists Are Doing to Solve It,” microplastics pollution poses an even bigger problem.
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Industrial revolution
Replaced by synthetic one !
Incentivise recycle production way forward !
Temporary tax breaks for those producing recyclable products. No if or buts !
We know the problem
Let’s have more solutions
Kamtan uk-ex-EU
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I agree, Kamtan. Thanks for adding your thoughts 🙂
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Thank you for sharing!!.. unfortunately, until they discover a better method we will have to deal with plastic… the issue is disposing of the used plastic as most will just put it in the garbage rather that go to the effort of recycle… and seeing as how there is not a great deal of “money” and “profit” in recycling, there are not many places that recycle… hopefully there is change in the future…. 🙂
Until we meet again..
May flowers always line your path
and sunshine light your way,
May songbirds serenade your
every step along the way,
May a rainbow run beside you
in a sky that’s always blue,
And may happiness fill your heart
each day your whole life through.
(Irish Saying)
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Thanks for sharing, Dutch 🙂 We created a product that would outlast generations of human populations. What could go wrong?
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The human population…. 🙂 🙂 🙂
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Such a topical issue. The unfortunate part is the alternative isn’t very user friendly atleast right now which makes it hard to eliminate plastic completely from our lives. I actively and sometimes obsessively limit the use of plastic in my household but often with little kids in the house it feels like battles.
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Pallavi, I face the same dilemma. Plastics have become so much an integral part of our daily lives that it’s a challenge to curb our individual use. Stopping our current production and recycling our plastic waste seem to be the best way forward.
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A friend recently reminded me that plastic contact lenses have become a huge problem in the oceans! Even the small things are not benign when they are multiplied by millions or billions. Hopefully, this past year has shifted our thinking a little about our consumerist society. Thanks Rosaliene.
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Kim, thanks for mentioning plastic contact lenses. Yet another indispensable product of our modern age!
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Thanks for sending this on, Rosaliene.
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My pleasure, Dr. Stein 🙂
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Plastics are doing us in. All in the name of convenience.
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Neil, we’ve become so addicted to the convenience that it’s hard to break free.
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Thanks for sharing this. I saved the link to Plastic Bank. Did you see this story about a student at UC Berkeley trying to go a day without plastic? It’s really interesting what she learned from that experiment
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My pleasure, Winteroseca. I haven’t read about the student’s experiment. Could you kindly share the link to the article.
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Here it is: https://news.berkeley.edu/2017/01/09/learning-to-live-without-plastic/
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Thanks for sharing the news of the 2017 experiment. As my desktop computer, monitor and keyboard are all made of plastic, I would not be able to work. I found the following comments by Minoo Moallem, the professor of gender and women’s studies at UC Berkeley, of special interest:
“Older generations had sustainable ways of living,” she says. “Many of them were developed by women. They were experts in recycling, reusing, preserving, maintaining. But that is now lost. It’s a wealth of knowledge that we don’t have access to anymore.”
That’s not entirely true. Women of my generation from the developing world still retain this knowledge. But, then again, plastic had not yet invaded our living spaces and lives.
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Thanks for sharing your thoughts. It is frustrating that the tech we use has plastic, and here’s to hoping it will change someday. That’s interesting about the developing world too. I think that professor sounded a little too fatalistic. It is possible to preserve and continue knowledge of sustainable living. I think in the developed world, we take that knowledge for granted or see it as archaic, but I am hoping there will be a trend shift back to it
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That would be an interesting experiment! I don’t know if I could do it.
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Reading this article makes me realise how many plastics I come across each day including inside the house, I even have a huge drawer where I keep the used plastics, while many others are polluted outside. It sounds scary that there would be a period when plastics in the ocean will be more than the fish. Maybe some plastic manufacturers must consider replacing plastics by something else.
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It is scary to think about a time when our plastic waste will outnumber the fish in our oceans. Once there is profit to be made in plastic production, manufacturers will keep ramping out their output. According to a Yale Environment study in 2019, a surge of plastic production is on the way.
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Hectic world we live in
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Thank you for this focus on the dangers of plastic. I think each country has its own packaging solutions to avoid plastic. I’ve heard Japan is somewhere that people are committed to less waste. Time for us to share info and learn how to use less plastic and generate less garbage.
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That’s true, Rebecca. As countries worldwide come up with new solutions, we’ve got to share the info and apply where applicable.
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Perhaps part of the climate accord could be a network to share such information!
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Rosaliene,
Thanks for the focus on plastics, a subject dear to my heart. In the US, it is almost impossible to avoid plastic, which does serve many useful purposes. However, a minimalist like me can find innumerable ways to cut down on single-use plastic or excess of any kind.
Also, plastic is not that simple to recycle, since only certain grades can be recycled.
I’ve observed that this COVID-19 panic-demic seems to have led to an increase in packaging, maybe due to all the supply chain disruptions that prevent products from landing on store shelves in a timely fashion.
Once again, I recommend the book “Plastic: A Toxic Love Story”, by Susan Freinkel, which is good but only scratches the surface rearding the inundation of plastic on the planet. People also need to remember that plastic is a petroleum product and far worse than CO2 with respect to its damage to the environment. At least CO2 gets recycled through plants to produce oxygen and water.
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Simple Simon suggests
By introducing “penalties” for plastic manufacture/usage is way forward.
UK there is a 10P charge by retailers for
a plastic carrier bag to fund recycling…now “free” paper bags are also available at checkouts !
Question
Are vaccines packaged in plastic syringes/bottles and are they “recyclable” ??
K
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I know there is momentum for taxing plastic grocery bags and the like, but I prefer the individual approach to plastic reduction. I shop with a canvas bag, carry my own thermal cup for my coffee shop visits (or did, before I decided it’s more pleasant to stay home with coffee), and have cut back on all spending, since I find so little worth buying, and I already have too much stuff in my life.
I don’t know the answer to your question about vaccine vials. I do know that the medical world generates incredible amounts of plastic waste. Sterilization and re-use is a thing of the past.
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Katharine, without a doubt, as individuals we have to change our high consumption and wasteful lifestyles. The pandemic forced a lot of changes in our everyday lives. Hopefully, our return to the new normal will be accompanied with a hightened consciousness of the impact of our behavior on the environment.
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Rosaliene,
I’m looking for, and finding, a few things to like about this panic-demic, including the forced slow-down in the frenetic pace of so-called modern society. The cutting back on over-consumption, perhaps learning to make better use of what people already have. We have so much, especially in the USA, that we are tripping over our own excesses.
I’ve been thinking about you today, remembering the book, “Confessions of an Economic Hit Man,” by John Perkins. I posted a summary of it on my WordPress site in November, 2015, but it has even more relevance today, in light of what’s happening in Guyana. Perkins spent some time in Ecuador and witnessed the devastation created by the oil companies and their waste. I guess there are huge oil deposits across that latitude of South America, including Venezuela, as you know, and companies like Exxon-Mobil are hot to seduce governments into believing they benefit by having the oil industry move in (and ruin the environment as an unstated part of the deal).
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Katharine, I share your misgivings about Guyana’s newfound oil wealth.
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Katharine, it’s great to hear from you on this issue. We’ve also had an increase in plastic packaging here in Los Angeles due to the pandemic. Thanks for the book recommendation, an appropriate title. I’ve added it to my To Read List. Petroleum, plastic, and petrochemicals: a giant leap forward for humankind. Breaking free is hard to do.
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Rosaliene,
I forgot to mention in my comment that Freinkel’s book omits mention of two ubiquitous plastic products (that is, petroleum-based products): PVC (poly vinyl chloride) pipes, which are installed in just about all new US construction; and acrylics, like clothing and paint.
Considering that plastic microfilaments leach out of plastic storage containers, the PVC pipes may be damaging everyone’s health.
Also, I read on Stuart Bramhall’s site (I think it was), that there is a move afoot in Congress to get the FDA involved in medical plastic tubing because of its hormone-disrupting effects. I believe Freinkel mentions its hormone-disrupting effects in her book, too.
Case in point: Have you ever noticed the foul taste of bottled water when it has sat in a hot car, for instance? You can taste the plastic.
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Plastic Bank is wonderful! Thank you 😊
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Thanks for dropping by 🙂
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You are welcome!
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I don’t understand why people find it so hard to recycle. I guess it’s always been easy where I’ve lived.
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Crystal, reusing and recycling also come easily to me due to habits developed in my childhood years.
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Sharing! Reduce, reuse, recycle everything…
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The suns Ultraviolet rays do affect plastics.
Decades ago white UPVC plastic windows
would change colour (yellowish)
Just imagine what happens to plastics in lanfilll
sites….
For centuries arsenic was used post burial…
only to later be discovered in the Aqua fir
water supply.
Frankenstein re-incarnate in food/water chain.
How naieve are the homosapiens species.
QED
RIP
Kamtan uk-ex-EU
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Thanks, Bette!
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This is an excellent initiative! We must work for solutions on every front – reduce, reuse, recycle! Thanks for sharing, Rosaliene.
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My pleasure, JoAnna. I recalled another excellent initiative in Kenya that you shared in one of your posts in February about making low-cost construction bricks using recycled plastic and sand.
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Yes! It’s very encouraging to know there are multiple projects for better living and a better world.
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Not feel-good statistics at all.
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Indeed not, Don 😦
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Well, we all know that plastic and especially micro-plastic is a big problem. We have several market towns near our village where plastic shopping bags, plastic drinks cups, cuttlery, plates and straws and much more are banned. We know that’s not enough nevertheless it’s a beginning.
Thanks for sharing
The Fab Four of Cley
🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂
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Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Klausbernd. If we’re to catch up, we’ve got to make a giant leap forward.
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great post. definitely we need to do something better with all our trash — & not create so much of it…
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Thanks so much for reading, da-AL!
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Incredibly distressed by our plastic waste. Thank you for the insightful statistics🌺
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Thanks for stopping by 🙂
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