When the first man-made plastic was patented by Alexander Parkes, it offered a more sustainable alternative to ivory. A century and a half later, it has turned from environment’s friend to its daily foe. In that time, we have dumped into landfills 5.7 billion tonnes of the total 8.3 billion tonnes produced1.
The world may be starting to wake up to the problem, but there are still plenty of misconceptions about plastic. Alexis McGivern, low-plastic campaigner and member of the Plastic Pollution Emissions Working Group, is keen to set the record straight.
1. Plastic is dangerous to humans, not just sealife
BBC’s Blue Planet II wildlife documentary series is often credited with raising public awareness to the dangers of this waste poses with powerful images of a whale calf killed by plastic pollution. It is a big problem: the UN estimates that 10-20 million tonnes of plastic find their way into the world’s oceans each year, causing some USD13 billion in environmental damage to marine ecosystems.
However, the material’s environmental impact goes beyond the seas2.
“Plastic is so much more than just an oceans issue,” says McGivern, who runs the noplasticplease.life website.
Plastic pollution is also disastrous to land animals, including people all along its lifecycle. Not only are there side effects from chemicals from plastic leaching into food through packaging, but the manufacturing process is also noxious with the inhalation of nano- and micro-plastics, particularly in factory environments, raising respiratory risks.
Research has linked exposure to phthalates – chemicals used to make plastic more flexible – with a number of issues, including potentially higher risk of premature births and higher risk of insulin resistance in teenagers3.
Another health-threatening chemical, Bisphenol A (BPA), has been largely excluded from modern plastic manufacture. But there are now early signs that its replacements – Bisphenol S and Bisphenol F – could also be far from harmless4.
2. Not everything recyclable is recycled
Of all the plastic ever produced, only 6 per cent was recycled. Admittedly, this situation is improving – today global plastic recycling rates have increased to around 20 per cent1. But it’s not as simple as just putting all your used plastic in the recycling bin.
For a start, of the seven commonly recognised types of plastic only one – PET – is widely reused, McGivern says. Three cannot currently be recycled – either at all or in a cost efficient manner.
“Not all plastic is created equal,” McGivern explains. “Some plastics are like butter. You can melt it and then you can put it in the fridge and solidifies again. Other plastics are more like bread. When you heat bread – for example by putting it in the toaster – it goes dry and brittle.”
Melding plastic with other materials can also cause problems, she adds.
“Coffee cups are demonic for waste management. It’s paper, covered in plastic, held together with glue. It costs more to recycle the cup than it does to produce it,” which is clearly not financially viable.
Even for plastic that can be recycled the path is not always smooth. Contamination in recycling bins is a big problem, and design can hinder too. Black plastic – favoured by food manufacturers for aesthetic reasons - is not recognised by automated sorters.
3. Biodegradable isn’t the easy way out
So, if recycling is such a problem, should we opt for biodegradable plastic? McGivern says this, too, is not a straight forward matter.
“Biodegradable can be a misleading label. Almost all biodegradable plastic will not biodegrade if you put it in your garden and leave it. It needs to go to an industrial compositing facility, of which there are very few in the world.”
Furthermore, tests on whether something is compostable do not take into account potentially toxic effects for soil.
4. Plastic alternatives aren't always greener
Fees for plastic bags are becoming more common as governments and businesses seek to reduce their use to help the environment. Using a cloth bag instead seems like a much greener option – and it can be as long as you use the bag enough times.
Research from the Danish Environmental Protection Agency shows that a conventional cotton bag would need to be re-used 52 times to achieve the same level of greenhouse gas emissions as a standard single use plastic bag.
Paper bags fare better in that comparison, but emissions aren’t the only factor. If your bag ends up in the landfill after just one use, a paper bag will take up more room than a plastic one, notes McGivern. “So actually it’s worse to take a paper bag.”
[1] “Production, use, and fate of all plastics ever made”, R. Geyer et al, 2017[2] “Valuing Plastic”, UNEP, 2014
[3] Association Between Urinary Bisphenol A Concentration and Obesity Prevalence in Children and Adolescents, L.Trasande et al, 2012
[4] Bisphenol S Disrupts Estradiol-Induced Nongenomic Signaling in a Rat Pituitary Cell Line: Effects on Cell Functions, R.Vinas and C.S. Watson, 2013
