On Feb. 28 history was made: 175 nations agreed to begin writing a global treaty that will restrict the growth of plastic pollution. Writing for The New York Times, Hiroko Tabuchi said, “The agreement commits nations to work on a broad and legally binding treaty that would not only aim to improve recycling and clean up the world’s plastic waste, but would encompass curbs on plastic production itself. That could put measures like a ban on single-use plastics, a major driver of waste, on the table.”
The volume of plastic waste produced by the world is enormous. Unfortunately, only about 5% of all plastics are recycled. Plastic producers who deceptively place triangular recycling arrows on their products, leading people to believe that all they have to do is toss plastic waste into a recycling container and it will be recycled, have duped many consumers. The producers know it’s a lie. According to Jana Dell, founder of the Last Beach Clean-up, a nonprofit fighting plastic waste, 85% of plastic waste in the United States ends up in landfills and 10% is incinerated. Guardian writer Katharine Gammon adds, “plastic waste per person in the U.S. has increased by 263% since 1980, from 60 pounds per person to 218 pounds a person.”
Recycling will not be enough. We need to listen to scientists. They tell us the issue needs to be tackled at the source. Plastic production needs to be regulated, capped and phased out. “Even if we recycled better and tried to manage the waste as much as we can, we would still release more that 17 million tons of plastic per year into nature,” says Melanie Bergmann of the German Alfred-Wegener Institute in a letter published in Science.
So what can we do? We all need to re-evaluate what products and packages are really necessary. The amount of plastic we each toss every day is astonishing. My friend Shirley is a plastic recycling advocate in California. She recently bought me a large Terracycle box. Terracycle will recycle any plastics you send them – for a hefty price, the real cost of recycling – including hard-to-recycle items like single-use plastics, plastic wrap and pens as well as all types of plastic packaging. I started monitoring my plastic use more carefully to determine what really could go into my blue recycle bin, what went into the garbage, and what I could put into the Terracycle box. I was astonished at the daily volume of plastic one household produces, most of which unconsciously went into the garbage. And since we know that what we toss in the garbage will not degrade for hundreds of years and adds to the climate crisis, it leaves you feeling pretty disgusted and helpless.
Canada has banned single-use plastics. So have China and the EU. California just passed a sweeping law reducing single-use plastics. Maine, Oregon and Colorado have passed legislation that requires companies to pay for the cost of recycling of their products. This is called Extended Producer Responsibility, EPR. Julie Enck, who runs Beyond Plastics, says EPR bills do not go far enough. “The European Union has had EPR for packaging in place for years, but when we talked with people in Europe, we realized that while it was good to get funding for recycling, it didn’t actually do anything to help with plastic reduction, so to speak. Plastic reduction is where our focus needs to be.” She says the planet needs standards for packaging and plastic reduction. Hopefully the new UN Global treaty will accomplish its goal of restricting the growth of plastic pollution.
Here in Albuquerque, we have taken a big step backward in ending the plastic bag ban. But there are things we can all do. Be a part of Plastic Free July. Join the effort to start new habits and become part of the national Take-Back Plastic Campaign. There is a lot we can accomplish. Check out plasticfreejuly.org.
Betty Yee, controller of the state of California, reminds us plastic waste is the legacy we are leaving our children. “It is everywhere: In remote alpine lakes, in deep sea trenches, and even inside us. Studies show we consume up to a credit card worth of micro-plastic every week,” she says. Sadly, that statistic is true.
Published on July 11, 2022, in the Albuquerque Journal.
© Judith Polich. All Rights Reserved. May be republished with author’s written consent and proper attribution.