Live a sustainable life
Problem Plastic
07.09.2020
Welcome to the age of plastic! We couldn’t imagine a life without plastics. After all, they provide us with valuable services in the form of packaging, furniture, toys, clothing, medical products and much more. But plastic comes at a high price. We’ll explain why.
The mass distribution of plastic began in 1950. In that year, around two million tonnes of plastic were produced around the world. The fact that packaging and bottles could end up in the rubbish bin after use instead of being reused helped the industry to simplify supply chains and save money. But that also marked the beginning of today’s throwaway mentality.
According to the 2019 plastic atlas of the Heinrich Böll Foundation, however, this figure has now risen to 400 million tonnes per year. According to the online magazine, there are currently more than 8.3 billion tonnes of plastic on the planet klimareporter.de off. This is equivalent to more than one tonne per person. And our current consumer behaviour is causing forecasts to rise dramatically, especially for single-use plastics.
Plastic accelerates global warming
Plastic consists of fossil raw materials that have to be extracted, refined, processed and transported. All of this is very energy-intensive and releases tons of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and methane. A lot of it is also produced during combustion. And plastic that ends up in the ocean is also harmful to the climate, as plankton usually binds carbon dioxide on the surface of the ocean and secretes it back into the deep sea. The oceans thus have an important role to play in contributing to a stable climate on Earth. However, according to the Plastic Atlas, the plastic that has broken down into microparticles in the ocean can disrupt this natural process.
Plastic carpets three times the size of France
The Heinrich Boell Foundation summarises that around 86 million tonnes of plastic waste had ended up in the oceans by 2018. According to Greenpeace, up to 13 million tonnes of plastic are added every year, i.e. one truckload every minute. The plastic in the sea and on beaches injures and kills marine animals and birds, also because it is confused with food.
What’s more, the plastic in the ocean is not broken down, but only crushed – into microplastic. This “decay” takes a very long time, as figures from the German Environment Agency show:
Plastic bag: 20 years
Polystyrene mug: 50 years
Disposable diaper: 460 years
Fishing line: 600 years
Plastic bottle: 600 years
Microplastic spreads everywhere and collects in particular in five giant piles of rubbish in the oceans. The largest of these is now three times the size of France.
Plastic deposits in soil and ends up in food
But soils are also heavily polluted by plastic particles: littering, materials used in agriculture and construction, and microplastic, which is caused by tyre abrasion in traffic, for example, and is carried across the country by the wind. Once there, microplastic accumulates in the soil, remains there for several centuries and changes its structure. This has a negative effect on the microorganisms and earthworms that are important for soil fertility. In addition, microplastic there attracts other pollutants like a magnet and enters the food chain together with them. It can be absorbed by humans and animals and, according to the FOEN, has already been detected in foods such as fish, mussels, sugar and honey – as well as in the human body itself.
«Not even 10% of the plastic ever produced in the world has been recycled so far.»Plastic Atlas of the Heinrich Böll Foundation, 2019
Plastic has a negative impact on health
Plastics are a health risk, not just those in our food chain. They contain a lot of added chemicals such as plasticizers, dyes or flame retardants. Many additives can leak out of the material over time, accumulate in room air and house dust and enter the body through breathing or the skin. According to the Plastic Atlas, the leaked substances, in particular the plasticizers, can trigger numerous diseases – from ADHD and immune and nervous diseases to diabetes and infertility.
Plastic cannot be disposed of in an environmentally friendly manner
According to the Plastic Atlas, around 40% of our plastic products are waste again after less than a month. Unfortunately, however, plastic cannot be disposed of in an environmentally friendly way. Although recycling would be desirable, it quickly reaches the limits of what is technically possible, partly because of the many chemical additives involved. As a result, a large part of it is incinerated, but not only a lot of CO2 but also numerous pollutants that are hardly broken down by the environment and can cause further diseases in humans.
We’re still sitting on our plastic waste
Because there is too much waste, there has been a veritable export of plastic waste around the world. Since 1988, around half of the global plastic waste has been exported to China, where it has been melted and processed into pellets to be reused. Since 2018, most of the global waste flows have gone to Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia and Indonesia. But as import requirements are generally tightening, exporting countries – especially the industrialised countries – are increasingly sitting on their waste. As a result, it is usually incinerated or disposed of in landfill without further ado instead of being recycled.
«The problem of disposal is exacerbating as more plastic is produced every year, with more than 600 million tonnes per year by 2025.»Plastic Atlas of the Heinrich Böll Foundation, 2019
Solution Bioplastics?
Well, what next? There are already “biodegradable” plastics made from various materials, including plant-based ones. However, degradation only works under exactly the right conditions (temperature, microorganisms, etc.) and requires industrial fermentation or composting facilities. As neither nutrients nor humus can be extracted from them, such plastics are usually incinerated in order to generate “at least” thermal energy from them. In addition to biodegradable plastics, there are also “bio-based” plastics: They consist of natural, renewable substances such as sugar cane, corn and palm leaves. But here too, the environmental friendliness is unclear, as the raw materials are processed into chemical raw materials in large-scale industrial processes and their decomposition takes an extremely long time.
So what can you do? The best way to do this is to replace plastic products with alternatives as far as possible. Here are some suggestions in this article. And it remains to be hoped that science and industry will find new, intelligent, promising ways and materials.
Sources:
FOEN
German Federal Environment Agency, infographic “So lang bleibt der Müll im Meer,” 2016
2019 Plastic Atlas of the Heinrich Böll Foundation