The Plastic Age
How do we live without plastic, the first of a two part series
From the Stone Age to the Iron age, periods of history have been described as times when certain materials were discovered and primarily used. Unfortunately, plastic surrounds us in every part of our lives, which means we would be living through the Plastic Age. With the ever growing waste, is there an end to this? How can you minimise your plastic footprint and leave the Earth better after us.
A brief history of plastic
Plastic has a long history, and it doesn’t start with the hydrocarbon type. Natural plastics such as horn, tortoiseshell, amber and rubber were used for various things like decorative combs for rich aristocrats in the 19th century. Sadly, the over use of these materials meant that these animals, namely elephants and turtles were facing extinction. This has lead to the invention of synthetic plastics, another material that is pushing many marine animals to the brink of extinction.
The first man-made plastic was a blend of natural and synthetic materials, its inventor, Alexander Parkes. His aim was to mimic ivory and tortoiseshell, allowing him to sell it for a lower price, making it more affordable for the everyday person. After this invention, a race to the first fully synthetic plastic was on. Leo Baekeland, a Belgian chemist, beat his Scottish rival, James Swinburne by submitting his patent one day earlier. Thus, Bakelite was invented, in 1907 and the world has ever since been addicted to plastic. If you want to know more visit this link
Being split into 7 categories, there are thousands of variations of plastic, but what is it exactly?
The term plastic actually comes from the material property meaning: being able to be formed or moulded under heat and pressure. All synthetic plastic nowadays are made of two groups: chemicals and fossil fuels.
Why do we use plastic?
Plastic is dirt cheap, easy to manufacture, easily customisable and can be mass produced, its abundancy makes it ideal for many industries to incorporate plastics into everything.
What’s so bad about plastic?
Well its these chemicals and fossil fuels that are the problem. The use of plastic has two main elements that are bad about it, the production and the disposal.
During its production, the extraction of fossil fuels as well as the moulding of the plastic creates not only carbon dioxide but other greenhouse and toxic gases. According to a study, the most prevalent gases are methane and ethylene, these don’t only affect the atmosphere, but can lead to health concerns like cardiovascular and respiratory disease when exposed long term to these emissions.
The second and the more irreversible effect are the consequences of its disposal. Many plastics are 1) not recyclable, 2) if recyclable, not recycled and 3) not biodegradable.
Not Recyclable: Surprisingly, this isn’t as much of a problem as you would think. According to the British Plastic Foundation ‘nearly all plastics are able to be recycled’. So what happens? Why is nearly all of the plastic going straight to the landfill.
If recyclable, not recycled: This comes down to two points:
Money: It is far cheaper to produce new plastic than to use recycled plastic in products. This is because of the additional things that have to happen first before it actually gets recycled. It comes down to 12 individual processes which thoroughly separate the non-plastics from the plastics, splitting it into the individual categories and then getting rid of any dirt/residue.
Contamination: Contaminants is a general term for anything that shouldn’t be together with the thing you’re recycling. It could be a glass jar in a plastic bin, or even yoghurt still left in the cup. These things not only make it harder to recycle things, but also means it doesn’t get recycled in the first place. Unfortunately, the processes listed above don’t always happen and therefore recycling centres often discard the item, if not the whole bag of recyclable material. This leads to most of your recycled material not ending up where we expected. To read more about contamination read the following link.
Not Biodegradable: So at this point, we are talking about most of the plastics which sadly, end up in the landfill. Once there, it will very slowly degrade, damaging the surrounding environment in one of many ways.
Earth: You know those chemicals, the ones added for colour or flexibility, well while the plastic degrades, they are leaching into the soil and can end up in the water table. Not only does this pollute nearby water sources but it can end up in animals, our food or even the water we drink. The main issue here is that each bit of plastic can take 500 years to decompose, meaning the build up of the chemicals at landfills leads to high pollution rates at nearby water sources.
Wildlife: Landfills don’t only have plastics or metals, but they also have a lot of food waste. This means that a lot of animals such as rodents and birds eat the food. But in a lot of cases, they aren’t just eating your scraps, but the plastic as well. These can not only cause them to have internal injuries or blockages but also release toxic gases and chemicals that can effect a lot of natural processes.
Marine Life: A lot of the time, these plastics end up in waterways like rivers and oceans by either direct dumping, or by wind. Again, the animals mistake them as food and eat them and in many cases, it leads to death. For example, a floating plastic bag, to a hungry turtle looks like a jellyfish.
This is just the tip of the iceberg, the plastics I have been talking about are the ones visible to the naked eye. Microplastics are less than 5mm in size, about the width of a grain of rice. Even though being small, these plastics can have the same effects on nature that regular sized plastics do. Due to the size, it also means that these plastics are much harder to eliminate from the oceans.
If you can have damage from one piece of plastic imagine it from the annual wastage of 350 million tonnes. A stat that is growing rapidly and expected to triple to 1 billion by 2060. With all that plastic, where is it in our lives?
Spot the Plastic!
Look around you, or go on a short trip around your house or town, and make a list of all the items in your life that contain plastic, no matter how big the amount is. Now even with the list that you have, there may be many items that will surprise you that have plastic in them.
Classic Plastics - the ones you probably picked up
Plastic bottle (reusable or not)
Tech: Headphones, speakers or phone cases
Kitchen Appliances: Blenders, mixers, kettles, kitchen robots, electronics all surrounded by plastic.
Bathroom: Your bodywash, shampoo, mouthwash, toothpaste and toothbrush.
Stationary: Pens, rulers, pencils and scissors.
Hidden Plastics
Bedroom: Duvets, pillows and mattresses (especially those fancy memory foam ones), desk organisers and storage.
Bathroom: Shower heads, shower floors, baths, faucets, disposable wipes, the bodywash/shampoo itself, make up and sanitary products.
Kitchen: Cutting boards, ladles, containers, sponges, the non-stick part of nonstick pans, clingwrap/clingfilm and ziplock/freezer bags. All these plastics turn into microplastics when scratched and can be ingested, cutting boards are especially bad. A lot of those plastic containers will also contain BPA’s a chemical that affect your hormones and have links with cancer.
Wardrobe: A lot of your clothing will be made of plastic nowadays, largely due to fast fashion and the consumer culture. The fibres of the plastic come loose in the washing machine and become ‘microplastics’ which are washed away and end up in waterways.
Restaurants: Take-out containers, utensils, straws, menus. Those restaurant’s with chalkboard menus may not be so bad after all.
Supermarkets: Pretty much everything, even glass jars have plastic stickers/wrappers on them. Be weary of those tinned goods, they also have plastic, some contain those BPA chemicals, so be aware.
In Food: Tea bags, chewing gum, yes you are chewing on plastic, be careful next time you’re looking for that minty fresh breath.
Hospitals: Due to hygiene a lot of plastic gets wasted, from PPE to syringes and prescription medicine.
Now you may be asking yourself, ok, I know these are all made of plastics but what can I do about it? Is a glass jar better for the environment than a plastic one?
And there is a lot of items that for one reason or another cannot be made without plastic, but in next week’s newsletter I will discuss the ways you can limit the plastic you use in most aspects of your life.
Thanks for tuning in,
Till next week,
Maxime