[Special Article] Everything about Plastic and Our Choice for Tomorrow 2. Plastic Disposal, How It became the Major Cause of Environmental Pollution

The plastic amount annually generated in the world is 4 million tons. Among them, it is disposable packaging that has been contributing the environmental pollution most. How do you think these post-consumer products are managed? Today, we will check how much plastic waste each country produces and how they become a serious cause of pollution.

 

Plastic Waste Generated in Each Country

A joint research team with SEA (Sea Education Association) in the U.S. published a report on plastic waste generated in each country at <Science Advances> in October last year. It turns out the U.S. produces the most amount of plastic waste in the world.

According to the report, the U.S. officially generated 34 million tons of plastic waste in 2016 and summed up to 42 million tons if including the amount that was illegally dumped or exported.

With the population of a country considered, it is noted that the U.S. consumer produces 20% more plastic waste compared to India or China. Now, did you notice that the waste generation per capita of each country is mostly proportional to a country’s economic level? Experts point out it is due to the increases in single-person households, the use of delivery service, and demands for processed food. The outbreak of COVID-19 is also known to be a cause for the plastic waste increase.

Then, where does this plastic waste flow to?

 

Plastic Waste Management and Its Environmental Impact

Roland Geyer and his team said the total amount of plastic in the world generated so far is 8.3 billion tons and 6.3 billion tons of it had been disposed of. Unfortunately, as little as 9% of the waste has been recycled and 12% was incinerated while 79% of them went to landfills or abandoned in nature. How does each management affect the environment?

1) Incinerating

Plastic mostly made of oils and gases generates a great deal of heat. Therefore, it is suggested to be a positive measure to expand the number of incinerators to have ‘waste to energy' facilities. Some places already produce electricity by burning plastic waste instead of oils and coals.

If burned, plastic waste emits toxic gases.

However, plastic which is a compound of various chemicals release highly toxic gases such as Dioxins, Furans, Mercury, and Polychlorinated Biphenyls into the atmosphere. These gases may increase the risk of heart diseases and respiratory diseases such as asthma and emphysema, and cause rashes, nausea, damage to the nervous system, and so on. Therefore, the expansion of an incinerator is usually strongly resisted by the residents. After all, it ends up being established in a relatively poor neighborhood with people who are already vulnerable to health care.

 

2) Burial

Plastic waste in landfills pollutes the air.

The landfill releases Methane and Carbon Dioxide which are the major causes of global warming. Methane, especially, can capture 20 times more heat in the atmosphere than Carbon Dioxide that its generation should be minimized to prevent global warming from getting worse.

Plastic waste in landfills pollutes underground water.

The waste in landfills produces hazardous toxic chemicals. When it rains, these substances leach into underground water. This water containing toxic metals, ammonia, and pathogen may seriously pollute the groundwater and flows into lakes, rivers, and oceans destroying the marine ecosystem in the end.

Plastic waste in landfills pollutes the ecosystem.

In addition, pest breeding and odors from landfills may cause congenital defects, cancers, respiratory diseases. Besides, it may change the soil quality and ecosystem around the place, too.

 

3) Recycling

Only 9% of the plastic waste gets to be recycled.

The figure, 9%, doesn’t also mean that they are recycled in each country. The number contains the amount passed on to developing countries from advanced places under the name of ‘recycling’. In fact, the U.S. has passed much plastic waste to countries including Vietnam, Philippines, Bangladesh, Laos, Ethiopia, Senegal where environmental regulations have not been strongly implemented with low labor cost.

 

Why Doesn’t Plastic Waste Get Recycled?

How come does this versatile material plastic lose its value after the first use?

First, it is more efficient to produce virgin plastic than to recycle. Because of the oil price continuously dropping, it is economically beneficial to produce new plastic than to sort the waste and recycle it. Furthermore, as there is no strict regulation on the use of recycled plastic, a market is hardly established without the demands of such products.

Second, composite materials hinder recycling. The products sold in the market usually consist of more than 2 different materials for either beauty or specific functions. When they are not completely separated from each material, they are often excluded for recycling.

Lastly, it is different recycling infrastructures in each country. It contributes to the low recycling rate that each country and even each local has different infrastructures to recycle materials. In developing countries, most of them do not have enough resources or infrastructure to even manage their own plastic waste produced in the country.

 

Then, Is Recycling the Right Answer?

There is a clear limit to recycling plastic waste. The more times the material is getting recycled, the less quality the recycled product has. In short, it is considered to be downcycling that they end up burial and incineration in the end. Therefore, recycling plastic is not a fundamental alternative, but just a mere delay.

After all, the waste will be either burned or piled up in the landfill or waterways flowing into the ocean, posing a great threat to the marine ecosystem.

For sure, recycling has some environmental benefits. Yet, there are barriers to widely apply recycling in this complicated system of capitalism. We may expect some energy efficiency by incineration, but both incineration and burial can cause great danger if there weren’t stringent regulations and control. Therefore, we need to find the most proper way with consideration of each country’s environment and economy.

 

Let’s Find the Packaging Easily Compostable Everywhere!

Environmental impacts from plastic pollution are not limited to a certain area, but are related to the world. Therefore, it is required to develop more environmentally friendly products as rePAPER’s REPA COAT that is recyclable and compostable and to apply them to many more industrial fields.

Some bioplastics made from biomass such as starch or by-products of sugar canes are suggested as an alternative. However, it is difficult to distinguish them from conventional plastic materials and separation standards are not yet prepared that they have been blamed to be another cause of greenwashing.

Lately, PHA(Polyhydroxyalkanoate) has been spotlighted for its outstanding compostability, but it seems to take some more time to be ready for mass production. Still, more development and research on these environmentally friendly materials are required to recover the crumbling environment.

COVID-19 stopped the world for about a year now and somehow made us generate more plastic waste than ever. Yet, there are now countries gradually released from the threat of the virus by strict social distancing and vaccination and they started to regulate disposable plastics more actively now. Next time, we will review each country’s updated regulation on disposable plastics and think about our next step for the environment!