Plastic products show up in nearly every aspect of our lives. I feel fortunate to have lived at a time when this was not the case. When I was a kid, Coke was bottled in returnable glass bottles. People figured out how to stay hydrated without single-use plastic bottles and clothes were made mostly of cotton and wool. I feel a profound sadness that today’s youth only know and experience plastic products. About half of all plastics were made in the past 20 years. The evidence of these materials is everywhere. It is difficult to find places that are not polluted by plastic materials. In my collaborative work at the Lake Michigan shoreline, over 55,000 pieces of plastic garbage have been removed from one sand path.
Plastics are made with disposal in mind. They are the third most manufactured material (after cement and steel), but have short lifetimes. Some researchers view this human era of plastic production as its own part of the human geological time (Anthropocene), as the Plasticene, “the marker of the upper subdivision of this stage,” since there will be evidence of plastic around for thousands of years, if not longer.
The fact that most plastics are made for short-term use or simply do not last very long is contrary to the timeline of the resources used to make plastics, gas and oil. Fossil fuels took hundreds of millions of years to form deep in the earth. An estimated 4-10% of gas/oil are used to make plastic products and many are used one time. Single-use plastics are manufactured from resources that took millions of years to form. After their one use, they are mostly discarded, buried, maybe recycled. An estimated 80% of plastics are not recyclable. We have a massive waste problem.
Plastics do not biodegrade. They fragment into smaller pieces. Plastics contain thousands of different chemical compounds; many are known to be toxic. Studies show that there are many adverse human and environmental health consequences of exposure to plastic pieces (micro and nanoplastics) and their chemical additives. We ingest them; they are in the air we breathe; they are common in our soils.
Since I am concerned about what the rising exposures to plastic particles and chemicals mean for our youth, my grandchildren and life, I speak out as often as possible. We can turn the tide if we work together and reject the onslaught of unnecessary plastic materials in our lives. This is happening in other countries, and in some states in the U.S.
Join the Hoosier Environmental Council and the Plastic Reduction Alliance in highlighting the problems of plastics. Talk with your friends and family and take steps to cut out single-use plastics.
About the Author
Dr. Julie Peller is a professor of Chemistry at Valparaiso University, and the Executive Director of the Plastic Reduction Alliance.
Categories: Health & Wellness, Water & Wilderness Protection