Final Presentation: The Plastic Disaster

 How we went from discovering a miracle-material from crude oil to polluting every square inch, from the ocean to our lungs. 

The discovery of a cheap, sterile, and abundant material could have been an undeniable boon to humankind, if not for a gross mishandling of our waste, and a violent abuse of our environment. 

First discovered in 1869, synthetic polymers, plastics, quickly became a household product. It's production exploded during World War II, where the cheap and simple product was used both domestically and militarily. Plane parts and windows were manufactured from plastic compounds abroad, while kitchen tools were phased towards plastic at home. 

The explosive growth in plastic production, combined with a negligent and ignorant method of disposal, COMBINED WITH the promotion of single-use plastics to increase income of producers resulted in vast amounts of pollution, especially in our oceans. In 1997, Charles Moore discovers the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. This was an especially startling find, since concern for plastic pollution had been present since the 60's, but was largely assuaged by the start of the recycling contain, promoted heavily by the plastic industry. 

Recycling has, however, not saved us from plastic.

First, the prevalence of plastic pollution has resulted in a ubiquitous presence of microplastics, the result of plastic breaking down. These plastics, ranging from 5μm to 5mm, have been found... everywhere. From the deep ocean to the deep lung, MPs are everywhere. And problematic, they are. Plastics contain additives, some of which are estrogen mimics, affecting the sexual development of anamniotes. We're far from safe, presence of these MPs in our lungs, blood, and placental tissue has resulted in heavy inflammation of these regions. Cell death and DNA damage has been recorded in nonhuman animals. This certainly seems serious enough to make some effort in reducing plastic pollution, right?

The pandemic has complicated plastic pollution, of course.
With the pandemic, especially early on before the CDC had laxed their recommendations, single-use face masks and gloves were hot items. With a spike in usage, however, we see a spike in waste. An area only 20% the size of Nashville, in Toronto, discovered enough pollution related to COVID-19 protection to predict ~14,000 PPE items polluting the area in a year. This is, of course, additional to the already present crisis. These masks leak/break down into additives and MPs, just as any other plastic vinyl does. We can expect an increase in estrogen mimics, chemical pollutants, and MPs from discarded PPE. 

Plastic recycling, as is, has been largely unsuccessful.

Where to begin? First, the cost of recycling plastics is nearly universally more expensive than manufacturing virgin plastic. This incentivizes manufacturing over recycling in our capitalist system, so who would ever recycle? Recall, plastic companies supported the recycling movements early in its conception. In large part this was an attempt to deflect responsibility away from the corporations and onto the individuals. What's worse, unlike glass, plastics can only be recycled 2-3 times at most. Even the most recyclable types. The failure to structure the recycling industry prudently has been another nail in the coffin, as single stream recycling (the public dumps all plastic into one bin, which is organized on site to be recycled) is much too costly and multi-stream recycling (the public dumps plastic in individual bins by type) has been much harder to promote effectively. 

 

What hope do we have?

Recycling can be helpful, though not as a solution. Think of it as applying pressure to a wound. It helps, it can slow the problem at hand, but you should definitely see a doctor. With restructuring, such as better promotion of multi-stream recycling and more effective recycling methods, recycling could be seen as an invaluable tool in combating plastic waste. The problem is, the plastic still exists. While I'm not naive enough to believe we can nix plastic completely, we can use alternatives. Glass, as previously stated, is infinitely recyclable. Alternatives such as metals, which are much more reusable, and bamboo, can cut non-degradable plastic waste. There have, additionally, been efforts to reduce or restrict single-use plastic usage, such as 3 states completely banning single-use plastic bags. 

The Ethics of plastic.
Julie Sze and Jonathan London, two environmental bioethicists, have claimed that plastic pollution has resulted in environmental racism, where locations in the global south and central Asia have been claimed by more prosperous nations as "pollution havens," where plastic can be deposited with little recourse, despite not producing it. This theme is not one-off, as Robert Bullard has claimed this activity is a form of "slow-violence" where the global south is saddled with the repercussions of plastic pollution they didn't produce. Andrew Watterson and William Dinan pointed out the lagging of legislature in terms of environmental sciences, resulting in this slow-violence going unchecked for long periods of time. Speculatively, they claim this may be in part due to the involvement of fossil fuel and plastic industry in politics.