Climate Emergency Diaries #1
The Plastic Planet
Plastic consumption and packaging global madness
Humans started to populate the Earth only 200,000 years ago.
It is a very short time, compared to the 4.5 billion years of the planet.
Despite this, our impact has become so critically important that scientists have begun calling this era Anthropocene, a Latin term that means “the era of humans.”
Unfortunately, our control and domination over nature are proving terribly destructive, leading not only to the so-called sixth mass extinction of animals — at a rate 100 times faster than it would be without humans, the world population of wild animals has been halved since 1970, while our has doubled — but also to a real risk for our own civilization.
One of the problems that is emerging is the over-consumption of plastic.
The first synthetic plastic, Bakelite, was produced in 1907, but the exponential growth in the consumption of plastic materials did not start until 1950. Since then and until the present day, production has increased around 200 times, up to 381 million tons in 2015, and beyond. In total from the 50s to today, it is estimated that over 8 billion tons of plastic have been cumulatively produced.
According to an OECD report, only 15% of plastic waste is recycled globally. About 60% ends up in landfill, abandoned or burned. Moreover, a shocking amount of plastic, about 8 million tons every year, ends up in the Oceans, with terrible consequences for the ecosystem. The total plastic at sea currently exceeds 150 million tons.
The main problems that this cause are:
- Marine life: Animals get caught, or ingest plastic and are exposed to chemicals
- Human health: through the food chain, plastic and chemicals reach us
- Economy: the estimated cost of plastic in the seas, mainly to the detriment of the tourism and fishing sectors, is between € 250 and € 700 million a year
- The non-recycling of 8 million tons of plastic per year is equivalent to the CO2 emission of 8 million cars
- Energy cost: plastic production is energy intensive, and represents between 4 and 8% of global oil and gas consumption
All of this to produce a flood of disposable objects, in a context of a linear economy that we can no longer afford,as we can no longer waste time, resources and energy, while we continue using the seas as an immense open-air dump.
An enormous percentage of plastic is used in the packaging sector. And an impressive quantity ends up becoming a waste in an extremely short time.
The numbers are incredible.
Consider for example the 2015's data:
- Globally Produced Plastic: 407 Million Tons
- Plastic produced globally for Packaging: 146 Million tonnes (36%)
- Global plastic waste: 302 Million tonnes (74% of production)
- Global plastic waste from packaging: 141 million tons (35% of production, but above all 47% of total waste, and 96% of packaging production)
These are numbers that testify to the general madness we are all contributing together. 96% of the plastic produced to be used as packaging becomes waste within a year of life. 47% of all plastic waste produced annually is due to packaging. And of all this, only a minor part, as mentioned, is recycled, while the rest ends up in landfills, burned (with all the negative consequences for health and the environment) or in the oceans.
With the exponential economic growth of countries like China, the situation is getting worse. China is responsible for a quarter of all the plastic abandoned in the world. In 2015, the Yellow River alone discharged 367,000 tons of plastic waste into the sea, more than any other river in the world, double that of the Ganges for example.
In total, the waste generated in China amounted to 59 million tons in 2010, in the USA 38 million, in Germany to 14 million, in Italy to 2.9 million.
These figures are obviously relative to completely different populations. If we analyze waste per capita, we find China produces only 0.12 kg per person per day, very close to Italy’s 0.13, while Germany produces 0.48 kg and USA 0.34.
But it is clear that on one hand the total waste matters, and on the other hand, it counts the amount of waste that is recycled out of the total.
Recently, the problem has also increased, because of the spread of new delivery models related to food and to everything else we can possibly imagine.
In 2018 for example, the food delivery apps totaled 62 billion euros revenues in China. UberEats, to give an idea of the different size of the business, has delivered orders for “only” 7 billion euros worldwide.
This astronomical growth of the delivery business has the consequence of having to get rid of a disproportionate amount of plastic, including containers, bags, packaging, etc., which the Country is unable to recycle. According to a study by the University of Shenzhen, in 2017 the Chinese food-delivery market generated 1.6 million tons of packaging waste, nine times more than just two years earlier.
The Chinese government is obviously already trying improving the situation and to increase recycling. Among other things, it has recently banned the import of waste from other countries destined for recycling, thus aiming to dispose of a greater amount of internal waste. However, this has repercussions on other countries and the global problem of plastics, because many found themselves without an outlet for waste that was essential for so many years, and lacking a dedicated management policy and places to carry and manage their own waste.
Another reason why plastic has spread so incredibly in the food sector is obviously due to health issues, for which it is considered good to pack food with sterile material. The problem is that we have gone too far, so now it has become the practice to find in supermarkets natural and naturally peeled products, such as fruit and vegetables, packaged in plastic trays and covered with cellophane.
What can we do to resolve these issues?
The choices we make every day have a crazy impact.
If we choose to bring this problem to the center of our lives, and if everyone does something, we can still solve it.
On one side it is clear that we must demand that food and industrial packaging be drastically re-designed and that new rules get enforced. For example, a recent European Union law bans the use of disposable plastics starting from 2021 and represent undoubtedly a step in the proper direction.
But on the other side, within a civilization based on unbridled consumerism and “free” market, consumer power is essential.
When we go shopping, we have to start selecting the things we purchase based on their environmental impact. And so, for example, we must try to discard all packaged commodities as much as possible, and within packaged products we should prefer those that use glass, paper and aluminum, products for which recycling and reuse rates are significantly superior, and which cause less environmental problems and energy consumption.
For example, we must avoid plastic water bottles choosing glass instead, or even better, filter and drink tap water.
Recently the WWF, to make us become aware of the problem, has launched what will become the longest live streaming ever , which films the process of decomposing a bottle. The video was launched May 10, 2019, and will last for the next 450 to 500 years!
We must make this choice not only when we buy our food, but in general when we purchase any item.
We must also start reducing consumption; we must take the path of minimalism in all fields. This does not mean living worse, nor does it means to stop the economy. It means making purchases with awareness, of oneself, of the environment, and of one’s real needs. It means preferring quality products, even more expensive, but not to be thrown away over a short period of time, adding to the mountain of waste we have already produced.
It means becoming aware that our time is running out, and that we need to wake up from the long sleep and the dream of dominating nature. This dream is becoming more and more a nightmare, and the time has come, as a whole humanity, all together, to remedy our mistakes and take responsibility for ourselves.
Will we continue allowing our indifference to be responsible for a crime against Nature and Humanity?
We owe it to the planet; we owe it to the ecosystem, to following generations that we are robbing of the future.
But before that, we owe it to ourselves.