Author: SDG Knowledge Hub

Following an all-night negotiating session and years of talks, the fifth International Conference on Chemicals Management (ICCM5) formally adopted a new global framework for the integrated management of chemicals and waste beyond 2020, the ‘Global Framework on Chemicals – For a planet free of harm from chemicals and waste.’ The Conference also adopted the Bonn Declaration, a political statement drafted over months of informal consultations and agreed to in the final hours.

Author: Katarina Anđelković

October 4, 2023 – About 40 minutes after midnight, a fire broke out in the yard of the Drava International company in the Osijek suburb of Brijest. As the police reported, it is plastic mass and packaging that are burning. About 50 firefighters are putting it out, and in case you are in or near Osijek, here is what you need to know about the Osijek fire.

Author: Center for International Environmental Law

BONN, GERMANY — The Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL) welcomed the adoption of the Global Framework on Chemicals and Waste (GFC*), on September 30 at the Fifth International Conference on Chemicals Management (ICCM5) in Bonn, Germany. The new framework, for a planet free of harm from chemicals and waste, is a successor of the Strategic Approach to International Chemicals Management (SAICM), organized by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

Author: Frank Landymore

A cave that's been closed off to human visitors for 30 years has been found to contain high concentrations of microplastics — and that should worry you. Such were the findings of a pair of new studies, the most recent of which was published in the journal Science of the Total Environment, that used the cave's hermetic seclusion as a way of gauging just how far microplastics have penetrated the environment, and more specifically, subsurface water systems.

Author: Sean Seddon

A ban on some single-use plastic products will come into force across England on Sunday. Shops and hospitality businesses will no longer be able to supply plastic cutlery, balloon sticks and polystyrene cups under the new rules. The government says the move will "tackle the scourge of litter and protect the environment from plastic pollution". But councils have warned that some firms are not ready for the change.

Author: Tom Wilfer

Yesterday the Bundestag decided on the levy rates for the new single-use plastic fund. With the majority of the government factions of the SPD, Greens and FDP, Parliament approved the disposable plastic fund regulation presented by the Federal Environment Ministry without any changes. This not only fixed the amount of the single-use plastic tax to be paid by manufacturers, but also defined the points system for disbursing funds to the public waste disposal authorities to eliminate littering.

Author: Recycling Product News Staff

The ISRI Board of Directors is considering changes to the Guidelines for Recycled Plastic that were approved by the ISRI Plastics Division on September 20, 2023. The deliberations will take place at ISRI's upcoming fall board meeting in Denver, Colorado on October 18, 2023.

Author: Schuyler Mitchell

Head south on State Highway 96, past a stretch of soybean crops and tobacco fields, and you’ll arrive in Zebulon, North Carolina, population 8,665. There, on a quiet stretch of Industrial Drive, sits a nondescript commercial building. It’s easy to miss; the name on the front door is barely legible. But atop that humble three-acre lot lies a leading solution to the global plastic pollution crisis — well, according to the plastic industry.

Author: Esmé E Deprez

Kyla Bennett, an ecologist and attorney in Easton, Massachusetts, subscribes to a school of thought called antispeciesism, which considers the preferential treatment of any animal species over another, humans included, to be unethical. So she’s long railed against the use of chemicals to kill insects, especially over a 26-square-mile stretch of freshwater wetlands and soggy woodlands near her home. For thousands of years, the Wampanoag people sought refuge and sustenance in the area and considered it alive with spirits. Today it’s called the Hockomock Swamp and retains lore of the paranormal, with reported sightings of Bigfoot and UFOs, but it’s mostly a place to walk dogs and paddle canoes.

Author: Chris Voloschuk

This week, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island and Congressman Lloyd Doggett of Texas reintroduced legislation that, if enacted, would impose a 20-cent-per-pound fee on the sale of virgin plastic resin used to make single-use plastics. The Rewarding Efforts to Decrease Unrecycled Contaminants in Ecosystems (REDUCE) Act was first introduced by Whitehouse in 2021 with the goal of creating an incentive to recycle plastic and help reduce plastic waste he says “is disrupting coastal economies, overwhelming ecosystems and threatening public health.”

Author: Reilly Sullivan

Ten fire trucks and 100 firefighters are currently battling a blaze in Sydney’s west which has engulfed a plastics factory. The fire broke out on Thursday about 4am at a factory on Woodpark Rd in the suburb of Smithfield, in the city's west. The facility is believed to have been operational at the time the blaze started with about 30 workers inside the building.

Author: Peter Dennis

Rishi Sunak has scrapped “burdensome” proposals he says would “force” British people to have seven different bins in their homes. The Prime Minister announced the changes in a speech that signalled a major policy shift. Yesterday (19 September) reports emerged that Rishi Sunak was likely to scrap what he sees as “burdensome” recycling schemes as part of plans to weaken some of the government’s key net zero commitments.

Author: Danielle Renwick

In August 2019, the sprawling Kpone landfill, 25 miles from the center of Accra, Ghana, burst into flames. As the city’s only engineered landfill, Kpone had been collecting cast-off clothing from the United States and other wealthy countries for years. As they soaked up rain, the textiles trapped gases and chemicals that emanated from all that decomposing trash until, one day, the landfill exploded. The ensuing fire burned for eight months, engulfing nearby communities in smoke. “Waste has always been inflicted upon the margins,” said Oliver Franklin-Wallis, author of the new book, Wasteland: The Secret World of Waste and the Urgent Search for a Cleaner Future. Waste, he writes, is often exported from rich countries to poor ones, a phenomenon known as “toxic colonialism.” 

Author: Nina Lakhani

The vast majority of the environmental projects most frequently used to offset greenhouse gas emissions appear to have fundamental failings suggesting they cannot be relied upon to cut planet-heating emissions, according to a new analysis. The global, multibillion-dollar voluntary carbon trading industry has been embraced by governments, organisations and corporations including oil and gas companies, airlines, fast-food brands, fashion houses, tech firms, art galleries and universities as a way of claiming to reduce their greenhouse gas footprint.