Author: Beatriz Santos
Exports of plastic waste from the European Union to countries worldwide has been growing steadily in the past decade. EU plastic waste exports to non-Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, a group of mostly rich countries, rose to 58.9 million kg/month in August 2023 from 28.1 million kg/month in May 2022.
Read MoreAuthor: Daisy Dumas
More than a year after the demise of REDcycle, Coles and Woolworths customers are still incorrectly being told they can return soft plastic food packaging to stores, where they will be handled by the now-defunct recycling program. So what’s going on?
What are soft plastics? Simply put, they’re plastics that can be scrunched into a ball. The term covers bread and cereal packets, vegetable packaging, chocolate bar wrappers and clingfilm. Australians use 70bn pieces – or about 538,000 tonnes – of soft plastics each year, according to the Australian Packaging Covenant Organisation (Apco).
Read MoreAuthor: Jabed Ahmed
Shocking pictures have revealed Hermit crabs are increasingly turning to plastic waste as armour for their bodies amid record levels of pollution in the world’s oceans. The findings are based on analysis of photos taken by wildlife enthusiasts and the discovery have been published as part of a study in the journal Science of the Total Environment.
Read MoreAuthor: Victoria Gill
Hermit crabs all over the world, which scavenge shells as armour for their bodies, are turning increasingly to plastic waste instead. The conclusion is based on analysis of photos, taken by wildlife enthusiasts, and published online. Scientists said they were "heartbroken" to see the extent to which the animals were living in our rubbish.
Read MoreAuthor: Sidhi Mittal
This is according to the ‘Failing Commitments’ report from Business360, a competitive intelligence firm providing research and analysis services. The analysis is based on data sourced from both the Ellen MacArthur Foundation and the revenue filings of companies that committed to the Foundation’s New Plastics Economy Global Commitment in 2018. This initiative, supported by more than 1,000 organisations, aims to address global plastic pollution through collective goals.
Read MoreAuthor: University of Utrecht
About half of Europe’s plastic waste is exported to several countries in the Global South, including Vietnam. An Utrecht University research team ventured to Minh Khai Craft Village, the largest recycling hub in Vietnam, to follow the recycling path of European plastic.
Read MoreAuthor: Daily Sabah
he Mediterranean region faces a severe threat from plastic pollution, with an average of 229,465 tons of plastic waste added annually, according to warnings from experts. Middle East Technical University (METU) Marine Sciences Institute faculty member professor Ahmet Kıdeyş expressed concerns over the escalating pollution levels in the Mediterranean, comparing it unfavorably to other seas worldwide.
Read MoreAuthor: Carolyn Wilke
Microplastics have turned up in some of the most remote places, such as the Antarctic and the summit of Mount Fuji. Yet models of atmospheric transport haven’t been able to fully explain how these plastic bits stray so far from the people that produced them. A new study finds that the shape of microplastics influences the distances they fly (Environ. Sci. Technol. 2023, DOI: 10.1021/acs.est.3c08209). “You find these microplastics worldwide, even far away from likely sources,” says Andreas Stohl, a meteorologist at the University of Vienna and one of the study’s authors. Most of these microplastics seem to be fibers or relatively complex shapes, he says. “But most models assume that particles are spherical.”
Read MoreAuthor: Miquéla Thornton
“Big Oil Is in Trouble. Its Plan: Flood Africa With Plastic,” a headline in The New York Times read in 2020. The “trouble” the Times referred to was the decline of fossil fuels amid the climate crisis. “Big Oil” referenced the lobby group the American Chemistry Council (ACC), which includes the likes of Exxon, Dow, Shell, Dupont and Total. As the industry ramps up plastic production to make up for lost profits, the plan was to find somewhere to dump all the waste.
Read MoreAuthor: Karen DeWitt
Environmental groups in New York say a top priority in 2024 will be getting a law approved that would cut the amount of plastic packaging in consumer products in half over the 12 years and help combat climate change. It faces fierce opposition from the plastics industry. The bill would also step up recycling efforts and ban a form of plastics recycling known as chemical recycling, which heats the plastic waste to a high temperature and converts it into a form of fossil fuel.
Read MoreAuthor: Chris McCrory
WASHINGTON — Aldi, the popular discount grocery chain, will no longer sell plastic shopping bags to customers, becoming the first major retailer in the U.S. to completely eliminate the environmentally-problematic checkout staple. In a statement released earlier this month, Aldi officials said they had met their goal of removing all plastic shopping bags by the end of 2023, eliminating them from the chain's 2,300 stores across the U.S.
Read MoreAuthor: Josh Jackman
Plastics release 1.8 billion tonnes of greenhouse gases per year, which equates to 3.4% of the world’s emissions. That means plastic has a bigger effect on climate change every year than all aviation and shipping. We can’t effectively address climate change without massively reducing the amount of plastic we create, use, and throw away. Here are the main ways in which our addiction to plastic contributes to climate change, and the actions we can all take to help solve this issue.
Read MoreAuthor: Bethanie Carney Almroth and Eric Carmona Martinez
Plastic pollution is a menace worldwide. Plastics are now found in every environment on the planet, from the deepest seas to the atmosphere and human bodies. Scientific evidence describing harm to the environment and humans is growing. Hence, the United Nations has resolved to negotiate a legally binding instrument to end plastic pollution.
Read MoreAuthor: Pandora Dewan
Microplastics are all around us—in the soil, in the air, in the sea and in our food. But exactly how much plastic we are eating daily is still somewhat of a mystery. The average person consumes a credit card's worth of microscopic plastic particles every week, according to previous estimates, and new studies have shown that this plastic often shows up in places you might not expect.
Read MoreAuthor: Katharine Gammon
On the top of Mount Everest, in the Mariana Trench, in the human placenta, and babies’ feces: Plastics are everywhere. They are built to last, and last they do: A plastic bag can endure for 20 years in the environment, and a disposable diaper, soiled or not, up to 200.
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