The Plastic Problem
Plastic is something most of us use everyday. From our personal products to items in our kitchen – it is literally everywhere.
Plastics were originally produced in order to replace more expensive and hard to find items like ivory, tortoise shell, horn, and linen. They were made by chemically treating cellulose (yes, a natural product) to create a moldable material. It was seen as actually helping the environment at the time because less items from nature were being depleted for human use. If only humans knew then what a negative effect it would have in the future.
About 30 years later the first synthetic plastic was made without any products from nature. Use of these new types of plastics increased tremendously during and after World War II because of their inexpensive production and durability. It wasn’t until the 1960’s hit that Americans started to see the negative side of plastic (1).
There are many, widely known negatives to plastic now. Chemicals within them have been known to leach out into our foods leading to hormone disruption and cancers. Wildlife has perished due to plastic consumption or entanglement. Most plastic is not biodegradable, and actually never completely disappears. It instead stays strewn across our landscapes, essentially forever. In some cases it breaks down into smaller and smaller pieces resulting in a form called a microplastic. These microplastics litter our environment, accumulating in our oceans and harming wildlife that ingests them. Marine species are especially at risk for ingesting microplastics, which in turn may affect the humans who then consume the marine life.
With all of the health and environmental concerns, why hasn’t plastic been eliminated?
We would have to make dramatic lifestyle changes in order to eliminate it completely. Many items we use to go about our daily lives – think cars, phones, and food containers – are made from plastic. Plastic helps keep items less expensive allowing more people to have access to the items we currently see as necessities, too.
We need to eliminate our reliance on plastic and develop more environmentally sound replacements, especially for those items that are not recyclable. I realize that this will be a slow process, though, and seems virtually impossible. As replacements are being invented and until we can create lives without plastic, we should focus on cutting down on the amounts we use in our daily lives.
While there are many different types and uses of plastic in our society, we are going to focus about one of the worst types (and usually the easiest to eliminate from our lives).
Single use plastic.
Single use plastic is a container or item that is generally only used once and then discarded. Out of the plastic produced in the world, it is estimated that over 40% is packaging that is used once and then discarded (2)! Most of the time these items are used for the convenience factor – like pre-packaged snacks or plastic cutlery. Some other examples of commonly used single use plastic items are straws, plastic grocery bags, coffee cups, cling wrap, and sandwich baggies.
We put a lot of energy and resources into an item that only gets used ONCE. Even worse – the time it is used just that once is usually short, very short. Think about how long you actually use a plastic straw for at a restaurant…an hour maybe? Well, it is estimated that it takes that same straw 100’s of years to decompose (if it even decomposes at all).
Where are these items discarded to once they have served their [short] purpose? Well, it depends.
Sometimes single use plastic is recycled. The key word here is sometimes – it is actually rarely recycled and it is estimated that we only recycle 9 percent of our plastic in the United States (3). The rest ends up in our landfills, floating in the ocean, or littering the landscape. The issue of why only a small amount of plastic is recycled is due to many reasons. One big factor is complexity of recycling and how challenging it can be to find where or how to recycle certain types of plastic. Many centers will not accept plastic grocery bags for example. These must be taken separately to other locations, so it easier for people to throw them in the trash instead of making a seperate trip to recycle. A few other reasons are inaccessibility to recycling centers and honestly, laziness.
But the real issue here is not lack of recycling – it is the reliance of single use plastic in the first place. We must stop this problem at the source if we really want to see change. We must STOP buying and using single use plastic!
I know…easier said than done.
I decided to see just how hard this monumental challenge would be by keeping track of how much single use plastic items I used or came in contact with for a whole week. It really opened my eyes to how many items I was using just once and then throwing away!
*Disclaimer* I have already started eliminating some single use from my life, but I still listed some of the items on here as if I haven’t just to show how much I would normally have used! Also – the only plastic items listed were ones that were used just once. Total plastic usage will be a future article!
Baby Wipes (daily) – Diapers (daily) – Stickers on produce – Grocery bags – Produce bags – Floss (daily) – Breastmilk storage bags – Prepared fruit container from store – Gallon freezer bag – Bun packaging – Plastic wrapping for celery – Chip Bag – Bag for baby carrots – Deli meat bag – Spinach bag – Strawberry container – Plastic sealant on milk jug – Make-up remover wipe – Pre-cut veggie container – Ground hamburger casing – Packaging for online order – Sealant on top of raisin container – M&M bag – New pen packaging – Netting for clementines – Film around fresh mushrooms – Clothing tag – Spoon/container for take out ice cream – Straw – Binding holding together bundle of yard waste bags
A few surprising items that I realized I come in contact with pretty regularly- produce stickers, floss, and the little plastic tags that are used in the clothing industry!
I also learned the bags I use for the occasional tea aren’t made with plastic! Score!
I am now on the journey of slowly eliminating each of these items from my life. I will be keeping everyone updated as I go!
Now it is your turn. How much single use plastic do you use in a week? In a day? Post your answers on social media or in the comments! The start of eliminating something from our lives is finding how much we actually use it. Once we do that – we can look at ways to remove it or find alternatives. Look out for my post next week on common single use items and how to begin eliminating them from your life!