Plastic is everywhere. The water bottle you are carrying. The phone case for the phone you are holding. The mouse you are using to surf the internet.
It’s a material we all use in our daily lives. But we hear a lot of bad things about it, and how it’s polluting our environment. We are encouraged to use less plastic, or not use it at all, to stop plastic pollution.
How can you help though? And what is it about plastic that’s so bad?
In this blog post, we investigate everything plastic, the good, the bad and the ugly.
The benefits of plastic
Despite its bad reputation, the material is ingrained in society. Why is that?
In the past, billiard balls were made of ivory from elephant tusks. In the 19th century, billiard ball makers started looking for alternative materials, due to the excessive hunting and decreasing elephant population. The first synthetic plastic was invented in 1869 by John Wesley Hyatt.
Society modernised, and more and more plastic was incorporated into everyday items. Replacing materials that were traditionally made from natural resources.
Examples include nylon (a stronger version of silk) and acrylic (imitating glass without being easily shattered).
You can see how plastic has been used in the design of products since its invention. So, what is the flip side?
How does plastic pollute our environment?
As we continued to manufacture more plastic items, plastic waste became inevitable.
One of the biggest benefits of plastic is its durability. But this is also what makes it harder to dispose of.
Natural and organic materials break down at a much quicker pace. Plastic on the other hand does not decompose easily, if at all.
This sounds like a difficult waste management challenge. And it is.
Sadly, our seas and marine life often take the blunt of plastic pollution.
Why are our seas heavily impacted by plastic pollution?
Plastic waste, especially microplastics often find their way into the sea.
Microplastics are tiny pieces of plastic less than 5mm long. They therefore enter our seas easily through various routes to include rivers, littering and other human activities.
Once they have made their way into the sea, they are tricky to remove because of their size. Bigger pieces of plastic might sink to the bottom. Smaller pieces float around in the sea and are then eaten by marine life.
A well-known example of this is the Lego cargo spill.
In 1997, 62 containers on a cargo ship from the Netherlands slid off into the sea during a storm. One of the containers had five million pieces of Lego inside.
The Lego pieces have since spread from the location of spill to the Netherlands, the UK, France, Belgium etc. Some even believe this is not the furthest they’ve reached and that they could have travelled across the world!
Most of the Lego pieces have never been found. But over the years, changing sea currents have swept some ashore. Where they are then picked up from the beach.
This incident gives us an insight on what could happen to other plastic waste.
Plastic waste in the sea doesn’t only include Lego pieces. Plastic bottles, carrier bags and other items are often reported.
How to reduce the impact of plastic pollution?
It will take a lot of fundamental changes to society to reduce the impact of plastic pollution. You will have heard it many times, but reducing and recycling plastic waste is a good way to start to tackle it. Government policies have been implemented to help to facilitate this too.
The UK has implemented a mandatory charge for plastic shopping bags since 2015. All retail shops in the country must charge consumers if they wish to take a plastic bag from the checkout. Since imposing the charge, the number of plastic bags supplied to consumers has reduced by 98%.
In April 2024, The Big Plastic Count reported there are around 90 billion plastic pieces being thrown away in the UK households annually. In October 2024, single-use plastics were banned. Items that are banned include drink stirrers, balloon sticks and cutlery. This is expected to reduce the amount of plastic waste. Other ways you can help is to reuse plastic items to prolong their life.
Plastic is one of the most used materials, but its convenience comes at a significant cost to the planet. If everyone reduces their plastic footprint, we will be able to pass on an environment we are proud of.
