Addicted to Plastics
I recently watched the documentary by Ian Connacher titled Addicted To Plastics. This was a three year journey around the world documenting the current status of plastic from production, use, trash, pollution, recycling and health. I recommend this movie to anyone who really wants to understand our current situation with plastics.
Product Stewardship and Manufacturers Responsibility
Reusing sounds like the answer to reducing pollution and the amount of trash we put into our landfills but it isn’t working. Manufacturers have built in product obsolescence for more than fifty years with the idea of the more we use the more jobs we’ll have. Recycling plays an important role in reducing waste; however, here in the U.S. recycling is failing miserably. Consumes are confused and believe that anything they put into a recycle bin should be recycled. It might be a good thought but recyclers are only removing the items that have market value…the rest goes into the landfill. Keep in mind that even if you reuse something or recycle something sooner or later it will end up as trash. Our landfills in this country are mostly the “Dry Tomb” type of landfill. Dry tomb landfills are nothing more than large pits that have been lined with a protective bottom and as each layer of garbage is bulldozed level it is compacted and covered with a thin layer of dirt. Biodegradation does take place with a dry tomb landfill but at a slow pace. The idea behind the dry tomb is to hide garbage from our sight and smell.
Biodegradable Plastic are You Confused?
Biodegradable Plastics, what does it mean and why is there so much confusion about something that sounds so simple to define? The ASTM defines biodegradable plastics as “a degradable plastic in which the degradation results from the action of naturally-occurring micro-organisms such as bacteria, fungi, and algae”. Sounds simple enough, so why all the confusion? The confusion really comes from two aspects; 1) confusion between using the term degradable vs. biodegradable and 2) the loose use of the word biodegradable.
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