What happens to your plastic after you drop it in a recycling bin? According to promotional materials from America’s plastics industry, it is whisked off to a factory where it is seamlessly transformed into something new. This is not the experience of Nguyễn Thị Hồng Thắm, a 60-year-old Vietnamese mother of seven, living amid piles […]
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Tag: Plastic pollution
Is a substitute for plastic coming anytime soon?
For most of us, hearing the world plastic makes us think of single-use plastics like plastic bags or disposable plastic water bottles, but plastic covers a much wider variety of materials than that. Key points Plastics are versatile, flexible, durable and cheap These benefits become problems when we are trying to dispose of them Dealing […]
Coco-Cola yet again top global plastic polluter
In 2019, 11,732 pieces of Coke-branded plastic waste was identified from 37 countries. Last year, the beverages brand accounted for 9,216 pieces of plastic waste from 40 countries
WHEN THE MERMAIDS CRY – MAGNITUDE SCOPE EXTENT
I: THE GREAT PLASTIC TIDE: MAGNITUDE, SCOPE, EXTENT A full understanding of the magnitude and scope of this plastic pollution starts with clear definitions as to what and why it is happening. Thus, we will define the notions of marine debris, gyres, and oceanic garbage patches, or giant floating marine debris field, as first discovered […]
WHEN THE MERMAIDS CRY: THE GREAT PLASTIC TIDE – INTRODUCTION
By Claire Le Guern Last updated in March 2018. INTRODUCTION The world population is living, working, vacationing, increasingly conglomerating along the coasts, and standing on the front row of the greatest, most unprecedented, plastic waste tide ever faced. Washed out on our coasts in obvious and clearly visible form, the plastic pollution spectacle blatantly unveiling […]
What we can do for our grandchildren
By Susan Horton Posted Aug 29, 2019 at 3:00 AMUpdated Aug 29, 2019 at 7:32 AM Like many others, I’ve heard Trump-supporting friends invariably ask, “Have you checked your 401(k) lately?” As if that’s all that needs to be said. It’s not. Approaching 78, I have more than 25 nephews and nieces, and twice that many great-grandchildren. Anyone seeing the exuberant smile on the newest […]
A Whale’s Tale | Hope Works
How plastic pollution ends up in the oceans
by Rodexo June 25, 2019 Plastic can take centuries to break down, and instead of quietly disappearing beneath the waves, it has a way of coming back to haunt us. Almost 1 million shoes and over 370,000 toothbrushes were among more than 400 million pieces of plastic recently found washed up on a remote group of […]
Plastic offset is here. Here’s how to do it right
A new paradigm is entering the environmental zeitgeist, and that paradigm is plastic offset. So what is it really, and how could it stem the global tide of plastic pollution? By Peter Wang Hjemdahl, Co-Founder at rePurpose Put simply, for every dollar contributed by a polluter, a certain amount of plastic waste would be intercepted from the […]
HUMANS HAVE PRODUCED BILLIONS TONS OF PLASTIC THROUGHOUT HISTORY
BY DOUGLAS MAIN ON 7/19/17 AT 2:07 PM EDT In the classic ’60s film The Graduate, a family friend gives the protagonist an iconic piece of advice. “One word… plastics. There’s a great future in plastics.” That advice couldn’t have been more prescient. Though the world hadn’t seen so much as a plastic bag prior to about 1950, it is […]