The Story of Plastic
Plastic is the poster child of our disposable society. A material that is light, flexible and strong with a vast array of uses, it has become a ubiquitous part of modern life. But it also reflects a terrible design problem for which the world is suffering tragic consequences. Let’s take a look at the origins and growth of the plastic industry, the ramifications for our planet and some “confluence” solutions.
Plastic, plastic everywhere
Plastic has many admirable uses. It forms the basis of a host of utilitarian and durable products; from sewer and other pipes, to auto, aircraft, and electronic parts, to tupperware, toothbrushes and trash cans. It also is made into a variety of necessary disposable products such as medical devices, protective clothing, disposable syringes, etc.
The problem lies with single use plastic in the consumer space ... straws, shopping bags, packaging, etc.. The astonishing scale of plastics use in our modern world, the fact that it does not biodegrade and the difficulties of recycling and disposal have made single use plastic one of the scourges of our planet. And this says nothing of the environmental pollution caused by the production of plastic in the first place! (See section below.)
Created in 1907, plastic production only took off in the 1950s with the creation of what Life Magazine in a 1955 cover article joyously called “Throwaway Living”. Since then, global plastic production has exploded from 2 million tons in 1950 to 350 million tons per annum now. In total, more than 9 billion tons of plastic have been produced since 1950, a weight equivalent to roughly 1 billion elephants. This production has made many companies rich. The oil industry makes more than $400 billion a year making plastic, and as demand for oil for cars and trucks declines, the industry is telling shareholders that future profits will increasingly come from plastic.
The problem is that plastic doesn’t go away
The very durability that makes plastic attractive as a product is what makes it such a problem for the environment. It is not biodegradable. It lives, basically, forever, and it is everywhere! Most of it (an estimated 79%) ends up in landfills and dumps where it off-gases harmfully into the air or leaches chemicals into the water table. A significant portion also makes its way into rivers, lakes and eventually the world's oceans–at a rate estimated at 8 million tons a year. Once there, the action of sun, salt water and waves can slowly break down plastic debris, but only into micro plastic particles which end up on beaches or are consumed by sea life, eventually moving up the food chain to humans. We have all read the stories: a whale washes up on a beach in the Philippines with 90 pounds of plastic in its stomach; locations as diverse as remote Pacific Islands and the Great Lakes find their beaches covered with both large plastic rubbish that has drifted ashore and with vast amounts of micro plastic particles that mix with the sand; the South Pacific Garbage Patch is discovered in 2017, a swirling vortex of largely plastic debris swept together by ocean currents covering an area 1 1/2x the size of Texas - and this is nothing compared to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in the northern Pacific Ocean, which consists of two different masses of debris three times the size of France. The scale of the problem is immense: if current practices continue, scientists estimate that there could be more plastic in the world’s oceans than fish by 2050.
Then there are the direct threats to human life such a bisphenol A (BPA) and a class of chemicals called phthalates that go into plastics during manufacturing, making them more flexible, durable and transparent. These and other toxic chemicals leach out of plastic and are found in the blood and tissue of many of us. Exposure to them is linked to impaired immunity, endocrine disruption and other ailments, with children particularly susceptible. (For a discussion of the health risks of plastic products see this article from Harvard Medical School.)
A shocking design problem
It is hard to believe that anyone would have created a product which would take such a toll on the natural world. Why did it happen? In the period of its development, people didn’t think much about the environment...it was just there to be used and dumped on. By the time concerns were aroused, it was too late–plastic had become inextricably entwined into our consumer-driven economy and the waste problem had already become immense. But excuses aside, at its heart, the plastic debacle reflects a terrible design flaw.
Plastic is a true cradle to grave industry
Plastic was created with no thought whatsoever about where the products would go once used. There was no consideration of recycling until decades later, and since the products were not designed to be recycled, success is minimal; unlike glass, aluminum and paper. Today, it is estimated that only 9% of plastic produced globally gets recycled: in the USA the figure is 10%, the EU is better at c.30%, but that is still appalling. The rest ends up in dumps, in the environment or is incinerated (12%) releasing toxic chemicals into the air. Every day in the USA, it is estimated that we throw out almost 88,000 tons of plastic. Globally, humanity produces 300 million tons of plastic waste per annum. Half of all plastic is designed to be used only once. Five trillion plastic bags are used worldwide every year. (You can find a wealth of data and charts regarding global plastic production and pollution in ‘Our World in Data’ by Hannah Ritchie and Max Roser.)
Total disregard of the value of natural capital
The success of plastic, particularly single use plastic, is based not just on utility but also on cheapness. But this cheapness only exists because no price is put on the environmental destruction caused by plastic, both in the extended production process and in the waste stream. Worse still, the industry has been subsidized every step of the way... taxpayers money being used to create a destructive product. Put these factors together and it becomes nearly impossible for alternative biodegradable packaging and other products to compete.
Governmental failure
Both of the factors above reflect a complete lack of regulatory oversight by national governments at all stages of the plastic industry’s development– a problem that continues to this day. Moreover, the subsidy issue indicates that governments have not only failed to regulate this destructive industry but have actively supported it.
Let’s take a look at the production process of plastic much like we did “product X’ in my thesis article and then search for some “confluence” solutions.
Looked at diagrammatically, the industry looks like this:
Oil drilling —> transport —> refining —> transport —> petrochemical production -> transport —> end use —> waste
Step 1: plastic begins as oil. Every year, the USA uses an estimated 17 million barrels of oil just to make plastic water bottles - enough to fuel 1 million cars for a year. All in, roughly 8% of oil use goes to make plastic; as raw material or as energy used in the production process. Getting oil out of the ground, by onshore or offshore oil wells or fracking, is a dirty, expensive and highly lucrative business. Vast fortunes have been made from the black gold. But one of the reasons this business is so lucrative stems from the fact that oil producers are not charged for the wide array of pollution they spew into our air and water—-from the routine flaring of gas by the fracking industry (last year enough gas was flared in the West Texas Permian Basin alone to power 5 million US homes) to leaking pipes and pipelines to the tragic Deepwater Horizon and Exxon Valdez disasters which so devastated the natural environment. And yes, oil is perhaps the most subsidized industry in the world...not just government grants, cheap loans and tax breaks, but ongoing support for the industry in geopolitical terms. Why else has the United States kept a fleet in the Persian Gulf for decades and become ensnared in a number of costly wars. To keep the peace...please!! Who pays for all of this? You the taxpayer do.
Step 2: refining: Oil refining, the use of intense heat and distillation to break crude oil into a variety of other products such as gasoline, naphtha, etc, is another incredibly polluting industry which never seems to have to factor in any cost for that pollution. It too is subsidized by governments desperate for jobs, even though refineries hire very few workers as they are heavily automated.
Step 3: petrochemical production. These plants, often but not always located near refineries, take the refined oil products and, through intense use of energy, turn them into resins, which are then shaped into the wide array of plastic you see every day. Again, there are very destructive environmental impacts for which the industry bears no cost. Instead, it gets subsidized by governments.
Now let’s look at the waste issue and the recycling design problem
Think about that plastic container you buy your strawberries in at the supermarket. It is a very light, strong, hygienic way to house the product. But in most of the world, including the USA, that container is not accepted for recycling. Why? Because our government allowed the plastic industry to develop without any regulatory controls.
In a cradle to cradle world, products would be designed, not only to avoid damaging the environment during the production process, but also to be eminently recyclable, with the recycling industry being part of the design process to ensure a closed loop. But, to date, that does not happen in our real world. The consequence is that most plastic ends up in a landfill rather than being brought back into the industrial food chain.
We simply do not have enough recycling capability to manage the volume of waste, even if it is all collected. Moreover, with no price attached to the environmental destruction caused in the production process, it is cheaper to make virgin plastic out of oil than out of recycled products. Recycling plastic costs money for collection, sorting and then processing. There are too many different types of products to deal with to allow economies of scale to develop. What, you may ask, of the much vaunted three arrow triangles with a number inside designating the type of plastic and whether a product is recyclable? Unfortunately, in large part, this is an intentional marketing ruse by plastic manufacturers to make it appear as if all that plastic is recyclable–when in fact it isn’t. Take a look at this NPR article: ‘How Big Oil Misled The Public Into Believing Plastic Would Be Recycled’.
The reality is that the consumer and plastic industries have done very little to address the waste and recycling problem. There has been no attempt to ease the burden on the planet by redesigning and standardizing products. Ask yourself this: why do plastic toothpaste tubes and shampoo bottles need to be made so that they last for decades in a landfill, when the products inside them are usually used in a few months? The industry doesn’t care because once their various plastic products leave the door of the manufacturing plant, the producer is absolved of all responsibility, whatever damage those products do in the environment and to humanity. Does that sound like clever design to you?
How can we change this?
It won’t be easy given how seamlessly plastic has become woven into so many different industries and all aspects of the average person’s life. Take a look in your refrigerator and see just how many plastic products are there. Then there is the opposition from vested interests and their influence on politicians gained by campaign donations. But difficult does not mean impossible: there are concrete steps that can and should be taken.
Confluence solutions:
Stop all subsidization across the entire plastic chain: oil exploration, refining, petrochemical production, transport.
Value natural capital/make the polluter pay: Measure every part of the production chain for its environmental impacts and make the polluter pay, with fines that escalate for repeat offenses. A carbon tax is merely the first step here. Only if the industry is made to pay for the pollution it causes will it innovate to adjust production processes and so reduce the environmental impact.
Subsidize innovation of alternative, pro-environmental products: Use the money raised from plastic polluters to incentivize innovation and production of alternative, pro-environmental products. Stopping subsidization of the plastic industry and making it pay an appropriate cost for its pollution will immediately raise the price of plastic products substantially, creating an opportunity for alternative, more environmentally friendly products to be developed and to compete. This is the real hope–that we can replace single use plastic products with biodegradable and/or easily recycled alternatives that are just as useful. Clearly we have to ensure that the new products do not also harm the environment. Replacing plastic bags with paper ones is an upgrade as paper is both easily recyclable and biodegradable. But it still has a high carbon footprint - collection, transport, recycle, transport.
Go cradle to cradle - force redesign: We are never going to get rid of plastics entirely. Nor should we given many of the durable products are highly value-added. But we can make sure that the bulk of these durable plastic goods are recycled by mandating that manufacturers take back their products at the end of their lives. This will surely make them redesign the products to ensure ease of re-entry into the production chain for future use, thus improving the bottom line. Think plastic toys, sports goods, auto and electronic parts, etc. We have seen this work in other industries; for example automobiles. About 12 million vehicles are junked in the USA every year. By law, new cars now contain a minimum of 25% recycled content, mainly steel and aluminum. More recycled parts are being added every year.
We need to vastly improve our collection and recycling systems. As mentioned earlier, according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), only 10% of plastic is recycled in the USA. The recycling industry got lazy when China and other Asian countries were paying to take plastic waste for their own industrial purposes. This discouraged innovation. Now that Asia has refused to take any more of our plastic waste, much of it goes straight to landfills. Through taxation, regulation and subsidization, our governments need to force the consumer products industry and the recycling services to work together to redesign products and processes from top to bottom so they are eminently recyclable. This just makes sense. Government simply has to mandate this, with some limited lead time to allow product redevelopment. And the technologies created should be shared freely with other countries suffering under the load of plastic waste. We are all in this together!
Ban or discourage single-use consumer plastic products...bags, straws, etc. These cause the worst problems for our environment. Banning use is the most effective way to stop adding to the problem and this is now happening in many parts of the world (see below). For governments not willing or able to go that far, aggressively charging for the use of plastic bags and straws is a partial solution. For example, subsidize the use of cloth shopping bags by offering say a 50 cent discount for their use, while charging $1 for a plastic bag.
Finally, improve disposal. Western countries are reasonably effective at getting the bulk of waste plastic into landfills, though more needs to be done to stop leaching of chemicals into the water table and into the air. In Asia, however, plastic disposal is a vast problem, with huge amounts of it ending up in rivers and getting carried into the ocean. It is estimated that half of the plastic that ends up in the world’s oceans comes from five countries: China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam.
Positive progress
Lest you think all is doom and gloom, it is worth noting that there are lots of positive actions being taken around the world to reduce the plastic problem...not the sort of wholesale solutions being suggested here, but steps in the right direction nonetheless.
25 countries in Africa have banned the production and use of plastic bags.
Canada will ban single use plastics across the country in 2021. 81% of Canadians support this, with a majority willing to pay more for alternative products.
The EU will also ban single use plastic in 2021.
200 cities worldwide have or will take the same action.
Unilever has pledged to cut the amount of non-recycled plastic it uses by half by 2025.
Coke, in 2018 met 30% of its plastic needs from recycled material. By 2030, it is targeting to make this 100%. Since Coke sells 120 billion plastic bottles of drinks per annum using 3 million tons of plastic, this is a big deal.
Some companies in Asia and elsewhere are using collected plastic bottles in the production of asphalt, making it both cheaper and more durable.
A company in England has designed a product they call “in plastic” using brewery wastewater to make a strong, transparent, 100% biodegradable product that is even edible.
California puts a redemption value of 5-10 cents on non-carbonated PET bottles and as a result its recycling rate is 3x the rest of the nation.
Sweden is a leader in waste to energy, utilizing modern technology to capture and control emissions caused when burning plastic.
Since it’s clear that plastics have a valuable place in our lives, some scientists are attempting to make plastics safer and more sustainable. Innovators are developing bioplastics, which are made from plant crops instead of fossil fuels, to create substances that are more environmentally friendly than conventional plastics. Others are working to make plastics that are truly biodegradable.
What can you do?
Use only cloth bags at the supermarket.
Refuse plastic straws and bags in restaurants and shops.
Take a ceramic cup and metal water bottle to work and push your company to get rid of plastic utensils, plates, etc in the staff kitchen.
Push supermarkets to offer small paper bags to select your fruit and vegetables or better still to allow you to bring your own containers.
Use your voice and your vote to demand that political representatives adopt some of the confluence solutions discussed above.
The way forward
As set out in my thesis article (see ‘About Confluence’), I believe we need a wholesale redesign of our economic structure to pull our world back from the environmental abyss. The government must lead this, employing its tools of taxation, regulation and subsidization to bring about positive change–in the plastic industry and all others. But to truly create a new cradle to cradle industrial revolution, capitalism must also be part of the solution. With the right mix of incentives and penalties, free enterprise can lead the way in design innovation, creating huge new economic and employment opportunities. It is not going to happen under the Trump administration, which has sought to unwind almost all environmental controls established by previous governments. Their preference is to deregulate so that their financial backers in the fossil fuel and mining industries are free to carry on the destructive path that brought the world to this point. In another article on this blog, I will examine the proposals of the Biden team, which seem far more encouraging, though I have my doubts as to whether they will be willing to embrace the sort of holistic solutions suggested here.