Like fossil fuels, plastics have become a part of our everyday lives, making up the majority of the materials that we use, whether that’s in food packaging, medical equipment or even chewing gum! With the 400 million tonnes of plastic waste we produce each year, it’s not difficult to see why we have a massive problem with trying to dispose of it all. The obvious solution would be to recycle our plastic, right? But surprisingly, a mere 9% of our plastic waste is actually recycled. The rest of our waste ends up in landfills or in the oceans. So here’s the big question: why aren’t we recycling more of our plastic waste?
The term “recycling” is actually often misused - most of the time, the more accurate term for plastic “recycling” is actually plastic “downcycling”. This means that the recycled product is of a lower quality than the original. For example, recycling PET plastic into lower quality plastic fibres that can be used in clothing or making carpets. However, for the sake of simplicity, we’ve used the word “recycle” throughout this article.
Theoretically, all plastics can be recycled. In practice, however, there are several limitations:
Practical problems
Firstly, because there are so many different types of plastics, all of which have different chemical properties, not all plastics can be recycled together, nor is the recycling process the same for each type of plastic. This means that all plastic waste needs to be sorted before it can be recycled. Plastics also have to be cleaned before they can be recycled, so even if a piece of plastic is recyclable, it is more likely to be sent to a landfill if it is contaminated (e.g. with food residue) rather than washed as these extra steps in the recycling process cost money.
Health concerns
There’s also the problem that some plastics contain toxic chemicals that are released during the recycling process, which can be harmful to workers and locals.
Chemistry of plastics
Here’s another big problem: plastics aren’t made to be recycled in the first place. Each time plastic is recycled, its quality degrades. For this reason, plastic normally can’t be recycled more than once or twice. This also means that most recycled plastic still ends up in landfills anyway, sooner or later.
Profit
Perhaps the biggest reason why more plastic isn’t being recycled is because it simply isn’t worth the cost. Recycling requires huge amounts of energy and often costs more to do so than producing virgin plastic. This discourages companies from recycling more of their plastic waste.
So, as we can see, until we’ve developed more efficient and cost-effective recycling methods, it’s clear that recycling plastic isn’t the solution to our plastic problem. This may sound contradicting to many of the things that we’ve been told about being eco-friendly, especially the 3 R’s (reduce, reuse, recycle), but right now we need other solutions. Recycling is still an important part of solving our problem with plastic waste, and it will most likely play a big role in the solution in the near future.
In the meantime, here are the next best things you can do:
Avoid using plastic unnecessarily, especially single-use plastics
Use alternatives to single-use plastic when you can, such as reusable shopping bags, reusable cups and reusable cutlery
Try and repurpose existing plastic items instead of throwing them away
Advocate for policies that aim to reduce plastic waste
A massive change is also needed on an industrial scale. In order to reduce our plastic waste to begin with, we need to stop excessively producing plastic products in the first place, especially single-use plastics. Banning the use of toxic chemicals in plastics will make them easier and safer to recycle; increasing transparency in material sourcing will also help with this.
If we continue polluting the environment at this rate, there could be more plastic than fish in the ocean by 2050. Like climate change, urgent action against plastic pollution is needed to preserve the health of humans and the environment alike. It’s time we turn the tide on the war against plastic pollution.
Credits:
Image - Plastic Collective