Tackling the waste plastic epidemic

One cannot have missed the increasing concern surrounding waste plastic in the last few months and weeks. The good news is that the first step towards solving a problem is to recognise it as an issue in the first place, and it seems that this ongoing environmental crisis is now starting to get the publicity it needs.

The scale of the problem

The bad news is that the more articles appear on the subject, the more it becomes clear that the problem is even bigger than first realised. As recently reported by Sky News, a lot of the UK’s plastic waste is recorded as recycled when it is exported, regardless of what actually happens to it when it reaches its destination. This issue is only likely to worsen as China, previously the recipient of two thirds of the UK’s plastic waste, was due to ban imports of waste plastic as of January 2018.

With the national average recycling rate having stalled at 43% and even the fate of plastic which is exported for recycling uncertain, it is clear that we have to produce fewer single-use plastic items. According to the BBC, 480 billion plastic drinks bottles were sold globally in 2016 and given that each bottle will take around 450 years to biodegrade, production of these items is far outstripping our ability to dispose of them.

Changing behaviours

As with single-use plastic bags, changing public behaviours will be key to solving the problem. Though businesses and public buildings in the UK are already legally obliged to offer free drinking water, popping in and asking for a refill for your reusable water bottle can feel a bit cheeky if you are not buying anything else.

Fortunately, there is a growing initiative, spearheaded by a group called City to Sea in Bristol which aims to set up free refill stations nationwide. The Refill campaign already has 1,600 drinking water stations across the country which you can locate using the Refill app. Now Water UK have joined the campaign with a view to widening the network to include tens of thousands of high street shops and cafes by 2021. Crucially, the scheme will make it clear that people are welcome to refill their bottles via window stickers and a location marker on the Refill app.

The plastic bag tax demonstrated that uptake of single-use plastic items can be successfully discouraged. After a five pence tax on thin-gauge plastic shopping bags was introduced in October 2015, their use dropped by over 85% in six months. A similar tax on all single-use plastics (including packaging and take-away cartons) is being considered by the Treasury, whilst a plastic bottle deposit scheme has also been suggested. This could see around 20 pence added to the cost of drinks sold in disposable plastic bottles, which would then be refunded when the bottle was returned to the point of sale for recycling.

Germany introduced just such a scheme in 2002 and it has since helped them achieve the highest rates of polyethylene terephthalate plastic bottle returns and recycling in the world, with rates of 97-98% being reported. In addition to this, 80% of Germany’s recycling is done domestically, avoiding the kind of uncertainty which currently surrounds the fate of Britain’s exported waste plastic.

In combination with a wider, well-advertised network of refill points, a tax or deposit scheme could be the mechanism for effecting the genuine change in consumer habits necessary to stem production of single-use plastic bottles.

Smell the coffee

There are other areas, however, where eliminating single-use plastic is not proving as straight forward. A recent proposal to apply a similar levy – dubbed the latté levy – on single-use coffee cups has not been well received by the industry.

Disposable coffee cups are clearly an issue as, despite being mostly paper, they have a polyethylene lining to make them waterproof. Currently, there are just three recycling plants in the UK that can separate the paper from the plastic lining, clearly not enough when 2.5 billion disposable cups are used every year in the UK. In fact, only 1% of disposable coffee cups are ever recycled.

As with bottled water, swapping single-use containers for reusable mugs would seem to present a way forward and moves are already being made to reward customers for using them. This month, Pret A Manger announced it was doubling the discount it offers on hot drinks for customers who bring their own mug, from 25p to 50p. Even whilst levies on disposable coffee cups remain at the proposal stage, evidence suggests that consumers are already changing their habits with sales of barista-standard reusable cups reaching a quarter of a million in the UK in the last three months of 2017 alone.

It is important that all aspects of the industry are keeping up to date with the potentially rapid shift in consumer behaviour. United Baristas have identified planning law as a particular area where legislation is seemingly at odds with the move towards more environmentally friendly practices.

It turns out that a lot of coffee shops in the busiest ‘A1’ sites are subject to planning laws requiring at least 50% of their sales to be of products consumed off site. Measures to reduce the number of single-use cups, such as the 25 pence levy could impact take-out sales, and lead to a higher percentage of customers sitting in. Ultimately, this could put some coffee shops in breach of planning regulations, putting the business at risk. The irony here is that the higher the percentage of take-away coffees a shop currently sells, the less likely they are to find themselves in breach of the law – so the worst contributors to the disposable cup problem get off most lightly.

Cleaning up

Clearly, all aspects of consumer behaviour have to be examined and factored in to any changes in the law. But what can we do as individuals to speed up the rate of change and make a difference to the plastic waste epidemic?

Well, since it seems that since much of the plastic exported for recycling is not actually recycled, and the facilities do not exist on the scale required to deal with the number of disposable coffee cups we use, simply putting your waste in the right bin may not be the answer – we have to use fewer of these items. Get a reusable water bottle, get a reusable coffee cup with a lid, and buy fewer products with unnecessary packaging. We can talk all day about changing consumer behaviour but at the end of the day, those consumers are us, and our individual actions make a difference.

For the most committed amongst us, there are also ongoing initiatives that you can join to help clean up the plastic that already contaminates our beaches. The Marine Conservation Society, for example, runs regular Beachwatch beach cleaning events up and down the country, so find your nearest event, don your wellies, and get involved.

Matthew Pavli is writing for Aqua Cure. The views expressed in the article are those of the author, not necessarily those of Bright Blue

Drowning in plastic waste

We have now had over a year of the plastic bag charge. Since October 2015, shoppers in England have had to pay 5p for plastic bags at retailers with over 250 employees. Many people can now be seen juggling grocery items on their way home from the shops in a desperate attempt to avoid the levy. But have these super-human feats of contortion been worth the effort? Have they together had an impact on the environment?

We now have the data to answer this question, and the answer is a firm yes. The Marine Conservation Society has already reported a 40% drop between 2015 and 2016 in the number of plastic bags they collected from UK beaches. Official figures suggest a total of six billion single-use plastic bags were avoided in the first six months of the charge. Ministers also announced the charge had already raised £29 million for good causes, with many chains opting to support environmental charities.

The harm of plastic pollution

Plastic bags are, however, just a subset of plastic pollution, which is a major environmental challenge, particularly in marine ecosystems. Bigger pieces of plastic can entrap fish, causing injuries, suffocation, or strangulation. Smaller plastics can be ingested. This harms the creature themselves. Scientists have found evidence of plastic making fish larvae less active, more likely to be eaten by predators, and less likely to thrive. This also has implications further down the food chain: For instance, by eating six oysters you are likely to ingest around 50 microplastic particles.

The scale of the problem is immense: Eight billion tons of plastic waste ends up in the oceans every year. A Greenpeace report for the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) found evidence of 267 different marine species affected by plastic pollution. Another study has estimated that around half of marine mammals has either been entangled by or ingested plastic. There is growing evidence that plastic pollution affects freshwater rivers too. Researchers found 8,490 pieces of plastic in the River Thames during a three-month-long observation.

The process of plastic manufacturing contributes to climate change. The Committee on Climate Change reports that the industrial sector in general produces 32% of the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions (including both direct emissions and its share of electricity emissions). The plastics industry makes up 2% of this total. Plastics provide another market for oil, and so help to support global fossil fuel supply chains. Incineration of plastic waste releases carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

Policies to cut down plastic pollution

In the spirit of Edmund Burke’s “little platoons”, litter-picking groups which collect plastic debris from beaches and coastline can ameliorate the problem. The Marine Conservation Society frequently runs such events. While the impact on the total mass of plastic in the ocean is minimal, the activity gives people a tangible connection to their local environment. This can also help raise awareness of plastic pollution, and in turn change behaviour to encourage people to use less disposable plastic.

Increased recycling rates could also help clean up plastic pollution. Single-use plastic bags have been dramatically reduced. But single-use plastic bottles, for instance, remain a major challenge: The average household recycles just 44% of the 480 plastic bottles it uses each year. Fiscal nudges like landfill taxes can encourage recycling, by ensuring businesses to pay for the effects of plastic waste. Improved and more frequent council recycling services could also cut down on such waste.  

Plastic pollution has become a major focus of circular economy studies, which seek to increase resource productivity. As well as harming the environment, single-use plastic is an inefficient use of resources. The Ellen MacArthur Foundation has found that 95% of the economic value of plastic is lost after its first use. This is worth between $80 and $120 billion annually. They call for a rapid scaling up of the global supply chain for reused and recycled plastics, with improved infrastructure for collection, sorting and reprocessing to expand the current market.

Microbeads used in cosmetic products are another area where the Government has acted to cut plastic pollution. Next year, a consultation will be launched on how to ban these entirely. This could have a significant impact: A single shower can release up to 100,000 tiny particles of plastic into the sea, according to the Environmental Audit Committee. Up to 4.1% of all microplastics in the ocean are estimated to derive from microbeads in cosmetics. Some are calling for the ban to be extended to other products containing microbeads, such as washing detergents.

Many of these different levers may be needed if the tide is to be turned on plastic pollution. Scientists found earlier this year that since the Second World War we have manufactured enough plastic to cover the entire earth in cling film. The oceans are some of our most precious environments, which host most of our diverse species and flora. We cannot afford to keep damaging them.

Sam Hall is a researcher at Bright Blue