Dilip Simeon's blog

The global plastic binge which is already causing widespread damage to oceans, habitats and food chains, is set to increase dramatically over the next 10 years after multibillion dollar investments in a new generation of plastics plants in the US. Fossil fuel companies are among those who have ploughed more than $180bn since 2010 into new “cracking” facilities that will produce the raw material for everyday plastics from packaging to bottles, trays and cartons. The new facilities – being built by corporations like Exxon Mobile Chemical and Shell Chemical – will help fuel a 40% rise in plastic production in the next decade, according to experts, exacerbating the plastic pollution crisis that  scientist warn already risks “near permanent pollution of the earth.” “We could be locking in decades of expanded plastics production at precisely the time the world is realising we should use far less of it,” said Carroll Muffett, president of the US  Center for International Env...

Man's legacy on Earth may be the piles of plastics we've mass produced - roughly 8.3 billion metric tons so far, according to a  new study  published today in  Science Advances . In the first ever global analysis of plastic production, researchers from universities across the United States combined production data with product lifetime information from various industries - such as construction, packaging, and consumer goods - to find out how much plastic humans have made, and how much of it is still around. "You can't manage what you don't measure," says  Roland Geyer , an associate professor at the University of California–Santa Barbara and lead author on the new study. "I think in order to manage plastics sustainably hopefully and stem the tide of plastics we need to know how much we're making and where it goes." About 30 percent of all plastics made since the middle of the 20th century are still in use, but the vast majority of  plastic...

Our appetite for plastic continues unabated. But rather than make more, what if we could make do with what we have? Recycling plastic has been a stop-start endeavor, plagued by limitations caused by the large variety of plastics we churn out, waste contamination, and the energy-intensive processes which can make recycling an economic moot point. It's estimated only  9%  of plastic ever created has been recycled. But with the help of a chemical process, Canadian Miranda Wang and her company  BioCellection  want to change that. Call to Earth and the extraordinary people working for a more sustainable future Anna Fletcher: Indian student creates a brick made from recycled plastic Unmaking plastic is tough. There's limited evidence some plastics can biodegrade (one solution requires  mealworms ) but largely plastics  photodegrade  in the sun. It's a lengthy process, and the truth is we can only estimate how long it takes. What's certain is tha...

A Japanese waste dump is an unlikely location for what may be a huge breakthrough in the plastics pollution crisis. But back in 2016, a team of Japanese scientists sifting through plastic waste found bacteria  capable of breaking down and “eating” one of the world’s most popular plastics  ― polyethylene terephthalate, or PET. It was hailed as a potential breakthrough at the time.  But in a new twist, British and American   scientists have announced that while studying this bacteria, they accidentally created a mutant enzyme that’s even more efficient at breaking down plastic bottles. More posts on plastics The discovery came as a team of scientists from the University of Portsmouth in the U.K. and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in the U.S. examined an enzyme produced by the Japanese bacteria to find out more about its structure. By shining intense beams of   X-rays on it, 10 billion times brighter than the sun, they were able to see ind...

Annual consumption of plastic bottles is set to top half a trillion by 2021, far outstripping recycling efforts and jeopardising oceans, coastlines and other environments Humans produce almost 20,000 plastic bottles every second More than 480bn plastic drinking bottles were sold in 2016 across the world, up from about 300bn a decade ago. If placed end to end, they would extend more than halfway to the sun. A million plastic bottles are bought around the world every minute and the number will jump another 20% by 2021, creating an environmental crisis some campaigners predict will be as serious as climate change. New figures obtained by the Guardian reveal the surge in usage of plastic bottles, more than half a trillion of which will be sold annually by the end of the decade.  The demand, equivalent to about 20,000 bottles being bought every second, is driven by an apparently insatiable desire for bottled water and the spread of a western, urbanised “on the go” culture to...

The environmental impact of plastic is finally receiving the attention it deserves. This is partly down to the BBC’s  Blue Planet II  highlighting the problem of ocean plastics. But it’s also because the Chinese government has recently  imposed quality restrictions  on the import of recyclable materials, in an attempt to address domestic concerns over pollution and public health. Beijing’s move in effect closes down the export of recyclable plastics, paper and other materials from the world’s richest countries. The UK, rest of Europe, US, Australia and others have for a long time been dependent on China to take the poor quality materials that they collect and do not have the infrastructure or capacity to use themselves. Until more recycling plants are built to deal with it domestically, the UK faces a  build-up of plastic waste . Other countries in Asia will continue to accept some of the lower quality materials, but this is a temporary fix at best. Sen...

Barely a day goes by without a new anti-plastic initiative: the  Dutch supermarket with a plastic-free aisle ; the Bali inhabitants  sweeping the island for jetsam , the moves to get  plastic out of teabags  - and even out of  Lego . And that was all just this week.  But can we - or should we - aim to move beyond plastics altogether? What are the alternatives to a material that has dominated packaging for 70 years? Promising new technologies are vying for attention, but plastic is so ubiquitous – and so useful – that it will not simply disappear. Rob Opsomer, systemic initiatives lead at the Ellen MacArthur Foundation believes that 50% of plastic packagings could be recycled if they, or after-use systems, were better designed, and 20% could be tackled by reuse schemes. However about 30% of plastics need a fundamental rethink to prevent them ending up in landfill. It’s a sentiment that is gathering pace, with small businesses, laboratory scientists,...

more than 300 million tonnes of plastic is manufactured every year..   From supermarket bags to CDs, man-made waste has contaminated the entire globe, and become a marker of a new geological epoch Humans have made enough plastic since the second world war to coat the Earth entirely in clingfilm, an international study has revealed. This ability to plaster the planet in plastic is alarming, say scientists – for it confirms that human activities are now having a pernicious impact on our world. The research, published in the journal Anthropocene, shows that no part of the planet is free of the scourge of plastic waste. Everywhere is polluted with the remains of water containers, supermarket bags, polystyrene lumps, compact discs, cigarette filter tips, nylons and other plastics. Some are in the form of microscopic grains, others in lumps. The impact is often highly damaging. “The results came as a real surprise,” said the study’s lead author, Professor Jan Zalasiewicz, of...

A huge trash-collecting system designed to clean up plastic floating in the Pacific Ocean is finally picking up plastic, its inventor announced Wednesday. The Netherlands-based nonprofit  the Ocean Cleanup says its latest prototype  was able to capture and hold debris ranging in size from huge, abandoned fishing gear, known as "ghost nets," to tiny microplastics as small as 1 millimeter. "Today, I am very proud to share with you that we are now catching plastics," Ocean Cleanup founder and CEO Boyan Slat said at a news conference in Rotterdam. The Ocean Cleanup system is a U-shaped barrier with a net-like skirt that hangs below the surface of the water. It moves with the current and collects faster moving plastics as they float by. Fish and other animals will be able to swim beneath it. The new prototype added a parachute anchor to slow the system and increased the size of a cork line on top of the skirt to keep the plastic from washing over it…. https://edition.c...

 Ocean plastic has become a scourge around the globe, floating in the remote seas off Hawaii and washing up  in the ice fields of Antarctica . It wreaks havoc on marine life and is even polluting our food chain . The United Nations recently ” declared war ″ on marine litter after finding that a garbage truck of plastic is dumped into the ocean every minute.  Vanuatu, which has a total population of over 275,000, is responsible for less than .1 percent of marine plastic debris, according to global waste statistics. Pacific island nations as a whole are estimated to contribute less than 1 percent of the world’s mismanaged plastic waste that feeds into the oceans. By unshackling itself from the ease and convenience of plastics, Vanuatu’s leaders hope to set a standard that the rest of the world - especially top plastic consumers like the United States - can follow.  More posts on plastics But American policymakers have had a much tougher time banning...

Microplastic pollution spans the world, according to new studies showing contamination in the UK’s lake and rivers, in groundwater in the US and along the Yangtze river in China and the coast of Spain. Humans are known to consume the tiny plastic particles via food and water, but the possible health effects on people and ecosystems have yet to be determined. One study, in Singapore, has found that microplastics can harbour harmful microbes. The new analysis in the UK found microplastic pollution in all 10 lakes, rivers and reservoirs sampled. More than 1,000 small pieces of plastic per litre were found in the River Tame, near Manchester, which was revealed last year as the  most contaminated place yet tested  worldwide. Even in relatively remote places such as the Falls of Dochart and Loch Lomond in Scotland, two or three pieces per litre were found. More posts on plastics Jair Bolsonaro launches assault on Amazon rainforest protections “It was startling. I w...

The advent of cheap, versatile plastics has created “a global scale deluge of plastic waste seemingly everywhere we look”, the report states, with the US a leading contributor of disposable plastics that ends up entangling and choking marine life, harming ecosystems and bringing harmful pollution up through the food chain. Plastic waste has increased sharply in the US since 1960, with the country now generating about 42m metric tons of plastic waste a year, amounting to about 130kg of waste for every person in America. This total is more than all European Union member countries combined. The overall amount of municipal waste created in the US is also two to eight times greater than comparable countries around the world, the report found… https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/dec/01/deluge-of-plastic-waste-us-is-worlds-biggest-plastic-polluter Nurdles: the worst toxic waste you’ve probably never heard of When the X-Press Pearl container ship caught fire and sank in the Indian O...

Children as young as eight, working in the  tanneries of Bangladesh  producing leather that is in demand across Europe and the USA, are exposed to toxic chemical cocktails that are likely to shorten their lives, according to a new report.  Approximately 90% of those who live and work in the overcrowded urban slums of Hazaribagh and Kamrangirchar, where hazardous chemicals are discharged into the air, streets and river, die before they reach 50, according to the World  Health  Organisation. Their plight spurred the volunteer doctors of Médicines Sans Frontières (MSF) to set up clinics in the area to diagnose and treat those who are the victims of their workplace. It is, says  a paper published in BMJ Case Reports , “the first time they have intervened in an area for reasons other than natural disasters or war”. MSF’s intervention was triggered by “the widespread industrial negligence and apathy of owners of tanneries and other hazardous material f...

Scientists are preparing to launch the world's first machine to clean up the planet's largest mass of ocean plastic. The system, originally dreamed up by a teenager, will be shipped out this summer to the  Great Pacific Garbage Patch , between Hawaii and California, and which contains an estimated 1.8 trillion pieces of plastic.  The Global Crisis of Plastic Pollution :  Scientists across the globe are increasingly finding wildlife that has been killed after ingesting or becoming entangled in plastic. Ninety percent of sea birds, for example, have been found to have  plastic in their bellies . And the problem is only getting worse: The estimated  19 billion pounds  of plastic that ends up in the ocean every year is expected to double by 2025. These plastics will not only kill more animals; they’ll decimate  coral reefs , and  damage human health  as microplastics enter the food chain. It will be the first attempt to tackle the patc...

The future of boy genius Rizwan Shaikh is in jeopardy after his education sponsor decided to pull the plug on his monetary aid. Blessed with an astounding intelligent quotient (IQ), 10-year-old Rizwan caught attention of top cops a few years ago by correctly answering questions that are generally asked during MPSC exam. Citing unavoidable circumstances, German National Heinz Toelle who funded Rizwan's education till Std V through his company Menshen Ropa Plastics decided to stop the aid. The company had initially said it would sponsor Rizwan's education till Std XII.  Living in abject poverty, Rizwan's parents are afraid that lack of money will force them to discontinue their son's education and crush his dream of becoming a missile scientist.  Rizwan's parents said everything was going smoothly until the firm failed to deposit fees for their son's current academic year. They said the school management informed them that Toelle's firm decided to discontinue ...

As researchers, we have been shocked to find the most remote depths of the Pacific Ocean polluted by our plastic. And it will outlive us all. Another bottle. Yet another one. We are 200km from land, in the middle of the  South Pacific , and this is the third bottle we’ve found already this morning. Every-where is plastic. The plastic we use unthinkingly every single day, the plastic we throw away without a moment’s thought, it lives on, and on. Out here. Where it is killing our planet,  killing our sea life , and, slowly but surely,  killing us . I am here as part of a team of researchers from the University of the South Pacific collecting seawater samples far removed from any human habitation. My goal is to compare offshore concentrations of microplastics with those closer to shore. My hope is to put in place another piece in the Pacific puzzle. We have a fair idea as to the scale of the problem along more populous coastlines. Yet we know very little here. A knowled...

To celebrate  World Environment day , Reuters photographers met people from Athens to Singapore trying to play their part as the war on plastics becomes a key political topic...  More on plastics Eight million tonnes of plastic - bottles, packaging and other waste - are dumped into the ocean every year, killing marine life and entering the human food chain, the  United Nations Environment Program said in December . While governments and retailers started clamping down on plastic bags through  bans and small fees  more than a decade ago, the focus has now increasingly turned to  eradicating throwaway items  such as straws and takeaway food and drink packaging. Faced with shops full of food and other goods swathed in plastic, families across the world are trying to reduce its use and recycle wherever possible to cut down its impact on the environment. These images show typical plastic use over one week... https://www.theguardian.com/enviro...

  India alone generates 5.6 million metric tons of plastic waste every year, according to the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB). 80% of this waste is ‘potentially’ recyclable but 40% of it isn’t even collected Waste generated by modern society is one of the greatest problems of the 21st century. A 2014  Planning Commission report  estimates that urban India generates around 60 million tons of waste. Most of this remains untreated and as India grows rapidly, the challenge of managing waste will only become more daunting. Waste can be broadly classified into three varieties—synthetic, inorganic and organic. Synthetic waste, like plastics, and inorganic waste like minerals, iron or other metals are typically not biodegradable. This means that these types of waste will stay on in the environment for decades. If untreated, these can seriously harm the ecology and contaminate ground water. Organic waste like food is biodegradable, but poses a different problem. Wi...

We’ve all seen the impact of our plastic addiction. It’s hard to miss the devastating images of whales and sea birds that have died with their stomachs full of  solidified fossil fuels . The recent discovery of a plastic bag in the  Mariana Trench , at over 10,000 metres below sea level, reminds us of the depth of our problem. Now, the breadth is increasing too. New research suggests that chemicals leaching from the bags and bottles that pepper our seas are harming tiny marine organisms that are central to sustained human existence. Once plastic waste is out in the open, waves, wind and sunlight cause it to break down into smaller pieces. This fragmentation process releases chemical additives, originally added to imbue useful qualities such as rigidity, flexibility, resistance to flames or bacteria, or a simple splash of colour. Research has shown that the presence of these chemicals in fresh water and drinking water can have  grave effects , ranging from reduced rep...

A report by the Ellen MacArthur foundation earlier this year predicted that there would be  more plastic  than fish in the ocean  by 2050, unless urgent action was taken. A bid to clear the Pacific of its plastic debris has moved a step closer with the launch of the biggest prototype clean-up boom yet by the Dutch environment minister at a port in The Hague. On Thursday the 100m-long barrier will be towed 20km out to sea for a year of sensor-monitored tests, before being scaled up for real-life trials off the Japanese coast at the end of next year. If all goes well,  full-scale deployment  of a 100km-long version  will take place in the “great Pacific garbage patch” between California and Hawaii in 2020. The Dutch environment minister, Sharon Dijksma, told the Guardian that her government, which part-funded the test, was fully backing  the project , which will eventually cost around €300m. “We can use our political pressure with other gover...