Rush of lawsuits over plastic waste expected after ‘historic’ deal

Rush of lawsuits over plastic waste expected after ‘historic’ deal

Like Paris climate agreement, treaty could provide tool to hold firms and states to account, say legal experts

A man collects recyclable materials along the Manila Bay, Philippines

A series of lawsuits against plastic producers and governments is expected after a “historic” international agreement on waste, say legal experts.

Last week, world leaders agreed to draw up a legally binding treaty over the next two years that covered the full lifecycle of plastics from production to disposal. The move was described by the head of the UN Environment Programme as the most important multilateral environmental deal since the Paris agreement in 2015.

And, like its climate counterpart, the new treaty could provide an essential tool to hold governments and companies accountable for their environmental impacts.

An imminent case in the Philippines could set an important precedent. Last year, a coalition of individuals and environmental groups led by the marine conservation group Oceana Philippines filed a petition accusing the Philippine government of failing to tackle the “unabated production, use and disposal of plastic” over the past two decades.

The group claims a law requiring the country’s public waste body to review, update and enforce a list of products that are not environmentally friendly has never been implemented despite being passed in 2001. The result of this, it say, is “the unabated emission of millions of tons of plastic waste into every nook and cranny of the Philippine archipelago”.

The petitioners, who include people who are catching fewer fish, having trouble conceiving or being affected by worsening floods aggravated by plastic pollution, say the government’s inaction is breaching their constitutional right to a healthy environment.

The Philippine supreme court has accepted the case, which goes to trial later this month.

Carroll Muffett, the president of the US-based Center for International Environmental Law, said it was “beyond any doubt” there would be more lawsuits on plastics in future, pointing to the “small but accelerating” body of litigation already in North America.

The coffee company Keurig Green Mountain recently agreed settlements in both the US and Canada with a consumer and regulator respectively after being challenged on claims about the recyclability of its disposable coffee pods. The company paid out millions of dollars and has to change the language it uses on its packaging.

Earth Island Institute, a California-based environmental group, has filed three separate lawsuits against producers of plastic goods. In 2020, it began suing Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Nestlé and other large companies for creating a plastic pollution “nuisance”. The following year Earth Island Institute brought another lawsuit against Coke as well as BlueTriton Brands (formerly Nestlé Waters North America), claiming the companies falsely portrayed themselves as environmentally friendly despite being huge plastic polluters. The companies argue they are all taking action to reduce their plastic use, improve collection and try to find policy resolutions with legislators.

All three cases are still pending, but at least two will be heard in state courts, which in general have been more sympathetic than federal courts towards environmental litigants.

According to Rosa Pritchard, a plastics lawyer at the environmental law charity ClientEarth, plastics-related litigation is already on the rise. “Plastics production – big oil’s plan B – is increasingly in the spotlight for its contribution to climate change.”

ClientEarth is taking legal action to stop the petrochemicals group Ineos building a giant plastics plant in Belgium,

Pritchard said the Paris agreement had “provided an essential tool” to hold governments and corporations accountable for their contribution to climate change. “A robust treaty on plastics could also have this impact” alongside further waste and climate laws being introduced across Europe, she added.

As well as using the law to challenge plastic production, ClientEarth will be focusing its efforts on industry greenwashing. It has already reported Ahold Delhaize, one of the world’s largest grocery retail groups, to the Dutch financial regulator for allegedly failing to disclose key information on the company’s use of plastics or to report plastic-related risk to its investors. The company has said that it reports annually on the progress it is making with regards to reducing its plastic use and is focusing on those areas where it can have a direct impact, such as improving packaging, phasing out single-use plastic and recycling plastic waste from its sites.

Muffett said: “Communities and states affected by plastics are going to be learning from the lessons of climate litigation and looking at the industries and actors that are playing a role in that crisis. A lot of different people are affected in very different ways, and that means that the potential avenues for litigation are actually very substantial and very diverse.”

In a stark parallel to the misinformation campaigns on climate crisis supported by the fossil fuel industry, Muffett said there was mounting evidence that plastic producers had known for a very long time it accumulated in the environment and that they had sought to shift the blame to consumers: “It’s just a matter of when the additional dots get connected.”

Muffett said the commitment to make a legally binding plastics treaty signalled an important shift in political and public debate. “It means that the era of unrestricted plastic production, use and disposal has a limited lifetime, so everyone working in those sectors is going to have to address that reality very soon – and if they fail to do that a new litigation risk will arise.”

Topics

Reuse this content

Raft of lawsuits over plastic waste expected thanks to ‘historic’ deal

Raft of lawsuits over plastic waste expected thanks to ‘historic’ deal

Like Paris agreement, new treaty could provide tool to hold firms and states to account, say legal experts

A man collects recyclable materials along the Manila Bay, Philippines

A series lawsuits against plastic producers and governments is expected after a “historic” international agreement on waste, say legal experts.

Last week, world leaders agreed to draw up a legally binding treaty over the next two years that covered the full lifecycle of plastics from production to disposal. The move was described by the head of the UN Environment Programme as the most important multilateral environmental deal since the Paris agreement in 2015.

And, like its climate counterpart, the new treaty could provide an essential tool to hold governments and companies accountable for their environmental impacts.

An imminent case in the Philippines could set an important precedent. Last year, a coalition of individuals and environmental groups led by the marine conservation group Oceana Philippines filed a petition accusing the Philippine government of failing to tackle the “unabated production, use, and disposal of plastic” over the past two decades.

The group claims a law requiring the country’s public waste body to review, update and enforce a list of products that are not environmentally friendly has never been implemented despite being passed in 2001. The result of this, it say, is “the unabated emission of millions of tons of plastic waste into every nook and cranny of the Philippine archipelago”.

The petitioners, which include people who are catching fewer fish, having trouble conceiving or being affected by worsening floods aggravated by plastic pollution, say the government’s inaction is breaching their constitutional right to a healthy environment.

The Philippine supreme court has accepted the case, which goes to trial later this month.

Carroll Muffett, the president of the US-based Center for International Environmental Law, said it was “beyond any doubt” there would be more lawsuits on plastics in future, pointing to the “small but accelerating” body of litigation already in North America.

The coffee company Keurig Green Mountain recently agreed settlements in both the US and Canada with a consumer and regulator respectively after being challenged on claims about the recyclability of its disposable coffee pods. The company paid out millions of dollars and has to change the language it uses on its packaging.

Earth Island Institute, a California-based environmental group, has filed three separate lawsuits against producers of plastic goods. In 2020, it began sueing Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Nestlé and other large companies for creating a plastic pollution “nuisance”. The following year Earth Island Institute it brought another lawsuit against Coke as well as BlueTriton Brands (formerly Nestlé Waters North America), claiming the companies falsely portrayed themselves as environmentally friendly despite being huge plastic polluters. The companies argue they are all taking action to reduce their plastic use, improve collection and try to find policy resolutions with legislators.

All three cases are still pending, but at least two will be heard in state courts, which in general have been more sympathetic than federal courts towards environmental litigants.

According to Rosa Pritchard, a plastics lawyer at environmental law charity ClientEarth, plastics-related litigation is already on the rise. “Plastics production – big oil’s plan B – is increasingly in the spotlight for its contribution to climate change.”

ClientEarth is taking legal action to stop petrochemicals group Ineos building a giant plastics plant in Belgium,

Pritchard said the Paris agreement “had “provided an essential tool” to hold governments and corporations accountable for their contribution to climate change. “A robust treaty on plastics could also have this impact” alongside further waste and climate laws being introduced across Europe, she added.

As well as using the law to challenge plastic production, ClientEarth will be focusing its efforts on industry greenwashing. It has already reported Ahold Delhaize, one of the world’s largest grocery retail groups, to the Dutch financial regulator for allegedly failing to disclose key information on the company’s use of plastics or to report plastic-related risk to its investors. The company has said that it reports annually on the progress it is making with regards to reducing its plastic use and is focussing on those areas where it can have a direct impact, such as improving packaging, phasing out single-use plastic and recycling plastic waste from its sites.

Muffett sais: “Communities and states affected by plastics are going to be learning from the lessons of climate litigation and looking at the industries and actors that are playing a role in that crisis. A lot of different people are affected in very different ways, and that means the potential avenues for litigation are actually very substantial and very diverse.”

In a stark parallel to the misinformation campaigns on climate crisis supported by the fossil fuel industry, Muffett said there was mounting evidence that plastic producers have known for a very long time it accumulated in the environment and that they had sought to shift the blame to consumers: “It’s just a matter of when the additional dots get connected.”

Muffett said the commitment to make a legally binding plastics treaty signalled an important shift in political and public debate. “It means that the era of unrestricted plastic production, use and disposal has a limited lifetime, so everyone working in those sectors is going to have to address that reality very soon – and if they fail to do that a new litigation risk will arise.”

Topics

Reuse this content

In a first, California plans to clean up microplastics

The state has adopted a strategy to monitor and reduce the ubiquitous form of pollution.

A volunteer with the Pacific Beach Coalition picking up trash near Pacifica Esplanade Beach last year.
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

They are in your gut. They are in the ocean. They are even floating through the air in the most remote regions of the West. Microplastics — fragments of broken-down plastic no larger than a fraction of an inch — have become a colossal global problem.

California wants to fix that.

Last month, the state became the first in the nation to adopt a strategy addressing the scourge of tiny detritus. “We need to eliminate our addiction to single-use plastics,” said Mark Gold, the executive director of the Ocean Protection Council, the governmental body that approved the plan.

The strategy is not regulatory, but the council has committed to spending $3 million this year, with reduction targets laid out between now and 2030. Gold added, “You find microplastics everywhere you look.”

By some estimates, humans have manufactured about 8.3 billion metric tons of plastic, only nine percent of which has ever been recycled. About 11 million metric tons of this plastic end up in the ocean every year, and without intervention, this number is expected to triple by 2040, according to the council. When these plastics break down, they can be eaten by marine animals, stunting their growth and causing reproductive problems. They have also been found in human organs, including placentas, as well as in soils and plants.

California’s strategy is part of a global effort to address this problem. Last week, representatives from 175 nations agreed to begin work on a legally binding treaty that would commit them to recycling and cleanup measures, as well as curbs on plastic production. The treaty, supporters say, would be the most important environmental accord since the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change.

At the local level, California’s strategy primarily aims to do two things: First, prevent plastics from entering the environment. Second, monitor those that are already out there.

The first step, Gold said, is reducing or ultimately eliminating the worst culprits, including single-use plastics, synthetic fabrics, cigarette filters and car tires. Research from 2019 showed that nearly half of the microplastics polluting California’s coastal waters were rubber fragments probably shed from vehicle tires, making them the largest single contributor to the problem.

The strategy also sets goals to improve storm water systems to catch the pollutants before they reach the ocean. “The thing about microplastics is if they get into the ocean environment, they are there to stay,” Gold said.

The plan also commits to monitoring levels of microplastics in California’s waters, just as the state monitors the level of harmful particulate matter in the air, which can often increase during events like wildfires. Such a program would be among the first to consistently monitor these pollutants in the environment.

It also sets goals to research where the majority of the microplastics are coming from, and how much risk each kind poses to the health of humans and aquatic life. Though scientists agree that plastic pollution is a blight, little is known about exactly how it affects us.

“The evidence of harm is not the same as the evidence of presence,” said Britta Denise Hardesty, a principal scientist with the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, an Australian science agency, and an expert on microplastics, who is not involved in the plan. She added, “It’s awesome that California is doing this.”

Lorin Eleni Gill/Associated Press

A sensible state strategy, she added, was far more likely to succeed than some previous efforts, including a giant boom that set sail into the Pacific Ocean in September 2018 with plans to remove 150,000 pounds of plastic from the ocean in a year. “You couldn’t design something to be more costly and less likely to succeed,” Hardesty told me.

The vessel returned several months later, in pieces.

The hope is that California — the state with the largest economy and among the best environmental protections in the nation — can forge ahead in reducing the harm of microplastics, even if it can’t solve the problem on its own, Gold, the Ocean Protection Council executive, told me.

“We’re California, we lead by example; it’s in our DNA,” he said, adding: “We don’t want to wake up in five years and find out this is absolutely devastating to our marine ecology, and we didn’t do anything.”

For more:

  • Last week, representatives from 175 nations agreed to begin writing a global treaty that would restrict the explosive growth of plastic pollution.

  • Sending a giant boom into the ocean to clean up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch was probably a bad idea, Vox reports.

  • A study in 2020 showed you’re probably inhaling microplastics right now.

Rich Pedroncelli/Associated Press

  • Housing law: California lawmakers are trying again to get rid of the nation’s only law that lets voters veto public housing projects, The Associated Press reports.

  • Trucker protest: A convoy that departed from California last month encircled the nation’s capital on Sunday in protest of Covid mandates.

SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA

  • Jury rules in favor of officers: Two Huntington Beach police officers did not use excessive force when they shot and killed a man in 2017, a jury ruled on Friday. Read more from The Associated Press.

  • Arts review: A Los Angeles troupe in search of choreographic vision.

  • Basketball: Tony Bland, a former U.S.C. assistant coach who was arrested in 2017 as part an F.B.I. investigation, is now coaching at a Los Angeles-area high school. He still hopes he can return to the college level.

  • L.A. councilman spending: Joe Buscaino, a Los Angeles city councilman who is running for mayor, has spent tens of thousands of dollars from his officeholder account on family trips, The Los Angeles Times reports.

NORTHERN CALIFORNIA

Sang An for The New York Times

These garlic noodles cross cultures, but are deeply San Franciscan.

Beth Coller for The New York Times

Today’s tip comes from Caitlin Rodriguez, who recommends a drive along State Route 150:

“One of my favorite things to do in the tri-county area (Ventura, Santa Barbara, and L.A. counties) is to go for drives and explore the mountain, agricultural, and ocean sceneries of the area.

My all time favorite drive is to drive along the 150, a mountain highway that goes through the small, agricultural town of Santa Paula, up to upper Ojai, and down into the Ojai valley. I always stop at Steckel Park on the outskirts of Santa Paula where there is a small aviary and wild peacocks roaming around. As you can hear the call of the peacocks in the distance, you can visit with the very friendly Cockatoo who likes to bring you sticks for a good head scratching. He really makes it hard to leave. Continuing up the 150, a great place to stop for lunch is a burger joint called the Summit or after enjoying the scenic drive all the way down into the Ojai valley, there are several places to enjoy great food in Ojai.

After lunch, you can hop back on the 33 and head down into Ventura where you can end the drive at the uncrowded, local Ventura beaches.”

Tell us about your favorite places to visit in California. Email your suggestions to CAtoday@nytimes.com. We’ll be sharing more in upcoming editions of the newsletter.

The artist Josh Kline imagines an unmoored life in the post-climate-change future.

Join The Times for a free online event on Wednesday with two of the nation’s most prominent Covid-19 experts.

Dr. Bob Wachter and Dr. Monica Gandhi, both at the University of California, San Francisco, have worked throughout the pandemic to explain the risks of Covid-19. And often, they have disagreed.

See event details here.

In a recent column, The Financial Times’s Janan Ganesh beautifully argued a point that I’ve long struggled to articulate: Los Angeles is a great walking city.

Ganesh wrote that the standard walkability rankings overlook the wonder of Los Angeles by overemphasizing distances and convenience:

“The more basic test is whether there is enough on the streets to see in the first place. Missing that point is how Washington comes to rank above Istanbul, and Munich above Bangkok. Being efficient and well put-together is prized over the one thing a city cannot design or buy: life, whether in its smile-raising or stomach-turning forms. Susan Sontag wrote that the urban wanderer must be on the search for ‘voluptuous extremes.’ That isn’t Bordeaux.

No western city of comparable heft is weirder or more random than L.A.”

Thanks for starting your week with us. We’ll be back tomorrow.

P.S. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Equivalent note to C sharp (5 letters).

Soumya Karlamangla, Jonah Candelario and Mariel Wamsley to California Today. You can reach the team at CAtoday@nytimes.com.

Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox.

In a first, California plans to clean up microplastics

The state has adopted a strategy to monitor and reduce the ubiquitous form of pollution.

A volunteer with the Pacific Beach Coalition picking up trash near Pacifica Esplanade Beach last year.
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

They are in your gut. They are in the ocean. They are even floating through the air in the most remote regions of the West. Microplastics — fragments of broken-down plastic no larger than a fraction of an inch — have become a colossal global problem.

California wants to fix that.

Last month, the state became the first in the nation to adopt a strategy addressing the scourge of tiny detritus. “We need to eliminate our addiction to single-use plastics,” said Mark Gold, the executive director of the Ocean Protection Council, the governmental body that approved the plan.

The strategy is not regulatory, but the council has committed to spending $3 million this year, with reduction targets laid out between now and 2030. Gold added, “You find microplastics everywhere you look.”

By some estimates, humans have manufactured about 8.3 billion metric tons of plastic, only nine percent of which has ever been recycled. About 11 million metric tons of this plastic end up in the ocean every year, and without intervention, this number is expected to triple by 2040, according to the council. When these plastics break down, they can be eaten by marine animals, stunting their growth and causing reproductive problems. They have also been found in human organs, including placentas, as well as in soils and plants.

California’s strategy is part of a global effort to address this problem. Last week, representatives from 175 nations agreed to begin work on a legally binding treaty that would commit them to recycling and cleanup measures, as well as curbs on plastic production. The treaty, supporters say, would be the most important environmental accord since the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change.

At the local level, California’s strategy primarily aims to do two things: First, prevent plastics from entering the environment. Second, monitor those that are already out there.

The first step, Gold said, is reducing or ultimately eliminating the worst culprits, including single-use plastics, synthetic fabrics, cigarette filters and car tires. Research from 2019 showed that nearly half of the microplastics polluting California’s coastal waters were rubber fragments probably shed from vehicle tires, making them the largest single contributor to the problem.

The strategy also sets goals to improve storm water systems to catch the pollutants before they reach the ocean. “The thing about microplastics is if they get into the ocean environment, they are there to stay,” Gold said.

The plan also commits to monitoring levels of microplastics in California’s waters, just as the state monitors the level of harmful particulate matter in the air, which can often increase during events like wildfires. Such a program would be among the first to consistently monitor these pollutants in the environment.

It also sets goals to research where the majority of the microplastics are coming from, and how much risk each kind poses to the health of humans and aquatic life. Though scientists agree that plastic pollution is a blight, little is known about exactly how it affects us.

“The evidence of harm is not the same as the evidence of presence,” said Britta Denise Hardesty, a principal scientist with the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, an Australian science agency, and an expert on microplastics, who is not involved in the plan. She added, “It’s awesome that California is doing this.”

Lorin Eleni Gill/Associated Press

A sensible state strategy, she added, was far more likely to succeed than some previous efforts, including a giant boom that set sail into the Pacific Ocean in September 2018 with plans to remove 150,000 pounds of plastic from the ocean in a year. “You couldn’t design something to be more costly and less likely to succeed,” Hardesty told me.

The vessel returned several months later, in pieces.

The hope is that California — the state with the largest economy and among the best environmental protections in the nation — can forge ahead in reducing the harm of microplastics, even if it can’t solve the problem on its own, Gold, the Ocean Protection Council executive, told me.

“We’re California, we lead by example; it’s in our DNA,” he said, adding: “We don’t want to wake up in five years and find out this is absolutely devastating to our marine ecology, and we didn’t do anything.”

For more:

  • Last week, representatives from 175 nations agreed to begin writing a global treaty that would restrict the explosive growth of plastic pollution.

  • Sending a giant boom into the ocean to clean up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch was probably a bad idea, Vox reports.

  • A study in 2020 showed you’re probably inhaling microplastics right now.

Rich Pedroncelli/Associated Press

  • Housing law: California lawmakers are trying again to get rid of the nation’s only law that lets voters veto public housing projects, The Associated Press reports.

  • Trucker protest: A convoy that departed from California last month encircled the nation’s capital on Sunday in protest of Covid mandates.

SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA

  • Jury rules in favor of officers: Two Huntington Beach police officers did not use excessive force when they shot and killed a man in 2017, a jury ruled on Friday. Read more from The Associated Press.

  • Arts review: A Los Angeles troupe in search of choreographic vision.

  • Basketball: Tony Bland, a former U.S.C. assistant coach who was arrested in 2017 as part an F.B.I. investigation, is now coaching at a Los Angeles-area high school. He still hopes he can return to the college level.

  • L.A. councilman spending: Joe Buscaino, a Los Angeles city councilman who is running for mayor, has spent tens of thousands of dollars from his officeholder account on family trips, The Los Angeles Times reports.

NORTHERN CALIFORNIA

Sang An for The New York Times

These garlic noodles cross cultures, but are deeply San Franciscan.

Beth Coller for The New York Times

Today’s tip comes from Caitlin Rodriguez, who recommends a drive along State Route 150:

“One of my favorite things to do in the tri-county area (Ventura, Santa Barbara, and L.A. counties) is to go for drives and explore the mountain, agricultural, and ocean sceneries of the area.

My all time favorite drive is to drive along the 150, a mountain highway that goes through the small, agricultural town of Santa Paula, up to upper Ojai, and down into the Ojai valley. I always stop at Steckel Park on the outskirts of Santa Paula where there is a small aviary and wild peacocks roaming around. As you can hear the call of the peacocks in the distance, you can visit with the very friendly Cockatoo who likes to bring you sticks for a good head scratching. He really makes it hard to leave. Continuing up the 150, a great place to stop for lunch is a burger joint called the Summit or after enjoying the scenic drive all the way down into the Ojai valley, there are several places to enjoy great food in Ojai.

After lunch, you can hop back on the 33 and head down into Ventura where you can end the drive at the uncrowded, local Ventura beaches.”

Tell us about your favorite places to visit in California. Email your suggestions to CAtoday@nytimes.com. We’ll be sharing more in upcoming editions of the newsletter.

The artist Josh Kline imagines an unmoored life in the post-climate-change future.

Join The Times for a free online event on Wednesday with two of the nation’s most prominent Covid-19 experts.

Dr. Bob Wachter and Dr. Monica Gandhi, both at the University of California, San Francisco, have worked throughout the pandemic to explain the risks of Covid-19. And often, they have disagreed.

See event details here.

In a recent column, The Financial Times’s Janan Ganesh beautifully argued a point that I’ve long struggled to articulate: Los Angeles is a great walking city.

Ganesh wrote that the standard walkability rankings overlook the wonder of Los Angeles by overemphasizing distances and convenience:

“The more basic test is whether there is enough on the streets to see in the first place. Missing that point is how Washington comes to rank above Istanbul, and Munich above Bangkok. Being efficient and well put-together is prized over the one thing a city cannot design or buy: life, whether in its smile-raising or stomach-turning forms. Susan Sontag wrote that the urban wanderer must be on the search for ‘voluptuous extremes.’ That isn’t Bordeaux.

No western city of comparable heft is weirder or more random than L.A.”

Thanks for starting your week with us. We’ll be back tomorrow.

P.S. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Equivalent note to C sharp (5 letters).

Soumya Karlamangla, Jonah Candelario and Mariel Wamsley to California Today. You can reach the team at CAtoday@nytimes.com.

Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox.

Landmark treaty on plastic pollution must put scientific evidence front and centre

  • EDITORIAL
  • 08 March 2022

Landmark treaty on plastic pollution must put scientific evidence front and centre

United Nations resolution on greening plastics is a positive step. As negotiations begin, they must be evidence-based.

Leila Benali and Inger Andersen bumps fists at UNEP in Nairobi on 3 March 2022.

Leila Benali (left), Morocco’s minister for energy and sustainablity, and UN Environment Programme chief Inger Andersen celebrate the decision to begin talks on a plastics treaty.Credit: Tony Karumba/AFP/Getty

On 2 March, world leaders and environment ministers agreed to start negotiations on the world’s first legally binding international treaty to eliminate one of humanity’s most devastating sources of pollution: plastics. This hugely positive step has the power to attack the problem as never before. But to achieve this goal, science needs to be front and centre in the negotiations.

Plastic pollution is a massive problem. Some 400 million tonnes of the material is produced each year, a figure that could double by 2040. Of all the plastic that has ever been produced, only about 9% has been recycled and 12% incinerated. Almost all other waste plastic has ended up in the ocean or in huge landfill sites. More than 90% of plastics are made from fossil fuels. If left unchecked, plastics production and disposal will be responsible for 15% of permitted carbon emissions by 2050 if the world is to limit global warming to 1.5 °C above pre-industrial temperatures.

Talks on the treaty are expected to take between two and three years and will be organized by the United Nations Environment Programme, based in Nairobi. A significant feature of the treaty is that it will be legally binding, like the 2015 Paris climate agreement and the Montreal Protocol, a 1987 treaty that led to the production and use of ozone-depleting substances being phased out.

How to globalize the circular economy

A team of negotiators from different regions is being established. By the end of May, they will start work on the treaty’s text. According to last week’s UN decision, these negotiators will consider “the possibility of a mechanism to provide policy relevant scientific and socio-economic information and assessment related to plastic pollution”. But they need to do more than just consider a mechanism. The UN must urgently set up a scientists’ group that can give the negotiators expert advice and respond to their questions. These science advisers would need to reflect the necessary expertise in the natural and social sciences, as well as in engineering, and represent different regions of the world.

Nations want the plastics treaty to be more ambitious than most existing environmental agreements. Unlike the Montreal Protocol, which replaced around 100 ozone-depleting substances with ozone-friendly alternatives, countries have agreed that a plastics treaty must lock sustainability into the ‘full life-cycle’ of polluting materials. This means plastics manufacturing must become a zero-carbon process, as must plastics recycling and waste disposal. These are not straightforward ambitions, which is why research — and access to research — is so important as negotiations get under way.

Most plastics are designed in a ‘linear’ one-way process: small, carbon-based molecules are knitted together with chemical bonds to make long and cross-linked polymer molecules. These bonds are hard to break, which makes plastics extremely long-lasting. They do not degrade easily and are difficult to recycle.

Marine litter often grabs the headlines, but plastic pollution is everywhere. Landfill sites containing mountains of plastic blight our planet, and minuscule particles of plastic are found in even the most pristine environments. Such is the scale and persistence of plastics that they are now entering the fossil record. And a new human-made ecosystem — the plastisphere — has emerged that hosts microorganisms and algae1.

Chemistry can make plastics sustainable – but isn’t the whole solution

As negotiators get to work, they will need scientists to help them address several key questions. Which types of plastic can be recycled2,3? Which plastics can be designed to biodegrade, and under what conditions? And which plastics offer the best chances for reuse4? Moreover, social-sciences research will be essential to understanding the implications of — and inter-relationships between — the solutions that countries and industries will have to choose from. For example, new technologies and processes will have impacts on jobs. These impacts need to be studied so that risks to people’s livelihoods can be mitigated.

Mapping out the implications of various approaches to greening the plastics industry will also require cooperation between governments, industry and campaign organizations — building on the cooperation that has brought the world to the start of negotiations.

Plastics have made the modern world. They are a staple of daily life, from construction to clothing, technology to transport. But plastics use is also increasing at a rapid rate, and this is no longer tenable — around half of all plastics ever produced have been made since 2004.

It is clear from the UN’s ongoing efforts to tackle climate change that it is not enough for a treaty to be legally binding. Signatories must also be held accountable, with regular reporting and checks on progress. Equally important is the need for science advice to be embedded in the talks from the earliest possible stage.

Last week’s decision is the best start the planet could have had to tackling our plastics addiction. But as the hard work begins, decision-makers must be able to quickly and easily access the very best available evidence that research can provide.

Nature 603, 202 (2022)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-022-00648-9

References

  1. Amaral-Zettler, L. A., Zettler, E. R. & Mincer, T. J. Nature Rev. Microbiol. 18, 139–151 (2020).

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  2. Hopewell, J., Dvorak, R. & Edward, K. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B 364, 2115–2126 (2009).

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  3. Coates, G. W. & Getzler, Y. D. Y. L. Nature Rev. Mater. 5, 501–516 (2020).

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Landmark treaty on plastic pollution must put scientific evidence front and centre

  • EDITORIAL
  • 08 March 2022

Landmark treaty on plastic pollution must put scientific evidence front and centre

United Nations resolution on greening plastics is a positive step. As negotiations begin, they must be evidence-based.

Leila Benali and Inger Andersen bumps fists at UNEP in Nairobi on 3 March 2022.

Leila Benali (left), Morocco’s minister for energy and sustainablity, and UN Environment Programme chief Inger Andersen celebrate the decision to begin talks on a plastics treaty.Credit: Tony Karumba/AFP/Getty

On 2 March, world leaders and environment ministers agreed to start negotiations on the world’s first legally binding international treaty to eliminate one of humanity’s most devastating sources of pollution: plastics. This hugely positive step has the power to attack the problem as never before. But to achieve this goal, science needs to be front and centre in the negotiations.

Plastic pollution is a massive problem. Some 400 million tonnes of the material is produced each year, a figure that could double by 2040. Of all the plastic that has ever been produced, only about 9% has been recycled and 12% incinerated. Almost all other waste plastic has ended up in the ocean or in huge landfill sites. More than 90% of plastics are made from fossil fuels. If left unchecked, plastics production and disposal will be responsible for 15% of permitted carbon emissions by 2050 if the world is to limit global warming to 1.5 °C above pre-industrial temperatures.

Talks on the treaty are expected to take between two and three years and will be organized by the United Nations Environment Programme, based in Nairobi. A significant feature of the treaty is that it will be legally binding, like the 2015 Paris climate agreement and the Montreal Protocol, a 1987 treaty that led to the production and use of ozone-depleting substances being phased out.

How to globalize the circular economy

A team of negotiators from different regions is being established. By the end of May, they will start work on the treaty’s text. According to last week’s UN decision, these negotiators will consider “the possibility of a mechanism to provide policy relevant scientific and socio-economic information and assessment related to plastic pollution”. But they need to do more than just consider a mechanism. The UN must urgently set up a scientists’ group that can give the negotiators expert advice and respond to their questions. These science advisers would need to reflect the necessary expertise in the natural and social sciences, as well as in engineering, and represent different regions of the world.

Nations want the plastics treaty to be more ambitious than most existing environmental agreements. Unlike the Montreal Protocol, which replaced around 100 ozone-depleting substances with ozone-friendly alternatives, countries have agreed that a plastics treaty must lock sustainability into the ‘full life-cycle’ of polluting materials. This means plastics manufacturing must become a zero-carbon process, as must plastics recycling and waste disposal. These are not straightforward ambitions, which is why research — and access to research — is so important as negotiations get under way.

Most plastics are designed in a ‘linear’ one-way process: small, carbon-based molecules are knitted together with chemical bonds to make long and cross-linked polymer molecules. These bonds are hard to break, which makes plastics extremely long-lasting. They do not degrade easily and are difficult to recycle.

Marine litter often grabs the headlines, but plastic pollution is everywhere. Landfill sites containing mountains of plastic blight our planet, and minuscule particles of plastic are found in even the most pristine environments. Such is the scale and persistence of plastics that they are now entering the fossil record. And a new human-made ecosystem — the plastisphere — has emerged that hosts microorganisms and algae1.

Chemistry can make plastics sustainable – but isn’t the whole solution

As negotiators get to work, they will need scientists to help them address several key questions. Which types of plastic can be recycled2,3? Which plastics can be designed to biodegrade, and under what conditions? And which plastics offer the best chances for reuse4? Moreover, social-sciences research will be essential to understanding the implications of — and inter-relationships between — the solutions that countries and industries will have to choose from. For example, new technologies and processes will have impacts on jobs. These impacts need to be studied so that risks to people’s livelihoods can be mitigated.

Mapping out the implications of various approaches to greening the plastics industry will also require cooperation between governments, industry and campaign organizations — building on the cooperation that has brought the world to the start of negotiations.

Plastics have made the modern world. They are a staple of daily life, from construction to clothing, technology to transport. But plastics use is also increasing at a rapid rate, and this is no longer tenable — around half of all plastics ever produced have been made since 2004.

It is clear from the UN’s ongoing efforts to tackle climate change that it is not enough for a treaty to be legally binding. Signatories must also be held accountable, with regular reporting and checks on progress. Equally important is the need for science advice to be embedded in the talks from the earliest possible stage.

Last week’s decision is the best start the planet could have had to tackling our plastics addiction. But as the hard work begins, decision-makers must be able to quickly and easily access the very best available evidence that research can provide.

Nature 603, 202 (2022)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-022-00648-9

References

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World leaders agree to draw up ‘historic’ treaty on plastic waste

World leaders agree to draw up ‘historic’ treaty on plastic waste

UN environment assembly resolution is being hailed as biggest climate deal since 2015 Paris accord

A delegate in Kenya looks at a 10-metre-high art installation of plastic waste urging people to ‘turn off the plastic tap’.

World leaders, environment ministers and other representatives from 173 countries have agreed to develop a legally binding treaty on plastics, in what many described a truly historic moment.

The resolution, agreed at the UN environment assembly in Nairobi, Kenya, calls for a treaty covering the “full lifecycle” of plastics from production to disposal, to be negotiated over the next two years. It has been described by the head of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) as the most important multilateral environmental deal since the Paris climate accord in 2015.

Approximately 7bn of the estimated 9.2bn tonnes of plastics produced between 1950 and 2017 are now waste. About 75% of that waste is either deposited in landfills or accumulating in terrestrial and aquatic environments and ecosystems.

“Against the backdrop of geopolitical turmoil, the UN environment assembly shows multilateral cooperation at its best,” said Espen Barth Eide, the president of UNEA-5 and Norway’s minister for climate and the environment. “Plastic pollution has grown into an epidemic. With today’s resolution we are officially on track for a cure.”

Inger Andersen, the director of the UN Environment Programme, tweeted: “We have just gavelled the resolution paving the way for global action to #BeatPlasticPollution. The most important environmental deal since the Paris accord.”

“The work starts now!” she added.

Andersen described the agreement as a “triumph by planet Earth over single-use plastics” but warned that the mandate did not grant stakeholders a “two-year pause”.

Plastic cups and other debris cover a beach in Bali, Indonesia

“In parallel to negotiations over an international binding agreement, UNEP will work with any willing government and business across the value chain to shift away from single-use plastics, as well as to mobilise private finance and remove barriers to investments in research and in a new circular economy,” Andersen said.

UN nations, which have been holding talks in Nairobi this week to discuss the terms for a treaty, agreed it should cover the production and design of plastic, not just waste. The resolution established an intergovernmental negotiating committee, tasked with drafting and ratifying the treaty. It will start work this year and aims to finish by 2024.

The resolution introduces provisions to recognise waste pickers, a “groundbreaking development” that would affect millions of people, according to NGOs, and the acknowledgment of the role of indigenous peoples. It is the first time waste pickers, low-paid workers in developing nations who scavenge for recyclable plastic and other goods, have been recognised in an environmental resolution.

NGOs described the resolution as a critical shift in international policymakers’ approach, which previously focused on plastic as a marine litter issue. The mandate recommends measures to tackle plastic production, predicted to almost quadruple by 2050 and take up 10-13% of the global carbon budget. They urged world leaders to show even more resolve in developing and finalising the details of the treaty over the next two years.

“We stand at a crossroads in history when ambitious decisions taken today can prevent plastic pollution from contributing to our planet’s ecosystem collapse,” said Marco Lambertini, director general of WWF International.

“But our work is far from over – world leaders must now show even more resolve in developing and implementing a treaty which addresses our current plastic pollution crisis and enables an effective transition to a circular economy for plastic.”

Christina Dixon, the deputy ocean campaign lead at the Environmental Investigation Agency, said: “This resolution finally recognises that we cannot begin to address plastics in our ocean and on land without intervening at source.

“Fundamentally, the plastics tap must be turned off if we are serious about tackling the problem,” she said.

A wave full of plastic waste breaks on a beach

Dixon said the world was at the “start of a journey” towards securing a legally binding treaty.

Niven Reddy, the Africa coordinator at the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives, said: “This milestone could not have happened without a global movement pushing decision-makers every step of the way.”

Joanne Green, a senior policy associate at Tearfund, said: “Today marks the first step towards justice for communities impacted by the burning and dumping of plastic waste. The recognition of waste pickers and the vital role they play in stopping plastic pollution is long overdue; governments must now ensure that they are given a prominent seat at the negotiating table.”

The treaty will be accompanied by financial and technical support, including a scientific body to advise it, and the possibility of a dedicated global fund.

The resolution was adopted with the conclusion of the three-day UNEA-5.2 meeting, attended by more than 3,400 delegates in person and 1,500 online participants from 175 UN member states, including 79 ministers and 17 high-level officials.

There is growing public concern over plastic pollution. More than 60 countries already have implemented bans and levies on plastic packaging and single-use waste, aimed at reducing use and improving waste management.

Plastic consumption in developed countries is 2.5 times higher per capita than in developing countries, according to the Planet Tracker thinktank.

Topics

Reuse this content

World leaders agree to draw up ‘historic’ treaty on plastic waste

World leaders agree to draw up ‘historic’ treaty on plastic waste

UN environment assembly resolution is being hailed as biggest climate deal since 2015 Paris accord

A delegate in Kenya looks at a 10-metre-high art installation of plastic waste urging people to ‘turn off the plastic tap’.

World leaders, environment ministers and other representatives from 173 countries have agreed to develop a legally binding treaty on plastics, in what many described a truly historic moment.

The resolution, agreed at the UN environment assembly in Nairobi, Kenya, calls for a treaty covering the “full lifecycle” of plastics from production to disposal, to be negotiated over the next two years. It has been described by the head of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) as the most important multilateral environmental deal since the Paris climate accord in 2015.

Approximately 7bn of the estimated 9.2bn tonnes of plastics produced between 1950 and 2017 are now waste. About 75% of that waste is either deposited in landfills or accumulating in terrestrial and aquatic environments and ecosystems.

“Against the backdrop of geopolitical turmoil, the UN environment assembly shows multilateral cooperation at its best,” said Espen Barth Eide, the president of UNEA-5 and Norway’s minister for climate and the environment. “Plastic pollution has grown into an epidemic. With today’s resolution we are officially on track for a cure.”

Inger Andersen, the director of the UN Environment Programme, tweeted: “We have just gavelled the resolution paving the way for global action to #BeatPlasticPollution. The most important environmental deal since the Paris accord.”

“The work starts now!” she added.

Andersen described the agreement as a “triumph by planet Earth over single-use plastics” but warned that the mandate did not grant stakeholders a “two-year pause”.

Plastic cups and other debris cover a beach in Bali, Indonesia

“In parallel to negotiations over an international binding agreement, UNEP will work with any willing government and business across the value chain to shift away from single-use plastics, as well as to mobilise private finance and remove barriers to investments in research and in a new circular economy,” Andersen said.

UN nations, which have been holding talks in Nairobi this week to discuss the terms for a treaty, agreed it should cover the production and design of plastic, not just waste. The resolution established an intergovernmental negotiating committee, tasked with drafting and ratifying the treaty. It will start work this year and aims to finish by 2024.

The resolution introduces provisions to recognise waste pickers, a “groundbreaking development” that would affect millions of people, according to NGOs, and the acknowledgment of the role of indigenous peoples. It is the first time waste pickers, low-paid workers in developing nations who scavenge for recyclable plastic and other goods, have been recognised in an environmental resolution.

NGOs described the resolution as a critical shift in international policymakers’ approach, which previously focused on plastic as a marine litter issue. The mandate recommends measures to tackle plastic production, predicted to almost quadruple by 2050 and take up 10-13% of the global carbon budget. They urged world leaders to show even more resolve in developing and finalising the details of the treaty over the next two years.

“We stand at a crossroads in history when ambitious decisions taken today can prevent plastic pollution from contributing to our planet’s ecosystem collapse,” said Marco Lambertini, director general of WWF International.

“But our work is far from over – world leaders must now show even more resolve in developing and implementing a treaty which addresses our current plastic pollution crisis and enables an effective transition to a circular economy for plastic.”

Christina Dixon, the deputy ocean campaign lead at the Environmental Investigation Agency, said: “This resolution finally recognises that we cannot begin to address plastics in our ocean and on land without intervening at source.

“Fundamentally, the plastics tap must be turned off if we are serious about tackling the problem,” she said.

A wave full of plastic waste breaks on a beach

Dixon said the world was at the “start of a journey” towards securing a legally binding treaty.

Niven Reddy, the Africa coordinator at the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives, said: “This milestone could not have happened without a global movement pushing decision-makers every step of the way.”

Joanne Green, a senior policy associate at Tearfund, said: “Today marks the first step towards justice for communities impacted by the burning and dumping of plastic waste. The recognition of waste pickers and the vital role they play in stopping plastic pollution is long overdue; governments must now ensure that they are given a prominent seat at the negotiating table.”

The treaty will be accompanied by financial and technical support, including a scientific body to advise it, and the possibility of a dedicated global fund.

The resolution was adopted with the conclusion of the three-day UNEA-5.2 meeting, attended by more than 3,400 delegates in person and 1,500 online participants from 175 UN member states, including 79 ministers and 17 high-level officials.

There is growing public concern over plastic pollution. More than 60 countries already have implemented bans and levies on plastic packaging and single-use waste, aimed at reducing use and improving waste management.

Plastic consumption in developed countries is 2.5 times higher per capita than in developing countries, according to the Planet Tracker thinktank.

Topics

Reuse this content

Unintentional PFAS in products: A “jungle” of contamination

Toxic PFAS are often added into consumer products to make items stain- or water-resistant. But mounting evidence indicates that many products made without the intentional addition of PFAS are also contaminated.

Researchers say these products may unintentionally become contaminated with PFAS, short for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, during the manufacturing or distribution process, raising concerns about entry points of PFAS into the supply chain that are not yet fully understood.

PFAS are linked to negative health outcomes including some cancers, reproductive problems, and birth defects, among others. Some manufacturers, such as cosmetics companies, will disclose the addition of the chemicals so consumers can determine their own exposure.

What’s harder to avoid, however, are those products that contain PFAS even when the manufacturers themselves may not know. Because of the widespread use of PFAS across industries, there are many ways that these “forever chemicals” can contaminate consumer goods—including manufacturing lubricants and coatings, misidentified raw materials, pesticides, personal protective equipment, and plastic packaging.

Marta Venier, an assistant professor at Indiana University who studies the transport of PFAS, told EHN that the high number of uses of PFAS in manufacturing means that products move through a “jungle” of possible contaminations before reaching the consumer.

PFAS contamination during manufacturing

Venier said it’s possible that coatings or lubricants used on manufacturing equipment or in factories can contain PFAS, which then transfer to the products made in such facilities. In such cases, the level of PFAS that is transferred to the product is low, but detectable, said Venier. Venier and Miriam Diamond, an environmental chemist at the University of Toronto, mentioned conveyor belt lubricant as a possible PFAS source.

Rainier Lohmann, an atmospheric chemist at the University of Rhode Island, also pointed to the possibility of contamination from slip agents—substances used in manufacturing to help mass-produced products slide easily out of molds.

In order to manufacture plastic goods, plastic pellets are melted, then extruded through a nozzle into a mold. Justin Boucher, the operations director of the Food Packaging Forum, thinks this could also be an entry point for PFAS. “To keep the plastic from gunking up these nozzles, they’re adding some kind of additives that contain PFAS,” he told EHN.

“You can basically go through almost the entire manufacturing chain and find several instances where you have this possibility that somewhere, PFAS has contaminated a product,” Lohmann told EHN. “It’s very difficult to figure out where that’s from, because they’re so ubiquitous.”

In other instances, said Venier, manufacturers may unknowingly create products with raw material that contains PFAS. “[Some] manufacturers buy their chemical products from intermediaries,” she said. “So they think that they are buying intermediary products that are PFAS free, when, in reality, they are not.”

There can also be PFAS in personal protective equipment or clothing that workers in manufacturing plants or food processing plants wear, particularly in gloves, which Lohmann and Venier said could be a possible area of concern.

To understand how PFAS in worker clothing and on equipment can accidentally contaminate products, Lohmann uses the analogy of a muffin tin with non-stick spray. Before baking, one sprays the muffin tin; after baking, the muffin is removed—with an oily sheen coating the bottom.

That ease of transfer makes it difficult to determine exactly how products get contaminated.

Incidental PFAS in food products

PFAS food

A 2017 study by the Green Science Policy Institute tested about 400 pieces of food packaging and found indications of PFAS in 40% of the items. (Credit: hewy/flickr)

Because PFAS bioaccumulates in mammals, unintentional contamination can be a concern in animal products as well. A 2019 study at the U.S. Department of Agriculture examined levels of PFAS in the blood and tissue of cattle in a New Mexico herd that was accidentally exposed to the toxics in contaminated water. Given the widespread nature of PFAS contamination in water, it is likely that similar unintentional exposure is a concern for animal agriculture across the country, said Venier.

PFAS are also used in different parts of agriculture and land management. PFAS in pesticides that contaminated water in Pepperell, Massachusetts, last May came from a liquid-repellent coating on the inside of the container used to store the pesticides. There is not always proper communication between companies in the chemical supply chain, said Boucher, which can make it impossible to know whether PFAS exist in certain agricultural inputs.

PFAS can also unintentionally contaminate food through packaging, specifically when packaging is made from recycled materials. Because PFAS are such persistent chemicals, they can accumulate in recycled paper or wood pulp, either because the recycled material was coated in PFAS or came into contact with PFAS unintentionally.

A 2017 study by the Green Science Policy Institute tested about 400 pieces of food packaging and found indications of PFAS in 40% of the items. If recycled, such PFAS-containing food packaging products would be reconstituted into other PFAS-containing products, perhaps without the knowledge of the manufacturer.

“So if you’re allowed to use recycled pulp in food contact, paper, and board packaging, and you don’t have total control or oversight over what material was recycled, you don’t always know what chemicals were present,” said Boucher. Whether or not manufacturers are able to monitor the levels of PFAS in wood or paper pulp they are buying, he said, is unclear.

What manufacturers can do about PFAS contamination 

Testing products for PFAS is still a relatively new field of science. However, some studies have indicated that non-intentional contamination is a growing problem.

A 2021 study that tested hundreds of cosmetic products for PFAS found the chemicals in many products that didn’t list fluorinated compounds (an indicator of PFAS) in the ingredients, while other research has indicated that food packaging and paper products can contain non-intentionally added chemicals by way of certain inks and adhesives.

In addition, recent testing by the wellness site Mamavation, partially supported by EHN.org, has found evidence of PFAS in makeup and clothing, including in many brands that are marketed as PFAS-free.

The main problem, said Lohmann, is not necessarily manufacturer negligence but lack of awareness. Once manufacturers are aware that they are using PFAS in their manufacturing process, they can switch to alternative processing agents, like PFAS-free lubricants. There’s ample motivation for manufacturers to do this: “Being associated with PFAS is not something that most brands want to have these days,” he said.

Boucher said manufacturers are “looking, and in some cases they’re finding, alternatives. My thinking is that the demand is going to grow for these PFAS-free alternatives across the whole processing chain.”

While unintentional contamination usually results in low levels of PFAS on the consumer end, recognizing possible non-intentional entry points still provides an opportunity to limit exposure, which is especially important for people already experiencing high levels of PFAS. Additionally, said Diamond, the wide use of PFAS in manufacturing is already a concern for worker health.

“We don’t spend enough time considering how the people who make our stuff are exposed,” she told EHN.

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