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The plastics industry claims that ‘chemical recycling’ or ‘advanced recycling’ technologies, which use heat or solvents to convert waste plastic into chemical feedstocks that can potentially be further processed into new plastics, are a green alternative to mechanical recycling.But according to a new report, five out of eight U.S. facilities assessed use chemical processes to produce combustible fuel, not new plastics. In addition, facilities are disposing of large amounts of hazardous waste which in some cases includes benzene — a known carcinogen — lead, cadmium and chromium.Critics say the chemical recycling industry’s multi-step incineration processes are polluting and generating greenhouse gases without alleviating virgin plastic demand. Environmental permits for six U.S. facilities allow release of hazardous air pollutants that can cause cancer or birth defects.A new UN framework to fight global plastic pollution could offer nations flexibility over how they meet recycling targets, potentially allowing the industry to lobby for policy incentives and regulatory exemptions for plastic-to-fuel techniques — policies that may threaten the environment and public health, say experts. A host of cutting-edge plastics processing technologies, known collectively as ‘chemical recycling,’ are releasing large quantities of toxic and hazardous substances into the environment. But the majority — while making fuel and chemicals — are producing no recycled plastic, according to a recent report by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC).
With over 240 million metric tons of new plastics generated every year, a growing global mountain of plastic waste now threatens to destabilize Earth’s operating system,  potentially closing the habitable window of climate and biogeochemical conditions that human civilizations have relied upon for survival over the past 12,000 years.
The United States is one of the world’s top plastic producers, but less than 9% of what it makes is currently recycled, mostly through the established process of mechanical sorting and shredding. Plastic industry representatives claim that so-called cutting edge ‘chemical recycling’ or ‘advanced recycling’ technologies, which use heat or solvents to convert waste plastic into fuels or chemical feedstocks, are the best recycling solution. But environmental groups, including NRDC, have raised concerns over the greenhouse gas emissions and toxic pollution generated by these processes.
Over 240 million metric tons of new plastics are generated planetwide every year, but only a small fraction is being recycled. Together with other novel chemical pollutants, plastic waste and its impacts threaten to push Earth outside of the habitable zone for humanity. Image by EFRH on VisualHunt.
Chemical recycling creating pollution?
The NRDC investigation collated publicly available data in the summer of 2021 from U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) databases and state environmental permits for chemical recycling facilities across the United States. They identified eight sites that were either already operating or expected to become operational in the near future.
EPA records revealed that several of these recycling facilities were disposing of large amounts of hazardous waste, containing chemicals such as benzene — a known carcinogen — as well as lead, cadmium and chromium. State-level environmental permits for six facilities allow for the release of hazardous air pollutants, including chemicals that can cause cancer or birth defects.
“The facilities were releasing or permitted to release a variety of hazardous air pollutants,” said NRDC Senior Scientist and report author Veena Singla. “That’s certainly of concern for the communities in direct proximity.” Those communities, the report found, were disproportionally low-income neighborhoods and communities of color. About 380,000 people live within 3 miles of the eight facilities and may be impacted by their toxic emissions.
Judith Enck, president of Beyond Plastics, a not-for-profit project based at Bennington College in Vermont, and a former EPA regional administrator, described NRDC’s investigation as “invaluable,” adding that, “every elected official who’s thinking about supporting [chemical recycling] facilities should read the report first.”
Less than 9% of U.S. plastic waste is recycled, the majority of which is sorted and shredded mechanically before being processed into recycled plastic pellets. Mechanical recycling of plastic has proved difficult to scale-up because of the wide variety of plastic types and sources of contamination present in household and commercial waste, challenges that have also besieged emerging plastic-to-plastic chemical recycling technologies. Image by Tony Webster on Flickr.
Plastics production continues to soar leaving the world with the difficult problem of how to process and reuse waste. Image courtesy of Our World in Data.
However, Plastics Industry Association Vice President of Government Affairs Matt Seaholm, accused the NRDC report of utilizing “cherry-picked examples, incomplete data, and unsubstantiated claims.” He said that “Attacks on advanced recycling technologies tend to follow the same pattern: ignoring the advancements and investments from many different companies, making unrealistic calls to end plastics production, and ignoring industry positions on waste-to-fuel recovery. NRDC’s report is no different.”
Singla invited the industry to provide substantiation for Seaholm’s claims: ”If they are aware of additional data on more facilities, or for these facilities, we’d be very happy to look and do an updated analysis.” She noted that the investigation included all publicly accessible data available at the time of analysis.
The American Chemical Council and the World Plastics Council did not respond to Mongabay’s request for comment.
Plastic-to-fuel conversion: Greenwashing incineration?
Chemical recycling is being marketed as an alternative to mechanical recycling that can meet the growing demand for recycled plastic and reduce the volume of waste being incinerated or ending up in landfills. However, chemical plastic-to-plastic recycling projects have been besieged by problems as they attempt to scale-up from promising laboratory studies into commercially viable enterprises, and five out of eight facilities identified in the NRDC report were instead converting waste plastics into combustible fuel.
“Producing fuel from plastic is not a circular process,” said NRDC’s Singla. Based on the data their investigation obtained, “this is not a solution for a circular, non-toxic materials cycle for plastic.”
Technologies such as pyrolysis and gasification degrade plastics in high-temperature chambers, often in low-oxygen conditions, to produce a liquid or gas that can be further processed into fuel or chemicals. Although the industry claims these processes can be used to generate new plastic, the NRDC report found no evidence that this is happening in practice. And since the low-grade fuels and chemical waste produced are ultimately burned, critics argue these techniques are simply multi-step incineration processes, generating greenhouse gas emissions and hazardous waste without alleviating consumer demand for virgin plastics.
Despite these concerns, pressure is mounting on politicians and policymakers to classify chemical recycling — including plastic-to-fuel processes — as a manufacturing technology and not solid-waste incineration. Sixteen U.S. states have already passed  recycling legislation that redefines chemical recycling facilities as manufacturers, exempting them from stricter reporting requirements imposed on solid waste recyclers, and similar bills have been advanced in other states including New York.
“That’s really concerning,” commented Singla. “There’s already a lack of transparency and reclassifying [of chemical recycling facilities] would narrow that further,” she said.
The EPA is currently evaluating how to regulate pyrolysis and gasification technologies under the Clean Air Act, with industry lobbyists fiercely campaigning to prevent these high-temperature degradation techniques from being classed as incineration.
As the demand for oil used for energy decreases, petrochemical companies, like these facilities seen here in Houston, Texas, are ramping up their plastic production which will increase the demand for green plastic waste disposal solutions. Image by Louis Vest via Flickr (CC BY-NC 2.0).
Could chemical recycling hurt global efforts to curb plastic pollution?
Chemical recycling is coming under the global spotlight just as the world comes together to acknowledge and address the plastic crisis. In early March, 175 countries agreed on a UN framework to fight global plastic pollution from cradle-to-grave, reigniting optimism among campaigners. However, environmentalists warn that flexibility in the framework over how individual nations meet recycling targets could leave the door open for exploitation by industry lobbyists seeking policy incentives and regulatory exemptions for plastic-to-fuel techniques.
Some experts say that chemical recycling, and particularly technologies that generate combustible fuel rather than new plastics, are not the plastic-waste solutions the world is so desperately seeking. “I was really disappointed with what we found [in our report], because the plastic waste crisis is so visible and so imminent and I wanted there to be some additional solutions. Unfortunately this isn’t it,” Singla concluded.
Chemical recycling is “a public relations attempt used by the petrochemical industry to try to hold back actual solutions to the growing plastic pollution problem,” said Enck. She encouraged state lawmakers in the U.S. to introduce legislation prohibiting chemical recycling facilities, extending producer responsibility to discourage unnecessary plastic packaging, and incentivizing plastic bottle return programs.
Citation:
Singla (2022) Recycling Lies: “Chemical Recycling” of Plastic Is Just Greenwashing Incineration (Issue Brief).
Banner image: Plastic waste being dumped in Beaver County, Pennsylvania. Plastics production exploded after World War II, and its pollution of water, land and air is now a global crisis. Image by Ted Auch/FracTracker Alliance.
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Plastics can take hundreds of years to fully decompose. The United Nations met in March to begin developing a cradle-to-grave global plastics production and waste treaty. The plastics industry will likely be lobbying heavily over the next two years for chemical recycling to be included in national action plans. Image by Ivan Radic on Visualhunt.com.

Chemicals, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Global Environmental Crisis, Green, Health, Microplastics, Ocean Crisis, Oceans, Plastic, Pollution, Public Health, Research, Toxicology, United Nations, Waste, Water Pollution
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Among rolling hills around the southern tip of majestic Lake Kivu, huge layers of plastic waste ride the water and block the turbines of the largest hydroelectric plant in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

The Ruzizi dam is polluted by thousands of bottles, cans and other objects thrown into the lake, which stretches 90 kilometres (56 miles) along the border between DR Congo and Rwanda.
“Since the lake flows towards the Ruzizi River, all the waste thrown into it comes here little by little,” Lievin Chizungu, production manager at the dam’s power station, told AFP.
The mountainous terrain and rainy climate around lakeside Bukavu, capital of South Kivu province, do not help.
“The rainwater carries the waste into the lake and then into the river,” Jovy Mulemangabo, an engineer for the national electricity company (SNEL) in south Kivu, told AFP.
Chizungu says piles of waste can “reach a depth of 14 metres” (almost 46 feet). Divers clean the river bed to keep debris from clogging the turbines. If waste gets trapped, towns in the area are deprived of power.
Other employees clean the surface, using barges.
“I have been doing this job for 13 years,” Byunanine Mubalama told AFP. “Every day there is garbage I have to clean up.”

— ’The impact is huge’ —But it is not enough. One of the four units in the plant was damaged by debris at the end of January, and it is still down.
“The impact is huge. We have a deficit of 6.3 megawatts out of 30 total MW that we must produce not only for South Kivu, but also for neighbouring North Kivu province and for Burundi,” Chizungu said.
Garbage also caused an alternator to fail at the Ruzizi 2 power plant about 25 km south of Bukavu. With the damage at both plants, they are 20 MW short, Chizungu said.
This has provoked “many power outages in Bukavu and Uvira”.
Nicole Menemene, 29, collects plastic waste on the lake’s shores to make baskets, flowerpots, stools and nightstands.
She runs a private company called Plastycor that transforms trash into “beautiful and useful” objects.
“We do the work by hand,” Menemene said.
The company has 10 employees, but her goal is to “industrialise” their work. With her project and other local efforts, Menemene hopes to see a “90 percent reduction of Lake Kivu’s pollution”.

— ‘We have to teach people’ —Education is a crucial first step in reducing the lake’s plastic pileup, Chizungu said.
“First, we have to teach people that they cannot dump waste in the lake,” he said, adding that authorities should crack down on people tossing garbage in the waters.
But for some local residents, it is not so simple.
“Our houses are crammed together on small plots. There is no way to manage garbage,” Mathilde Binja said. “I have no choice but to throw it into Kawa river, which dumps into the lake”.
The city does offer garbage collection and disposal services for $3 to $5 (2.70 to 4.50 euros) per month, Malgache Malyanga, director of Bukavu Household Waste Management Program (PGDM), told AFP.
“Many inhabitants prefer to throw their garbage out on the road at night or in the lake,” Malyanga said.
This could be either from ignorance or lack of funds to pay for waste removal services, he added.
To combat the plague of plastic waste filling the world’s lakes, oceans and lands, the United Nations launched negotiations in March in Kenya for a global treaty against plastic pollution.

As a mum of three on a single-income budget, Melissa Beeton is determined to make every household purchase count. Key points:There are more than 280 toy libraries across the countryMelissa Beeton says her toy library saved her $5,000 in a yearInterest is expected to grow as families try to manage growing household costs “I pretty much just got sick of buying toys,” she said.”There’s not a whole lot of disposable income for us to spend on stuff that’s not going to be used all the time.”For the past year, Ms Beeton has been a member and volunteer at her local toy library in Townsville in north Queensland, which allows her to rent from a large collection of toys each month for a subscription fee.”In the last 12 months, it says that I’ve saved approximately $5,000 just with borrowing toys,” she said.

In just 45 minutes, Reid Harlocker and his team collected 18 pounds of trash from the northern Pacific Ocean. “It’s awful,” he said, seated in his Hayden home Friday morning. “The pollution, it’s there.” Harlocker returned from his ocean voyage with Pangea Exploration on March 8. He and the crew spent a month in the …

Continue reading “Journey yields sad truth about Earth's oceans”

Breadcrumb Trail Links News Local News Local Business Business Tofino council amended its bylaw last month to include a ban on single-use plastic cutlery and local businesses have until August to comply. Author of the article: The Canadian Press Dirk Meissner Discarded plastic forks and knives are some of the most common items found during cleanups at local beaches and parks and banning their use will help the environment, said Tofino’s mayor. Photo by marcinm111 /iStock/Getty Images Article content Tofino, known for seemingly endless beaches and rolling waves that call out to surfers, has banned single-use plastic cutlery in a move to keep its ocean playground pollution free, says mayor Dan Law. Advertisement 2 Story continues below This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Article content The ban on plastic knives and forks at take out establishments is the coastal B.C. community’s latest stab at reducing waste after the district council passed a bylaw in 2020 banning single-use plastic bags, straws and polystyrene foam containers. Tofino council amended its bylaw last month to include a ban on single-use plastic cutlery and local businesses have until August to comply, Law said in an interview. Discarded plastic forks and knives are some of the most common items found during cleanups at local beaches and parks and banning their use will help the environment, he said. “Around here everything just ends up in the ocean,” he said. “That’s not where we want plastic garbage. This is just one way of cracking down on plastic pollution.” Advertisement 3 Story continues below This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Article content He said businesses in Tofino are already complying with the single-use plastic bylaw, with many switching to wood or paper-type utensils and it also appears consumers are bringing their own knives and forks. “We want it to stick,” Law said. “We want all the businesses to know we’re serious about this. We were serious about plastic bags, serious about plastic straws. Those things get in the ocean all the time and I think bylaws really cement that and make sure everybody’s on board.” Bylaw offenders are subject to a fine, but the amount is under review, said the mayor. “The intent of this bylaw is to set standards of general public interest, and not to impose a duty on the District of Tofino or its employees to enforce its provisions,” says the bylaw. Advertisement 4 Story continues below This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Article content The single-use plastic utensils ban and previous other plastics initiatives were the result of local awareness campaigns by residents, businesses and groups committed to reducing pollution in the Tofino area, said Laurie Hannah, Pacific Rim Surfrider Foundation coordinator. “For us, we’re trying to make zero waste the cool and trendy thing,” she said. Hannah said Environment and Climate Change Canada reports the country’s plastic recycling rate is nine per cent. The federal government announced last December that draft regulations prohibiting certain single-use plastics have been published for public comment. Laval, Que., banned single-use plastic utensils as part of its November 2021 bylaw banning single-use plastic bags. The B.C. government said last year more than 20 communities are developing bylaws banning single-use plastics. Share this article in your social network Advertisement 1 Story continues below This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Sign up to receive daily headline news from the Vancouver Sun, a division of Postmedia Network Inc. By clicking on the sign up button you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc. You may unsubscribe any time by clicking on the unsubscribe link at the bottom of our emails. Postmedia Network Inc. | 365 Bloor Street East, Toronto, Ontario, M4W 3L4 | 416-383-2300 Thanks for signing up! A welcome email is on its way. If you don’t see it, please check your junk folder. The next issue of Vancouver Sun Headline News will soon be in your inbox. We encountered an issue signing you up. Please try again Comments Postmedia is committed to maintaining a lively but civil forum for discussion and encourage all readers to share their views on our articles. Comments may take up to an hour for moderation before appearing on the site. We ask you to keep your comments relevant and respectful. We have enabled email notifications—you will now receive an email if you receive a reply to your comment, there is an update to a comment thread you follow or if a user you follow comments. Visit our Community Guidelines for more information and details on how to adjust your email settings.

Microplastics from European rivers spreading to Arctic seas, research showsBetter waste management needed to protect Arctic ecosystem, say scientists Microplastics from European rivers are finding their way to Arctic seas, research suggests.These tiny plastic particles, which come from clothing fibres, car tyres, cosmetics and many more sources, have been found across the entire planet, from the summit of Mount Everest to the deepest oceans.People are known to consume the tiny particles via food and water, as well as breathing them in. Microplastics have been shown to harm wildlife but the impact on people is not known, though microplastics do damage human cells in the laboratory.They have also been found in the Arctic, and until now the source of these tiny particles has not been known.A new study in Scientific Reports, led by Mats Huserbråten from the Institute of Marine Research, in Bergen, Norway, suggests particles in the Arctic Ocean, the Nordic Seas and Baffin Bay have spread from Europe.Companies race to stem flood of microplastic fibres into the oceansRead moreThe scientists used modelling to predict how many microplastic particles would be in certain parts of the ocean, and compared it with water samples from these places. Their analysis suggests microplastics have been circulating in the Arctic for at least a decade.To work it out, they combined models of ocean currents between 2007 and 2017 with simulations of floating microplastic movements. Then, they simulated the release of microplastics from 21 major rivers across northern Europe and the Arctic every day over a 10-year period and modelled their movements over decades. After this, they simulated the release of microplastics from 21 major rivers across northern Europe and the Arctic every day over a 10-year period and modelled their movements over decades, then compared the results of their model with the distribution of floating microplastics across 121 seawater samples that were collected from 17 sites off the west coast of Norway between May 2017 and August 2018.They found that most simulated particles drifted along two main pathways after being released from rivers, with 65% drifting along the Norwegian coast towards the Laptev Sea, north of Russia, before going to the Arctic Ocean, across the north pole, then exiting the Arctic Ocean via the Fram Strait east of Greenland. Thirty per cent went in another direction, travelling across Greenland then farther south along the north-east coast of Canada.Analysis of seawater found in each of these areas revealed the distribution of these floating microplastics was consistent with what was predicted by the models.The researchers warned that better waste management is required so the health of the Arctic ecosystem is not compromised.They said: “The equal distribution of sampled synthetic particles across water masses covering a wide time frame of anthropogenic influence suggests a system in full saturation rather than pronounced injection from European sources, through a complex circulation scheme connecting the entire Arctic Mediterranean. “This circulation of microplastic through Arctic ecosystems may have large consequences to natural ecosystem health, highlighting an ever-increasing need for better waste management.”Current methods to reduce microplastic release include adding filters to washing machines to catch particles. They can also be removed by some wastewater and drinking water treatments.TopicsPlasticsOceansArcticnewsReuse this content

Plastics have always been global—even before science began tracking the peregrinations of microplastics across meridians, into rain, through the human pla​​centa. At the industry’s outset, Civil War–era rubber goods were fashioned with latex extracted from the Amazon and later through Belgium’s brutal regime in the Democratic Republic of Congo. England imported gutta-percha from Southeast Asia for undersea telegraphy wires. Celluloid depended on Taiwanese camphor as a solvent and plasticizer. Today, tankers ferry hydrocarbons siphoned from beneath Appalachia’s shale basin to become plastics in Europe. And much of the plastic waste from Europe and the U.S. streams back toward Southeast Asia, Africa, or South America. Yet the dispersal of plastics and their pollutants, if regulated at all, has been addressed through a patchwork of municipal and national policies and a smattering of uncoordinated international instruments.Early this month, however, following 10 days of late-night negotiations in Nairobi, Kenya, the United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA) passed a resolution mandating the creation of a multilateral treaty to address plastic pollution. One hundred seventy-five nations backed its provisions, which are to be legally binding, rather than voluntary. Once in force, the treaty could be plastics’ symbolic equivalent of the Paris Agreement on climate change, and in its provisions, likely even more far-reaching. The meeting ended in an ebullient wave of joy and tired-teary relief.The resolution impanels an international negotiating committee and issues it a broad mandate: a treaty outlining global ground rules to eliminate plastic pollution. Most significant is the breadth of the resolution’s ambition—the committee must consider plastic as more than a matter of marine litter. Rather, the treaty will take on plastics’ entire life cycle—from production and design through use and reuse to disposal and environmental dispersion—and will address plastics’ myriad contributions to the “triple planetary crisis” of climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution. This treaty could govern not just micro- and nanoplastic pollution, but also the air pollutants, greenhouse-gas emissions, and toxic chemicals associated with plastics. The scope of the work is breathtaking and the timeframe ambitious: just over two years.What transpires between the resolution and the treaty will determine whether the final provisions are likely to make meaningful change. In the coming months, the United Nations Environment Programme will convene a working-group meeting, to include member states and private-sector and civil-society stakeholders, which will set the formal agenda for the negotiations to come. The final treaty’s success will rest on how inclusive a process the working group and negotiating committee follow, and whose experiences are enfolded into its deliberations. The strongest possible treaty will recognize a range of relationships to plastics and its assorted pollutants—including those of constituents who, across time and geography, have borne the heaviest, life-altering burdens of plastics production, and of people who require plastics to live or to earn a living. Plastics have engendered violence, but also resilience and community mobilization to mitigate those harms.The treaty’s strength will come from how negotiators resolve a few key issues. One is whether the treaty will limit pollution by limiting production—to close the tap, as so evocatively signaled by the sculpture, by the artist Benjamin Von Wong, installed outside the UNEA meetings, a floating spigot with a 40-foot torrent of locally gleaned plastic waste. The rate of world plastics production exceeds 400 million metric tons per annum—more plastics have been produced in the past 20 years than in the five decades following World War II. Short-term plastics, which include packaging, now account for about 40 percent of plastics made each year. Absent global controls, plastic production continues to trend upward; by the end of the decade, it is projected to hit 600 million metric tons a year, and 800 million metric tons by 2040. Plastic makers as well as the oil and gas industries, which supply plastics’ feedstocks, will likely fight production limits—especially as oil and gas companies look to plastics as a key area of growth.A weak treaty would lack enforcement mechanisms and focus on technological solutions to plastic waste. Some of the technologies pushed by the industry, based on high-heat waste management, are yet unproven and emit air pollutants and greenhouse gases. Decades of experience and recent modeling, however, have demonstrated that dealing with plastic-related pollution downstream from its source, even with a massive waste-infrastructure build-out, will not keep pace in the long term without policy and other interventions that limit the influx of yet more virgin plastics and related pollutants into the system. And the world knows how to do better. Both the Montreal Protocol, which addresses ozone-depleting pollutants, and the Minamata Convention on Mercury provide models for setting progressive targets that help nations phase out harmful materials.A second key question: How should the treaty address the toxicity of the more than 10,000 additives and other chemicals used in plastic production? Plastics are complex compositions, more than mere polymers. Their base materials are hydrocarbons, some of which are known carcinogens; finished plastics contain a mixture of chemicals—some additives, some residuals, some unintended—which can over time leach into the environment.Going back to the industry’s beginnings, when plastics were products of farms and forests, a network of toxics that served as solvent systems, processing aids, plasticizers, and more made these materials possible while also imposing health costs on workers. Carbon disulfide, used in hard rubber, viscose rayon, and cellophane, harmed generations of workers yet remains in use, notes Paul Blanc, a professor of medicine at UC San Francisco who has written about this history.Chemical additives in plastics have never been labeled, and most lack adequate health and hazard data. But what scientists know is cause for worry. Common additives used in food containers have been shown to interfere with the endocrine system, which directs human growth, fertility, and metabolism. And some plastics-associated chemicals are so long-lived, mobile, and toxic that they have been regulated under the UN Stockholm Convention, which curbs worldwide production of roughly two dozen persistent pollutants. Wind, weather, and ocean currents concentrate these pollutants in the globe’s upper latitudes, a burden borne by Arctic Indigenous Peoples, whose leadership was instrumental in framing the Stockholm Convention and in calling out how microplastics add to that problem. The interlocking crises of climate change, toxics, and plastic pollution compromise both the way of life and the existence of Sivuqaq’s Yupik people, wrote Delbert Pungowiyi, the president of the Native Village of Savoonga, in the Anchorage Daily News. Just last year, the Stockholm Convention recognized plastic debris as a unique mechanism for transporting pollutants northward.Chemical additives were not included in the final UNEA resolution, says David Azoulay, the director of the Environmental Health Program at the Center for International Environmental Law. But the terms that delegates negotiated ensured that chemicals’ toxic bearing on human health would remain within the treaty’s mandate. The negotiating committee will still, for example, take up supply-chain transparency, sustainable production, product design, circularity, and plastics’ impact on human well-being—all of which additives have a bearing on.A third criterion for the treaty’s success will be how responsive proposed plastics controls are to localized needs. In some communities, plastic has become so unavoidable that scaling back its presence would create new complications. In the Philippines, plastics have squeezed out traditional packaging, such as natural fibers, glass, and paper, and vital commodities are available or affordable only in small plastic packets. In some West African cities, sealed 500 ml plastic sachets are an important source of water. In subsistence economies—for example, in India—plastic carrier bags and other containers are used and reused to purchase essential goods, including rice and even liquids such as oil or kerosene, in low-cost portions.The disability community likewise has crucial insights into what’s possible for plastics, and “can be advocates for the success of solutions that bring everyone along,” as the Reverend Theresa Soto, a disability-community advocate, has noted. Disability can mean that those who most rely on certain plastic technologies are also among the most vulnerable to plastics’ toxic implications, observes the science and technology scholar Jody Roberts. He has written with eloquence about the toxics-plastics nexus that is the flexible plastic feeding tube.These three measures address, in different ways, basic questions of how, what, and who. But the treaty’s success can also be judged on whether it fully acknowledges the long arc of plastics’ exploitative history.Over the centuries, plastics’ burdens have fallen inequitably over the world, compounding preexisting inequities. Sourcing feedstocks for 19th-century plastics led to ecological ruin and deforestation, violent plantation economies, and colonial appropriation of indigenous lands. Across the 20th century, processing plants were overconcentrated in vulnerable communities. Fenceline communities and UN human-rights experts have flagged the environmental racism of siting yet another plastics factory in already overburdened petrochemical corridors, such as the Lower Mississippi Valley. Likewise, the Aamjiwnaang First Nation, who live surrounded by Canada’s plastics and petrochemical production, have resisted plastics’ unrelenting emissions and industrial expansion for decades.At the other end of plastics’ life cycle, discards have been dumped onto communities of color in the U.S. or the global South, often on the pretext that recycling it could generate income. But recyclability proved a pipe dream, absent adequate infrastructure and technical and financial support to process a crush of mostly single-use plastics not designed for recovery. Indeed, the very idea of disposability, even recycling, says the multidisciplinary plastics scholar Max Liboiron, is premised on unfettered access to land, often Indigenous land, such as for landfills.The resolution does recognize communities who have been integral to (and yet harmed by) this system—for example, by calling out the vital work performed by 20 million waste pickers, sorters, and recyclers, many of whom belong to marginalized groups, who reclaim much of the world’s plastic discards and have become experts as a result. In apprenticing with plastic-waste pickers and sorters in India, one of us, Dey, observed the highly specialized and efficient systems that waste handlers evolved to identify and classify plastics. Recyclers could bite and differentiate among various finer grades of low-density polyethylene. Sorters could crumple films and tell—by their sound—their polymer lattices. Their systems were far more specific than the resin-identification labels stamped onto plastics by manufacturers.Accordingly, the mandate directs negotiators to consider comprehensive knowledge systems, including best-available science, traditional knowledge, and the expertise of waste workers and indigenous peoples, which in turn presents opportunities for affording rights and developing best practices to deal with complex plastic waste. Even more, recognizing—at a global scale—the hands and bodies that recover plastics through the day and into the night presents an opportunity to advocate for better working conditions, job security, wages, and dignity.There are pitfalls to international negotiation—the need for consensus, compromises driven by member states and trade associations—and the response of producer nations, especially the U.S., the largest contributor to plastic waste, could ultimately shape the treaty’s success. The U.S. has signed other major agreements, including the Stockholm Convention, and then stopped short of ratifying them; this one, too, will require Congress to pass the necessary implementing legislation.Less than three years from now, we will find out whether the international community is up to the task the UNEA has set out. The influx of plastics and associated pollutants into the planetary system, say the scientists Linn Persson, Bethanie Almroth, and their colleagues, now diminishes the planet’s capacity to support life. And onward flow plastics through time, territories, and tissues. But if the treaty responds boldly to its mandate—if its negotiators heed history and hear the wisdom of those most intimately affected—it could offer a new vision for plastics’ place in society and the economy, and by extension, it could well alter the future of humanity and the planet.

When plastic debris pollutes soil ecosystems, some insects may play a role in spreading it by breaking it down into microplastic particles. A new study sheds light on this dynamic by looking at a variety of soil invertebrates—such as the Zophobas morio beetle larva shown here—and their taste for polystyrene. (Photo by Max Helmberger)
By Paige Embry
Paige Embry
Microplastics permeate the world. They can float through the air and have been found in Antarctic ice, the deep ocean, drinking water, and inside an array of animals. Microplastic pollution, mostly in the oceans, has been getting a lot of attention in the last few years but microplastics’ ubiquity means that scientists researching them have to find ways to limit contamination—and assess its extent when it inevitably happens. Max Helmberger, a Ph.D. student in entomology at Michigan State University, has researched several soil-dwelling organisms’ ability to create microplastics from larger plastic debris. He says labs have had to come up with “all sorts of creative solutions” to the contamination problem, with at least one dying all their lab coats bright pink so it would be obvious when bits invade a sample. Helmberger says, “Being persnickity is kind of a must in microplastic research because microplastics are everywhere.”
Max Helmberger
Microplastics come in two basic forms: primary and secondary. Primary microplastics are ones that are manufactured in sizes smaller than 5 millimeter (think sesame seed). Nurdles, the pre-production pellets used to make plastic products, are an example of a primary microplastic. Secondary microplastics are tiny bits that have broken off larger pieces. It is this second type of microplastic that Helmberger and colleagues recently studied in relation to insects and other invertebrates. Findings from their research were published in February in the open-access Journal of Insect Science.
Helmberger and his colleagues wanted to look at an array of different types of soil-dwelling organisms and assess their ability to fragment plastic in a fairly short period of time. His chosen animals were Acheta domesticus (a house cricket), Oniscus asellus (an isopod, sometimes known as a sowbug or woodlouse), Zophobas morio larvae (a beetle), and Cornu aspersum (a snail). Helmberger put each animal in an “arena”—a small glass jar. The bottom was filled with plaster of Paris and topped with sand that had been heated to 500 degrees Celsius to burn off organics and plastics. The animals went into the jar with pieces of both pristine and weathered polystyrene, along with one oat flake of real food to sustain them. He left them there for 24 hours.
To explore the role insects and other invertebrates may play in spreading plastic pollution in soil ecosystems by breaking it down into microplastic particles, researchers placed various organisms—such as this house cricket (Acheta domesticus)—in glass-jar arenas with a small amount of food and a piece of polystyrene foam for 24 hours. Afterward, the researchers counted the number of microplastic particles in the animal feces, the sand, and within the dead animal itself. (Photo by Max Helmberger)

Rush of lawsuits over plastic waste expected after ‘historic’ dealLike Paris climate agreement, treaty could provide tool to hold firms and states to account, say legal experts 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.”TopicsPlasticsnewsReuse this content

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 ImagesThey 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.”A floating boom designed to corral plastic debris littering the Pacific Ocean deployed from San Francisco Bay in 2018.Lorin Eleni Gill/Associated PressA 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.State Senator Scott Wiener, a Democrat, is one of the lawmakers backing the repeal of a law that lets voters veto public housing projects.Rich Pedroncelli/Associated PressThe rest of the newsHousing 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 CALIFORNIAJury 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 CALIFORNIAFake kidnapping: A woman from Redding was arrested on felony charges for faking her own abduction.Theranos show: The women of “The Dropout,” a new Hulu show, want to humanize the former Silicon Valley darling Elizabeth Holmes.Day care crash: Last Thursday, 14 children were taken to hospitals for precautionary reasons after a car crashed into a day care in Anderson, CNN reports.Berkeley admissions: The group behind U.C. Berkeley’s limit on enrollment offered to allow 1,000 additional students, but the university declined, The Associated Press reports.Church shooting: A man who killed his three daughters, a chaperone and himself this week used an unregistered “ghost gun,” The Associated Press reports.Sang An for The New York TimesWhat we’re eatingThese garlic noodles cross cultures, but are deeply San Franciscan.The Ojai Valley Trail is a nine-mile trail that parallels Highway 33 from Foster Park.Beth Coller for The New York TimesWhere we’re travelingToday’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.What we’re recommendingThe artist Josh Kline imagines an unmoored life in the post-climate-change future.Tell usJoin 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.And before you go, some good newsIn 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.