While it's all talk, some of the reporting on the Plastics Summit did sound surprising articulate and well intentioned. I do have to admit that listening to the Environment Minister talking about the summit outcomes sent me to look behind the radio to see if it was a different 'Environment Minister' talking. Maybe the federal government has simply decided that the way to skirt around skirting around climate change is to just get on with the job. In any event, time will tell if the loads of well intentioned talk about industry / government partnerships will lead to something useful or the Environment Minister simply aced what she learned on the 'Speaking to the Press with Confidence' course.WE AREN'T IN THE INNER GARBAGE CABINET SO WEREN'T INVITED TO THE SUMMIT BOO HOO. NOT CRYING BECAUSE WE ARE INTERESTED IN PLASTICS RECYCLING, BUT BECAUSE WE ARE INTERESTED IN NOT HAVING PLASTICS TO RECYCLE AT ALL.
One of the key points about recycling plastic, is that we need to add the 'avoidance of unnecessary plastic' to the plastics narrative. A great example is the plastic straws problem. Unless you have a specifically related disability, there is zero need for a plastic straw. And yet, the solution to plastic straws was not, 'No Straw'; it was a switch to a metal, glass, paper, pasta or bamboo straw. We have to stop acting like lemmings. We don't need straws. Any straws.
Much of the plastic we use is simply not only not needed, it's downright unhealthy - especially plastic water bottles and plastic shopping bags. Apart from the issue of health impacts, neither of these single (or very short) use plastics are actually needed. Why create an entire industry to recycle something that should never exist in the first place?
Eco Voice recently published some info on how plastic is made, which illustrates quite clearly how much effort and resources goes into creating a polyethylene retail shopping bag that has either limited use or value.
Polyethylene starts off as ethane molecules, a by-product of the process in which natural gas is made in a facility known as a cracker plant. The ethane is released and piped to a separate destination, where the gas is turned into a polymer through intense pressure and some processing. The polymer is a chain of molecules and polyethylene is one of those molecules. The polyethylene is separated and turned into beads which serve as the building blocks for plastic bags - polyethylene resin.
Manufacturers turn the 'resin beads' into a film-like plastic substance which is rolled onto large plastic rollers, to be cut into the correct shapes, according to the orders they receive. For example, different grocery and fashion stores require different thicknesses of plastic, colours and branding. Colours and branding of course requires design agencies and inks.
During the process, it's pretty clear that there has been extensive transportation, heating, cooling and processing of enormous quantities of polythene resin and bags. Both the initial gas acquisition and transformation as well as the resin, which is superheated to around 500-degrees fahrenheit in machines called extruders, intense power is used. At both the initial and end factory, there is also machinery, labour, housing and infrastructure.
Eventually, the manufacturer sends the completed order of plastic bags to the business owner and on to consumers who use them to carry groceries, fashion or other items. Sometimes, the bags tear. Sometimes, they’re reused to store items or as a rain hat. Mostly, they’re used as bin liners or simply discarded. Such a short end life after all that work seems like a bit of a let down really.Best get a reusable.
Bear in mind that way too many of these plastics and microplastics end up in us, our oceans, birds & marine life.