I sit here as a relatively new citizen from ‘the land down under’. To a degree, I continue to hang my head in shame. Like others, I know I could do more for what has been widely publicised as a climate catastrophe.
The precious space where we all live right now is suffering ongoing damage from the effects of human activity. And unless we can sustain life on Mars within the following decades, we all know there is simply no ‘Plan-et B’. This only fuels my ‘eco-anxiety‘.
One of the most pressing environmental issues contributing to this crisis is the issue of plastic waste.
Even schoolchildren are actively learning about this issue. Finally, I am beginning to heed their words more than ever before.
From Bakelite To Bioplastics – A Brief History
Plastics are totally artificial and are derived from hydrocarbons found in fossil fuels.
Beginning in the 1860s, a scientist called John Hyatt was on the search for a substitute for ivory. He eventually pioneered the first synthetic polymer.
Years later, in the early 1900s, the Belgian chemist Leo Baekeland invented Bakelite. In the 1950s, plastic became the new trendy material that crept into households.
It is light, malleable and can be made in any colour. It is relatively inexpensive to produce, and by this time, the world was producing 2.5 million tonnes annually.
Medical equipment was suddenly transformed to make it more robust. Space travel became a reality from a dream and vehicles became lighter and more durable.
By the 1960s, global production rose by 400%, and eventually, in the next decade, the world began manufacturing more plastic than steel.
Today, we have become victims of our own ‘success’, having manufactured material with relatively indestructible properties that are now becoming our planet’s scourge.
According to the Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment (DAWE), the amount of plastic we use is expected to double by 2040.
The Magnitude Of The Problem
The average Australian produces up to a staggering 100kg of plastic waste annually.
That equates to buying well over three million tonnes of plastic each year, of which 60% was imported in 2018-9. Unfortunately, only 13% of it can be recycled. And even then, we used to export half of it overseas.
Australia leaks a staggering 130,000 tonnes of plastic annually into the marine environment, which equates to eight million tonnes for all coastal nations worldwide.
And as we produce way too much new plastic than we recycle through overzealous consumerism, the problems lie within our nation regarding how to solve this ongoing issue.
Until the last few years, most of it used to be sent to China; to make ‘our’ problem an issue offshore. But then landfill sites there, the size of up to 100 football fields, were full 25 years ahead of schedule.
As a result, China imposed an embargo on the rest of the world, the so-called ‘war on waste’. That’s because it generates so much of it as a nation itself.
It is estimated that by 2030, China will produce three times the amount of waste as the USA. Furthermore, half of what we sent was contaminated rubbish that was totally unfit for re-purpose.
Australia then tried to send it all offshore to other Asian countries like its neighbour, Indonesia.
Quite rightly, they started returning it to us. Again, it was full of mixed material that could not be reprocessed for any meaningful use.
You Think You’re ‘Recycling’. But Really, Are You?
Modern-day living has made people more time-poor than ever. Diligently sorting waste into appropriately coloured bins may seem relatively straightforward.
But I have slowly had to learn what goes where. Initially, it takes a degree of effort to learn. After all, who studies the small print on every single label to understand what it means?
If not, don’t worry. Until years ago, neither had I. Then I finally realised that my best intentions in preserving the environment were seemingly futile. It appears the more you delve into interpreting labels, the more it causes confusion.
For instance, Australia has at least a dozen types of recycling labels.
Given that fact, have you ever wondered what the numbers mean inside the labels? It appears they refer to the different types of plastics as depicted and how easy they are to recycle:
Recycling Reinvented: The Australasian Label Leading the Way
With a population of >26 million, I have always wondered what proportion have familiarised themself with the Australasian Recycling Label.
It is printed on many labelled items you purchase that are not imported.
It provides Australasian consumers with detailed information on how the actual packaging can be recycled by its individual components:
This label was endorsed by the UN Environment Program as a world-leading consumer labelling system
If you examine the packaging in your household more carefully, you will discover that a significant amount of it is ‘conditionally’ recyclable.
If instructions aren’t followed correctly, it is treated as contaminated waste and will only end up in landfills despite your efforts.
One of the biggest problems I have encountered from my research about plastic waste is that we are erroneously dumping any soft plastics in recycling bins.
Others who are uneducated, like me previously, wrap eminently recyclable waste into plastic bags and then dispose of it. Unfortunately, that means the entire contents end up in a landfill, not their intended destination.
It’s simple. Plastic waste cannot be recycled if you scrunch it into a small ball. It will even clog recycling machines at sorting depots. At worst, that means up to 70 billion soft plastics, such as food wrappers, are incorrectly disposed of annually.
As If It Wasn’t Complicated Already?
To add another layer of complexity, Australia has no uniformity regarding how waste can be recycled. But at least it has some sort of system.
Many Asian countries have inefficient or non-existent waste collection facilities, so they are figuratively ‘swimming’ in their own waste.
Generally, bins for non-recyclable and recyclable materials are ubiquitous around Australia.
However, green bins for organic waste, as are blue bins for paper, are now readily available. Eventually, state governments and territories will introduce purple bins for glass bottles and jars.
To add to the confusion, healthcare facilities in Australia use purple-coloured bins to dispose of cytotoxic waste, i.e. any material contaminated with residues or preparations that are toxic to living cells!
Here, There And Everywhere
The utilisation of plastic continues to be a huge global problem that clearly transcends Australian borders.
Though progress seems painfully slow, member countries must keep their feet on the accelerator pedal as part of the global pledge as mandated by the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
As we continue living through a pandemic, we have yet to formulate robust strategies for disposing of the millions of tonnes of PPE and face masks that are polluting our shorelines.
Historically, PPE was primarily limited to the medical industry, but following COVID-19, its use exploded worldwide by the public. And we have all seen masks strewn on the ground somewhere. These single-use masks, made predominantly of polypropylene, take up to 450 years to decompose in the environment.
Medical waste is also incinerated, releasing toxic gases that must be sequestered to protect the atmosphere. So, although we are halting the tide of infection by using PPE, we are making a massive environmental impact that is threatening global health in another way.
The Plight of Plastic On Wildlife And Weather
We have suffered some of the most devastating floods and droughts in Australia since national records began in 1910. Thousands of homes have been destroyed. The 2019/20 bushfires incinerated 60 million acres of land, which once supported billions of birds, insects and reptiles.
Plastic pollution indirectly contributes to droughts and floods by disrupting the natural water cycle and exacerbating the effects of climate change. Plastic debris in oceans, rivers, and lakes can drastically contaminate water.
Reducing water quality harms aquatic ecosystems, clogging waterways and altering ocean currents. Bangladesh is an example. It became the first country in the world to ban thinner plastic bags after they were found to have choked drainage systems, which made them largely responsible for the devastating inundations in 2002.
Plastic production and disposal also generate significant amounts of greenhouse gas emissions and contribute to climate change by triggering extreme weather events.
The continuing threat to our wildlife only speaks for itself, primarily through the damage caused by microplastics ingested by all living organisms, including ourselves, through food chains.
Based on current predictors, the thought of having more plastic in our oceans than fish by 2050 is beyond imagination.
Globally, it is predicted that 99% of seabirds worldwide will have ingested plastic in any form because trillions of fragments are floating around in our oceans. (See my separate article on microplastics by clicking here).
Clarity Begins At Home
The state of NSW, where I live, is already taking steps and leading by example to combat the war on plastic waste.
Even a small village called Kangaroo Valley, where I lived until a few years ago, was one of the first places ever in Australia to become plastic bag-free. Impressively, that was back near the beginning of this century.
They are now partially or fully banned in >100 countries worldwide. Introducing a charge for them in certain countries has reduced their use by 80%.
And even today, NSW is slowly phasing out the use of single-use items. Currently, items such as these contribute to 40% of all plastic waste and include drinking straws, party balloons, glitter, disposable cutlery, plastic bread bag fasteners and plastic-stemmed cotton buds.
Plastic Pollution Persists, But Progress Is Possible
As part of the Australian National Plastics Plan, 100% of our plastic packaging will be reusable, recyclable, or compostable by 2025. Currently, certain manufacturing industries are still under no obligation to use recycled material for their products. Any use of virgin plastic, i.e. made de novo, should incur additional taxes. The UK is already employing this strategy to minimise its net waste.
Governmental agencies must be committed to purchasing recycled materials for re-purposing or at least enforce a minimum amount to be reused.
As recycling technology processes improve through changes in design paradigms, plastic quality should also follow the same trend. This should occur without the need to consume vast amounts of additional fossil fuels for repurposing.
The ideal would be to manufacture more plastics, such as polydiketoenamine (PDK), which can be recycled indefinitely. This constitutes a circular economy, where everything we produce is renewable or regenerative by design.
That means PDK will never find its way to landfill sites as opposed to our current linear model of taking from Earth, manufacturing and returning anything back to it as waste.
An Answer Through Nature, Perhaps?
There may even be a mycological solution for polypropylene, which accounts for roughly 28% of the world’s plastic waste, but only 1% of it is recycled. As of 2023, researchers at The University of Sydney have pioneered experiments using two strains of the fungi Aspergillus terreus and Engyodontium album. These organisms are usually found in soil and plants.
Their ground-breaking results were published in the Nature Partners Journal.
Using a combination of ultraviolet light, heat, or Fenton’s reagent (an acidic solution of hydrogen peroxide and ferrous iron often used to oxidise contaminants), the fungi were able to break down polypropylene by 21% over 30 days of incubation, and by 25-27% over 90 days.
The same scientists are isolating other microorganisms from the marine environment and are using a similar process to degrade marine plastic waste. Their preliminary results show an even higher degradation rate.
A Plastic-Free Future Is Worth Fighting For
As we strive toward a sustainable future, we must remember that every individual’s action will count. Although it may seem insignificant, making small changes, such as refusing single-use plastics and recycling even more diligently, can mitigate the effects of this global emergency.
As I live by the coast, I personally participate in an Australia-wide initiative called ‘Take-3-For-The-Sea‘. The concept is simple: I remove three pieces of rubbish whenever I leave my local beach or any waterway. If everyone followed suit, the dividends reaped would have a significant positive impact on the environment.
While it is easy to feel individual actions are futile in the face of a global crisis, hundreds of thousands worldwide have already modified their behaviour, demonstrating that change is possible. By taking collective action, we will create a ripple effect that inspires others to join the effort.
Together, we can make a real difference and leave a positive legacy for future generations by making conscious choices now and taking action to protect our environment.
As a global community, it is paramount that all agencies remain cohesive and keep pulling their resources together.
Even after you and I have departed and left behind, I hope for a cleaner and healthier ‘Plan-et A‘.
A very informative TED talk from Dr. Patricia Villarrubia-Gómez (plastic pollution researcher).
About the author
Dr Surrinder Singh is a medical doctor, blogger and freelance writer. He is passionate about healthcare, medicine and education and works professionally with B2B and B2C clients.
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