Does a 60 per cent reduction in plastics by 2040 sound achievable when the petrochemical industry wants to double production? Why should we care? Other than the unsightly waste we see on beaches and roadsides, what harm do they do? Worryingly, plastics are far from inert and are causing increasingly recognised harm to human health, let alone to other species and to the wider environment on which we depend.

One of the main problems is that plastics breakdown into microplastics. These are so small we can’t see them. Unfortunately, various toxins and heavy metals can attach to them and we eat them and breathe them in. These microplastics (and even smaller – nanoplastics) mainly pass through but some have been found to accumulate in all major organs including the brain. They’ve been found in the placenta and in breast milk. They’ve been implicated in a wide range of diseases. Do we want to wait and find out how much harm they are causing?

That’s all right; we recycle plastics now don’t we? Not much, is the answer. The recycled plastic maybe usable one more time but it is not a continuous cycle - unlike, for example, cardboard or glass. This means that plastics keep having to be made and that is what the petrochemical industry wants. Is it any surprise that the recent UN conference in Ottawa, which is trying to control and regulate plastics for the good of human health and the planet, has been flooded with representatives from the fossil fuel industry? Over 200: a third more than at the last conference. They will not be pushing for restraint.

Regulation is essential. For example: have you ever thought about the plastic we see covering fields at this time of year? It is degradable isn’t it? Yes, but in the UK it degrades into microplastics which contaminate the soil, and some enter our foodchain. In the EU it has to decompose into water and carbon dioxide, but since Brexit we don’t have to follow EU regulations - so our regulations are much worse. Remember this as the General Election comes around.

Article from Climate Action St Austell (CASA).