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Oct 24, 2022 · A new report from Greenpeace found that people may be putting plastic into recycling bins — but almost none of it is actually being recycled. Meanwhile, plastic production is ramping up.
In fact, plastic waste is now so widespread that researchers have suggested it could be used as a geological indicator of the Anthropocene. But what if we could wave a magic wand and remove all...
Feb 1, 2023 · If we don’t recycle our plastic waste, it can have disastrous consequences for the environment. Plastics that are not recycled are either thrown away, incinerated, or washed up on the beaches. Incinerating plastics emit carbon dioxide, which contributes to an energy imbalance that is causing the Earth’s temperature to rise.
- Overview
- You can’t manage what you don’t measure
- Tallying plastic waste around the globe
Billions of tons of plastic have been made over the past decades, and much of it is becoming trash and litter, finds the first analysis of the issue.
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This article was created in partnership with the National Geographic Society. In December 2018, Great Britain's Royal Statistical Society named the core fact in this story—that only about nine percent of all plastic ever made has likely been recycled— its statistic of the year.
Mass production of plastics, which began just six decades ago, has accelerated so rapidly that it has created 8.3 billion metric tons—most of it in disposable products that end up as trash. If that seems like an incomprehensible quantity, it is. Even the scientists who set out to conduct the world’s first tally of how much plastic has been produced, discarded, burned or put in landfills, were horrified by the sheer size of the numbers.
“We all knew there was a rapid and extreme increase in plastic production from 1950 until now, but actually quantifying the cumulative number for all plastic ever made was quite shocking,” says Jenna Jambeck, a University of Georgia environmental engineer who specializes in studying plastic waste in the oceans.
“This kind of increase would ‘break’ any system that was not prepared for it, and this is why we have seen leakage from global waste systems into the oceans,” she says.
The new study, published Wednesday in the peer-reviewed journal Science Advances, is the first global analysis of all plastics ever made—and their fate. Of the 8.3 billion metric tons that has been produced, 6.3 billion metric tons has become plastic waste. Of that, only nine percent has been recycled. The vast majority—79 percent—is accumulating in landfills or sloughing off in the natural environment as litter. Meaning: at some point, much of it ends up in the oceans, the final sink.
If present trends continue, by 2050, there will be 12 billion metric tons of plastic in landfills. That amount is 35,000 times as heavy as the Empire State Building. (Learn about one possible future solution.)
Roland Geyer, the study’s lead author, says the team of scientists are trying to create a foundation for better managing plastic products. “You can’t manage what you don’t measure,” he says. “It’s not just that we make a lot, it’s that we also make more, year after year.”
Half the resins and fibers used in plastics were produced in the last 13 years, the study found. China alone accounts for 28 percent of global resin and 68 percent of polyester polyamide and acrylic fibers.
Geyer, an engineer by training, specializes in industrial ecology as a professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He has studied various metals and how they’re used and managed. The rapid acceleration of plastic manufacturing, which so far has doubled roughly every 15 years, has outpaced nearly every other man-made material. And, it is unlike virtually every other material. Half of all steel produced, for example, is used in construction, with a decades-long lifespan. Half of all plastic manufactured becomes trash in less than a year, the study found.
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The same team, led by Jambeck, produced the first study that assessed the amount of plastic trash that flows into the oceans annually. That research, published in 2015, estimated that 8 million metric tons of plastic ends up in the oceans every year. That is the equivalent to five grocery bags of plastic trash for every foot of coastline around the globe.
“We weren’t aware of the implications for plastic ending up in our environment until it was already there,” Jambeck says. “Now we have a situation where we have to come from behind to catch up.”
Gaining control of plastic waste is now such a large task that it calls for a comprehensive, global approach, Jambeck says, that involves rethinking plastic chemistry, product design, recycling strategies, and consumer use. The United States ranks behind Europe (30 percent) and China (25 percent) in recycling, the study found. Recycling in the U.S. has remained at nine percent since 2012.
“We as a society need to consider whether it’s worth trading off some convenience for a clean, healthy environment,” Geyer says. “For some products that are very problematic in the environment, maybe we think about using different materials. Or phasing them out.”
This story was first published on July 19, 2017 and updated on December 20, 2018 with the news of the Royal Statistical Society's recognition.
National Geographic is committed to reducing plastics pollution. Learn more about our non-profit activities at natgeo.org/plastics. This story is part of Planet or Plastic?—our multiyear effort to raise awareness about the global plastic waste crisis. Learn what you can do to reduce your own single-use plastics, and take your pledge.
Apr 21, 2021 · The government claims that almost half of the UK’s plastic packaging gets recycled, but that simply isn’t true. Thousands of tonnes of our household plastic packaging put out for recycling, as well as other kinds of plastic waste ends up in waste incinerators in the UK.
Jan 31, 2012 · Relatively little of our plastic waste is recycled because there are various types of plastic with different chemical compositions, and recycled plastics can be contaminated by the mixing of types. Plastic waste is also contaminated by materials such as paper and ink.
Apr 4, 2018 · The same piece of plastic can only be recycled about 2-3 times before its quality decreases to the point where it can no longer be used. Additionally, each time plastic is recycled, additional virgin material is added to help "upgrade" its quality, so that the recycled product has a fighting chance in the market against new, durable and fresh ...
