In our previous posts, we have talked about “where is plastic in our lives”, ”Best alternatives for plastic” and “ how to break the plastic habit”. Today we are here to talk about how much harm plastic is doing to our environment and in what ways. No doubt plastic is one of the most polluting substances on earth, whether it is burnt or dumped, so in this article, we are here with 10 Points to show you How does Plastic Harm the Environment?
If you have read our previous articles you probably should know how single-use plastic materials have created a big mess. If you think that plastic pollution has decreased as compared to what it was before, then you are totally wrong. Pollution due to plastic never decreased but it kept on increasing every year. In case you were unaware of this problem, we have listed the Harmful Effects of Plastic in Points below that will show how badly plastic is affecting our environment.
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How does Plastic Harm the Environment
- Plastic is made up of petroleum oil which is a non-renewable source of energy. Petroleum oil is not sustainable and it pollutes the air on combustion.
- A lot of water is used when making plastic. According to the Water Footprint Calculator, one pound of plastic is made by using 22 gallons of water. That means if one plastic bottle is made then it uses double the amount of water it can hold.
- Every single minute people are buying nearly a million plastic bottles around the world totally unaware of what they are doing because from those millions of plastic bottles only 10 percent are recycled. What about the rest? Where do they go? Think about it.
- The plastics which are dumped instead of being recycled, it takes about 450 years for it to decompose. The plastic bottles are made up of polyethylene terephthalate (PET). PET is not biodegradable but it is photodegradable. After photodegradation even if the bottles are degraded, tiny pieces of microplastic still exist, which gets mixed in water bodies and harms the floras and faunas.
- Many states have banned plastic bags in stores, shops, and many places. If we see around most of the plastic that we are dealing with today was produced more than a decade ago. In spite of banning plastic production in many places and plastic bags, the expected production of plastic after 3 decades is still more than 3 times as of 2015.
- Instead of a slowdown in plastic production, it is increasing and filling up all the landfills and leaving no space. Landfills at many places are running out of space.
- If the energy which is used in making plastic and plastic materials is supplied to a megacity it can be powered for a month non-stop. Plastic production also affects the ozone layer.
- Oceans are filled with plastic and every minute nearly a ton of plastic is dumped in oceans. On average around 17.6 billion pounds of plastic is dumped in oceans annually.
- In 2016 Ellen MacArthur Foundation released The New Plastics Economy Report which says that by 2050 there is going to be more plastic weight in the ocean as compared to the weight of fishes in the ocean.
- 90 percent of the Americans who are tested have Bisphenol A in them. It is a chemical that is used in the production of polycarbonate plastics. BPA is found in almost all plastic products from water bottles to food containers. When the chemical bond breaks BPA gets mixed in your food and water.
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I hope that after knowing all these facts you are probably going to think twice before buying plastic bottles and other plastic products. The world is drowning under the weight of plastic and only we can take it out again. So try your best and do not use plastic
