How many people today grab a takeaway coffee cup from the local cafe to drink on the go? We don’t know, but the number must be enormous.. Most every one of the above have a plastic top that will last 100s of years. Some cafes still use plastic cups that last a similar time. Is 10 minutes of coffee worth 100s of years of trash?
These items can be seen littering our gutters and on our streets all over the place. If they were all cardboard, they would still be littered, but they would, at least, be gone in a short time.
They do not need to be made of plastic.
On the way home from the gym last week, a distance of about 1 km (1/2 mile), I counted the items of plastic litter on the curb as I walked. In that short distance I counted 63 pieces of plastic litter. Plastic drink bottles, bottle tops, candy wrappers, plastic film, polystyrene fragments etc. That seemed to be a lot to me. I guess it is a generational thing. Our parents would have been horrified to see that amount, whereas it seems to go unnoticed by our youth of today. In another 20 years how many pieces will there be on this stretch, -- 200? What will today’s youth think of that new amount then when they are older? Will their children be so readily accepting of a higher amount of litter? 
EU Parliament to phase out plastic water bottles
Posted on June 14, 2018 by DrRossH in Plastic Limiting Regulations
A story about Science from AFP, as featured in Newsfusion’s Science News app.
Source: EU Parliament to phase out plastic water bottles
Strasbourg (France) (AFP) – The European Parliament has told its lawmakers and staff to set an example for EU citizens by no longer drinking water from plastic bottles by next year.
The European Parliament bureau headed by Antonio Tajani and 14 vice presidents adopted a measure late Monday to phase out the plastic bottles and build a network of drinking fountains.
“Happy to announce that the EP bureau has decided to get rid of all plastic bottles and minimise single use plastic altogether at the parliament from July 2019,” tweeted Heidi Hautala, an EP vice president, on Tuesday.
“Phase out already under way!EP will lead by example!,” added Hautala, a Finnish ecologist.
The move comes amid broader European Union and international efforts to stop eight million tonnes of plastic waste polluting the world’s oceans annually.
One million bottles were consumed last year during events and meetings in the EP which gathers in the French city of Strasbourg and also in Brussels.
The European Commission, the 28-nation EU’s executive arm, last month proposed a bloc-wide ban on single-use plastics such as straws, cutlery and cotton buds.
The commission hopes the measure will be endorsed by the European Parliament and the member states before its mandate ends in 2019, though it will unlikely enter into force before 2022.
The commission also proposed that member countries collect 90 percent of single-use plastic drinks bottles by 2025, through deposit refund schemes
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