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? Most ‘home-compostable’ plastic doesn’t fully break down in compost bins, UK study finds
Posted on May 26, 2024 by DrRossH in BioPlastics
Most certified “home-compostable” plastics do not fully break down in home compost bins, a citizen science project finds.
Source: Most ‘home-compostable’ plastic doesn’t fully break down in compost bins, UK study finds – ABC News
Over two years, more than 900 people in the UK placed a total of 1,307 home-compostable-certified plastic items, such as food trays and newspaper wrapping, in a loose non-biodegradable net bag before adding it to their home compost.
Many study participants reported feeling “disgusted” by how much plastic remained in their compost bin.
“At the state of everything at the moment, [home-compostable plastic] won’t solve the plastic pollution problem alone, but technology is heading in the right direction.”
Add the above complications along with the 12-15 month short life of home compostable plastic before it starts to fall apart on its own, then Home Compostable plastics as they are now, have sigificant problems.
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