Officials seize plastic from shops – India

Officials seize plastic from shops – India

Posted on July 1, 2012 by DrRossH in Plastic Limiting Regulations

Officials seize plastic from shops | Deccan Chronicle.

This comment at the bottom of this article is quite misleading and contains many errors.  The oxodegradable additives only cause plastics to break down into small pieces of plastic if the plastic is left out in the open where sunlight and air can get at it.   This is the litter on the ground environment.

The claim of the plastic will then biodegrade has not been proven.  Careful reading of the d2w website and following on from their biodegradation claims raises real concerns about any biodegradation claims.   What we do not want to happen is for plastic to break down into little piece of plastic as that will be a far larger pollution problem.

The oft cited phrase of ‘when the bags reach the end of their useful life they degrade’ is very misleading.   Degradation by oxo additives starts a chemical reaction.  It has nothing to do with biology.  The reaction is always going on.   In hot regions it goes faster and in cold regions it goes slower.   The bags are made in a factory somewhere then shipped to their destination which could be 1000’s of miles away.   The manufactures have no idea at all about how the bags are to be used and for how long.  They have no idea what the ‘useful life’ is for every person.  This claim is simply a sales phrase to make the product sound good, when it is not.

Oxo bags cannot be recycled as they contaminate the next round of plastic.

Oxo bags do not break down in a landfill.

Oxo bags can degrade early and fail while people are using them.  Google the recent Tesco situation where the bags were dropped by Tesco as they were causing problems.

Look for landfill biodegradable bags as these can be recycled, will actually biodegrade in a landfill, will not prematurely break down until they are disposed to a environment where naturally occurring microorganisms will then break them down.