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? The State We’re In: Taking ‘plastic soup’ off the menu – USA
Posted on April 7, 2015 by DrRossH in Plastic Limiting RegulationsThe State We’re In: Taking ‘plastic soup’ off the menu | NJ.com.
Microbeads are made of polyethylene or polypropylene, the same plastics used to manufacture garbage containers, grocery bags and much more. They’ve replaced natural abrasives such as pumice and crushed almonds. A single tube of a personal care product can contain over 300,000 microbeads.
Most wastewater treatment plants can’t filter out or break down these tiny plastic particles, so they end up in rivers and streams and oceans. Once in the water, they absorb toxins from other pollutants. They’re then ingested by aquatic life and passed into the food chain. They can also get into drinking water supplies.
Fortunately, the New Jersey Legislature is taking plastic soup off the menu.
Good move for New Jersey. Let us hope other states follow suit soon.
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