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? 
Who Said Recycling Was Green? It Makes Microplastics By the Ton – Inside Climate News
Posted on November 11, 2023 by DrRossH in Plastic RecyclingResearch out of Scotland suggests that the chopping, shredding and washing of plastic in recycling facilities may turn as much as six to 13 percent of incoming waste into microplastics—tiny, toxic particles that are an emerging and ubiquitous environmental health concern for the planet and people. A team of four researchers measured and analyzed microplastics […]
Source: Who Said Recycling Was Green? It Makes Microplastics By the Ton – Inside Climate News
Dell said the study highlights a problem she said she has “been yelling about for years,” what she calls the “material waste rate” for plastic recycling, “but no one pays attention.” Her own calculations based on industry data she cited in her group’s report last year with Beyond Plastics estimated a 30 percent material loss for recycling PET plastic bottles, commonly used by beverage companies. “To make 100 bottles out of recycled plastic, 143 bottles have to be collected and processed,” she said.
The Association of Plastic Recyclers estimates there are more than 100 post-consumer plastic recycling operations in the United States and Canada. Many are likely sending their wastewater to municipal wastewater treatment facilities.
Generally, treatment plants are supposed to comply with rules that limit solid particles in their effluent. So regulations would capture some, but not all, microplastics—and what gets through would be the smaller and more dangerous particles, Dell said.
There is only 1 solution here and that is to STOP using so much plastic. reevaluate the use of it in every product. Not reevaluate by the manufacturers but independet people.
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