When we started this website, I wrote a few articles about recycling plastic (which you can read in the under the Pollution category), and I was very supportive of the efforts being made to try and reduce the disastrous effect plastic has had on the environment. Along the way, I read a lot about the problems recyclers were experiencing with plastics, and it didn’t seem to me that there were any cohesive efforts by local, state, and federal governments to upgrade and connect the different recycling processes being used. But it appears there now may be a gigantic and much more sinister problem with plastic recycling. A group of researchers did some incredible investigative research and wrote a 64-page report about plastic producers deceiving the public about recycling. You can find the report at https://climateintegrity.org/uploads/media/Fraud-of-Plastic-Recycling-2024.pdf
For now, I will simply show you the introductory paragraphs in the report (with emphasis added). In the future we will be supplementing this article with more details from the report:
“Plastic pollution is one of the most serious environmental crises facing the world today. Between 1950 and 2015, over 90% of plastics were landfilled, incinerated, or leaked into the environment. Plastic waste is ubiquitous—from our rivers, lakes, and oceans to roadways and coastlines. It is in “the air we breathe, the food we eat, and the water we drink.” One study estimates that humans ingest up to five grams or the equivalent of one credit card worth of plastic per week. Some of the largest oil and gas companies are among the 20 petrochemical companies responsible for more than half of all single-use plastics generated globally. ExxonMobil, for example, is the world’s top producer of single-use plastic polymers.”
“Underpinning this plastic waste crisis is a decades-long campaign of fraud and deception about the recyclability of plastics. Despite their long-standing knowledge that recycling plastic is neither technically nor economically viable, petrochemical companies—independently and through their industry trade associations and front groups—have engaged in fraudulent marketing and public education campaigns designed to mislead the public about the viability of plastic recycling as a solution to plastic waste. These efforts have effectively protected and expanded plastic markets, while stalling legislative or regulatory action that would meaningfully address plastic waste and pollution. Fossil fuel and other petrochemical companies have used the false promise of plastic recycling to exponentially increase virgin plastic production over the last six decades, creating and perpetuating the global plastic waste crisis and imposing significant costs on communities that are left to pay for the consequences. Big Oil and the plastics industry—which includes petrochemical companies, their trade associations, and the front groups that represent their interests—should be held accountable for their campaign of deception much like the producers of tobacco, opioids, and toxic chemicals that engaged in similar schemes. This report lays the foundation for such a claim.
Sources:
https://climateintegrity.org/uploads/media/Fraud-of-Plastic-Recycling-2024.pdf
Photo by Krizjohn Rosales: https://www.pexels.com/photo/person-hands-on-assorted-color-plastic-lid-lot-761297/
TO BE CONTINUED . . . .
