A new report says that plastic pollution is a global emergency. It’s the same as climate change or biodiversity loss.
The Environmental Investigation Agency, (EIA), is urging nations to accept a UN treaty. This will ensure that they have legally-binding targets for plastic waste reduction.
The EIA states that plastic pollution directly impacts our health, causes biodiversity loss and increases the risk of large-scale environmental damage.
You will find plastic in deepest oceans, at the top of mountain peaks and even on uninhabited and remote islands.
According to the agency, dedicated multilateral agreements for climate change and biodiversity loss have been in effect for almost 30 years.
Plastic pollution is a problem that has no solution.
This report states that the world faces a global emergency due to plastic pollution. This is the plastic pollution scene at Kuta Beach, Bali. In the background, you can see McDonald’s iconic golden arches
Tom Gammage is an ocean activist at the EIA. The non-governmental organisation has offices in London as well as Washington DC.
According to growing plastics production, the number of plastics in the oceans will triple by 2040.
“The public is concerned about the visible effects of plastic pollution, however, most of these plastic pollution impacts go unnoticed.”
The new report, titled Connecting the Dots: Plastic pollution and the planetary emergency, pulls together recent scientific data on the impact of plastics on climate, biodiversity, human health and the environment.
It claims that by 2025 there will be 250 million tonnes plastic in the oceans. This is based on previous research.
It could reach 700,000,000 tonnes by 2040. By 2050, the plastic weight will surpass the fish weight in all oceans.
The report blames ‘toxic’ plastic pollution on the rampant overproduction of virgin plastics — plastic resin that has been newly created without any recycled materials.
Virgin plastics are less environmentally-friendly than recycled plastic, which helps build a ‘circular economy’ — where material resources are used again and again for as long as possible.
Virgin plastic production and consumption have reached unsustainable levels, fed by the oil and gas industry investing heavily in production of petrochemicals — the chemical products obtained from petroleum by refining, according to the report.
Plastic production produces about 1.89 tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e), per ton of virgin plastic.
‘The damage done by rampant overproduction of virgin plastics and their life-cycle is irreversible – this is a threat to human civilisation and the planet’s basic ability to maintain a habitable environment,’ said Gammage.
Plastic in our rivers and oceans just breaks down into smaller and smaller pieces, eventually creating microplastics
Toxic pollution from plastic poses a threat at each stage of its life-cycle, from the point at which plastic becomes a material to the moment it is left to degrade in the environment, the EIA said.
The agency claims that plastic pollution is similar to climate change and directly contributes to the former.
To create plastics, large amounts of fossil fuels such as coal, oil and natural gas are burned.
The total life cycle emissions of plastics was 1.78 billion tonnes (GtCO2e) in 2015.
“For context: If the whole lifecycle of plastics were a nation, it would be fifth most prolific emitter in greenhouse gases worldwide,” the report says.
In the summary the agency includes a warning about the danger to Earth’s wildlife. These animals can be caught in plastic bags or mistakenly eat plastic.
For example, an estimated 25 per cent of polar bears have eaten plastic, according to a 2021 study.
According to the EIA, ‘Physical injury is due to ingestion and entanglement with plastic waste. These are the most well-documented and obvious impacts on wildlife, biodiversity and the environment.
‘To our knowledge, at least 914 species are directly impacted by either ingestion or entanglement — 701 through ingestion and 354 through entanglement.
Plastic pollution is a “planetary emergency”: This is an image of a dead seagull wrapped in plastic bags
“This covers all species of marine turtles, almost half of the marine mammal and seabird species surveyed as well as 69 freshwater bird species and 49 land birds from 53 family members.
Overall, the report argues that the issues of climate change, biodiversity loss and plastic pollution are closely related party because they share the same cause.
The report states that environmental crises are often competing for attention. Each crisis has its own group of supporters who claim theirs is the most urgent need for awareness, financial support and interest.
“But, the reality is that it could not have been further from truth. Environmental crises such as biodiversity loss, climate change and pollution do not exist in isolation; the root causes are, in fact, the same – the overconsumption of finite resources.’