We live in a plastic world. It’s hard to believe the substance only came on the scene about 155 years ago when Alexander Parkes, an Englishman, mixed collodion, camphor, and ethanol together in 1862. Then in 1907 Leo Baekeland created an entirely synthetic plastic from phenol and formaldahyde and coined it Bakelite. Its chemical name is harder to pronounce: polyoxybenzylmethylenglycolanhydride.
Imagine how novel this cheap, light, colorful material was to people accustomed to glass, clay, and cast iron, and it’s easy to appreciate the zeal for plastic in the last century. Think of sixties housewives furnishing their homes with fiberglass tables and chairs, donning polyester dresses, and hosting Tupperware parties on the weekends. Plastic wasn’t just for adornment either. It brought real progress – film, vinyl records, cassette tapes, compact discs, computers, artificial heart valves, prosthetic body parts, contact lenses, and more.
Recently, however, the fervor for plastic has given way to anxiety. Why?
Health concerns
People began questioning what’s in the long chains of unpronounceable chemicals filling our homes. What are our babies sucking on when we hand them a pacifier, bottle, or teething ring?
Bisphenol A, a chemical used in polycarbonate plastics – including pipes, dental fillings, water bottles, canned food, and many food wrappers – has come under fire. Bisphenol A is a “xenoestrogen” – a known endocrine disruptor. Numerous animal studies have found effects on fetuses and newborns exposed to it. Nearly everyone in the U.S. is exposed to it because polycarbonate plastic breaks down over time and leaches BPA into our bodies. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) found detectable levels of BPA in the urine of 93% of people they tested.
In 2007, 38 experts agreed that the average levels of BPA in people are above those known to cause harm to animals. A panel convened by the U.S. National Institutes of Health stated there’s “some concern” about BPA’s effects on fetal and infant brain development.
Manufacturers rushed to take BPA out of water and baby bottles. But in 2013, scientists discovered Bisphenol S (BPS) and Bisphenol F (BPF), the substances manufacturers used to replace BPA in products, also break down, leach into the body, and may damage human cells. BPS was found in 81 percent of random urine samples.
And those aren’t the only chemicals known to be toxic. In 1999, the European Union banned all pthalates, chemicals used to soften plastic, in childrens’ toys because they can leach out of plastic when chewed or sucked and may cause cancer, mutations, and reproductive damage. The U.S. didn’t follow the EU’s lead in banning pthalates in children’s toys until 2017, so pacifiers and teething rings manufactured before then may contain them.
Even if we stop eating off or chewing on plastic, the plastic manufacturing process has health implications. When Formosa Plastics Corp. built a factory in southeast Texas, ranchers noticed their steers losing weight, cows miscarrying more frequently, and calves being born with birth defects or stillborn. Texas A & M researchers discovered DNA damage in the cows living near the factory. The cattle downwind had the most damage.
Planetary Waste Crisis
Every time someone eats a tub of salsa, drinks a Styrofoam cup of coffee, sips on a bottle of Aquafina, or says yes to a plastic bag at the supermarket, a plastic container gets dumped. Plastic recycling rates have been dismal and stand to get much worse. Until 2017, only about nine percent of the plastic consumed in the U.S. was recycled, including about 23 percent of all plastic bottles, 12 percent of bottled water containers, and 1 to 3 percent of plastic bags.
To make things worse, in 2017, China announced it would no longer accept most of the U.S.’s recycled plastic because of public health concerns. The U.S. was exporting a third of its recycled plastics to other countries for processing, and half of that was shipped to China. China’s announcement led many U.S. municipalities to halt plastics recycling, forcing consumers to throw plastic waste in the garbage.
Scientists estimate it will take between 400 and a million years for most plastic products to biodegrade. Plastic is littering our roadways, filling our landfills, mucking up our waterways, and killing marine life.
A huge soup of plastic waste in the Pacific Ocean is estimated to be somewhere between the size of Texas to twice the size of the continental United States. According to one estimate, over a million seabirds and more than 100,000 marine mammals die every year from ingesting plastic debris.
A non-renewable resource
Plastic is a petroleum by-product, and more Americans are looking critically at our reliance on petroleum products. We had a devastating look at the downsides of petroleum extraction and distribution when thousands of gallons of oil spewed into the Gulf of Mexico after BP’s Deepwater Horizon rig exploded in 2009.
And it’s not just massive oil spills that pollute our environment. Minor petroleum leaks and spills contaminate soils or wash into storm drains and pollute waterways.
Petroleum extraction is also responsible for a myriad of social and political troubles around the world.
Is it time to part with polymers?
Americans throw away 60 million plastic bottles every day according to the Clean Air Council, and many of us are looking for ways to generate less waste.
Here are 12 easy ways to use less plastic:
- Carry a stainless steel coffee mug or water bottle.
- Factor packaging into your decision-making. If you can afford to buy the glass jar of tomato sauce instead of a can or plastic bottle, consider whether it’s worth a little extra cash to you. (Cans are lined with plastic, and 40 percent still contain BPA.)
- Bring reusable bags to the store. Keep some in your car or bike basket so you don’t forget them. Transport produce in reusable bags or a basket.
- Just say no to straws. Americans throw away 500 million straws per day.
- Buy food from the bulk section when possible. Refill glass jars with syrup, cooking oil, nut butters, shampoo, etc at a local health food store. Ask the checkout person to weigh your jars before you fill them and write the tare weight on the lid.
- Store food in jars or cloth bags. You can freeze leftovers, breast milk, or baby food in jars if you leave a little room at the top and thaw them slowly.
- Cook from scratch. Processed food, take-out containers, and to-go beverages are usually packaged in plastic, styrofoam, or plastic-lined materials.
- Use cloth diapers and/or reusable menstrual products.
- Use a Bento lunchbox.
- Make your own detergents, cleaners, and toiletries, such as deodorant, bath salts, and shampoo and conditioner.
- Buy products in larger quantities to reduce packaging waste. For instance, get the largest sizes of detergent and bath tissue.
- Avoid buying flimsy plastic toys and trinkets that you’ll throw away quickly. Keep plastic away from babies or toddlers who will chew on it.
[clickToTweet tweet=”Depressed about throwing plastic in the garbage? Check out these 12 Easy Ways to Use Less Plastic. #plasticfree” quote=”Depressed about throwing plastic in the garbage? Check out these 12 Easy Ways to Use Less Plastic.” theme=”style1″]
Reduce and Reuse
Scientists, governments, and consumers are just beginning to reckon with the planetary crisis of plastics pollution. We need large-scale solutions to address the problem. However, in the meantime, it’s up to all of us to use less plastic.
[Editor’s note: This is an updated and revamped version of a blog post originally published on June 19, 2009.]
Are you finding ways to use less plastic? I’d love to hear your ideas in the comments!
If you liked this post, you may like these related posts:
- Local, Seasonal Foods are Superfoods
- 3 Powerful Ways to Plant Flowers
- Become the Solution
- Redefining Wealth
- Making Economic Exchange a Loving Human Interaction
- How to Plant Geeks Grew a Permaculture Oasis in an Ordinary Backyard
- Why the Most Powerful Thing in the World is a Seed
Very good points, but, as “plastics” are so ubiquitous, the world will probably run out of petroleum before we stop the flow of plastic items !
Yes, sadly, I’m afraid you might be right.
great tips. I’m always looking to reduce my plastic use. thanks! 🙂
for menstrual products, the Keeper is AMAZING. replace once every 10 years only, save tons of money and no need for tons of waste! 😀
Thanks for the tip.
excellent article, I’m always looking for ways to reduce plastics in my life, sometimes the problem though is that it is almost genuinely impossible to buy stuff that isn’t packaged in plastic. For example, my favourite brand of shampoo, which is free from all horrible chemicals and is the most environmentally friendly shampoo produced in the UK, is packaged in plastic; my local whole food store packages bread in plastic on the shelves…..
Juliet
http://craftygreenpoet.blogspot.com
Yes, we’ve had similar frustrations. We like to buy in bulk from a wholesale natural foods company, but they often use plastic packaging even for things that aren’t ordinarily packaged that way, like flour and baking soda. I’m amazed by Beth Terry, who blogs at http://fakeplasticfish.com/. She’s managed to get her plastic consumption down to almost nothing. Truly inspiring.
I think the hardest of those twelve tips is not buying plastic toys. Just thinking of all the toys my children have, I would say that almost everything that’s not a book is plastic – either hard plastic or, in the case of stuffed animals, polyesther. Any ideas on good, non-plastic toys? (Or ways to make them? Wooden blocks? What else…?)
I know what you mean! The plastic toys seem to appear and fill every crevice of your home the moment your baby arrives.
Etsy is a great place to find unique, handmade, non-plastic toys: http://www.etsy.com/category/toys?ref=fp_ln_toys.
This company also has some cool stuff: http://www.novanatural.com/
And I’ve noticed more and more local craftspeople selling wooden and natural fiber toys at our weekly craft and farmer’s market. I’m not sure if that’s a national trend though.
Does anyone else have good sources?
Good luck!
There are a number of companies who use very little if any plastic. http://deltaflute.blogspot.com/2010/06/green-tips-toys.html
There is a manufacturer in California that makes recycled plastic toys if you are interested in an alternative. http://www.greentoys.com
The easiest thing to do is just ban them from your house. I still have people who have given us a number of plastic toys for the baby shower, but I’ve stopped my mom numerous times from buying the latest electronic plastic gadget (so has my dad). I’m hoping that at Christmas my son will be a bit too old for some of the toys that he has now, I can set up a Christmas wish list will all wooden toys or recycled plastic ones and put the cobash on the virgin plastic ones.
Thanks for the tips!
I’ve recently discovered that I can taste when things have been stored in plastic.
What I’m trying to find now is a non-plastic equivalent to Tupperware sandwich containers, for taking lunch to work. Nearly everything else can go in jars, but not sandwiches.
I just saw a friend carrying this:
http://www.healthykitchenware.com/small-3tier-stainless-steel-lunch-carrier-p-40.html?zenid=o9g7i8t5hm2mvqhsudf5jc1a91
She said she loves it, and it looks as though you could carry a sandwich (and much more) in it. I noticed that this company also offers some other options.
Great article! I announced earlier this week that I am banning all new plastic food storage stuff, dishes, cutlery and baby toys. I’m going to transition to stainless steel tiffins, for the most part. I saw a website recently (can’t remember where!) that sold stainless steel straws and Popsicle molds. Genius!
Oh, I’m so glad you said this about stainless steel popsicle molds. I’ve been dying to make popsicles this summer, but haven’t because we don’t have any molds, and I don’t want to purchase plastic ones. You inspired me to do a little searching, and I found these.:
http://www.thetickletrunk.com/products.php?id=205&name=Popsicle_mold
re: lunches
hi, i grew up rural nz 60s – 70s. being a bit behind the world at the time, we didnt have plastic lunch boxes and bags etc, so this is what i remember….the lunch box was tin and my sandwiches were in a sandwich size “envelope” of fabric that was damp to keep the sandwiches from drying out, cookies were wrapped in paper, fruit salad in a small glass jar, all packed into my tin.
toys were wooden, cloth or knitted.maybe the answer lies in the past?
ps handmade wooden toys etc also making a comeback here too 🙂
That’s so interesting! I think you’re right. We lived without plastic not long ago, so we can learn a lot from our forebears about packaging sans polymers. Perhaps I will write a post about that soon.
Thanks for this post. I have become very conscious of plastic in our environment ever since my granddaughter was born. I run a green B&B and have discovered lots of people are happy when I recycle and compost. We provide tote bags for guests. But I felt that was not enough. So I have decided to try and shift my little town non-toxic. This is a tall order. I know Marblehead, in MA did it. And Hudson, Ontario, banned pesticides for the lawn. A number of cities are trying to ban plastic bags. I have formed a working group and we will “work” under the economic development committee, of which I am a member. At the least, it will raise consciousness.
Do you know the blog Fake Plastic Fish? I think the more of us blog about these things, the more legislators will be unable to ignore us.
This is great! Yes, I’m amazed by Fake Plastic Fish. She’s quite inspiring.
I’m so glad to know that I’m not alone with my not wanting to bring hard plastic into my life. It’s been around a year, maybe more, since I made that pledge. No store-bought salsa, cottage cheese, hummus, ricotta cheese, yogurt, pesto, etc., etc. for us. If we want to eat something that only comes in hard plastic, we need to make them from scratch or find a resource who will package them in glass (which I’ve been successful at and has been fun to do, actually). I refill shampoo and lotion containers from the bulk section at my health food store [altho those bulk containers are plastic 🙁 ]. The challenge will be when I run out of personal care products and things in plastic that I’m not yet aware of, but I’ll probably enjoy making my own and connecting with others who are doing that. I feel like I’m going back to first principles and doing the right thing — it feels good. Thanks to you all.
Wow, this is amazing and inspiring! Yes, I know what you mean about the bulk containers being plastic. Several years ago where I was working, some people got upset because the employer used polycarbonate water cooler bottles. (They have BPA in them, which was all over the news at the time.) Then someone opened the sink and displayed all of the pvc piping, pointing out that our drinking water sits in plastic no matter where we get it. It’s everywhere! (Alarmingly, hard pvc piping, especially that manufactured prior to 1977, has been implicated for leaking toxins into water in studies: http://www.cleanwaterpipecouncil.org/#)
I think you’ll love making your personal care products when the time comes!
What I’ve learned from not bringing food packaged in hard plastic into my life: I thought I would miss not having the convenience of store-bought salsa, cottage cheese, hummus, ricotta cheese, yogurt, pesto, etc. at my fingertips at all times … but over time I realized that I DO NOT NEED all of those food items in my life simultaneously. Since my no-hard-plastic pledge, I make only what I want and usually only one item at a time. I didn’t realize that I would then really savor and enjoy what I made, knowing that when I wanted more I’d have to invest the time again! And generally, I like my homemade goodies (yes, there have been some less-than-thrilling outcomes, but practice makes perfect, eh?).
These are good tips. The bulk food aisle is a great big help to eliminating all of that plastic “cwrap” on the food.
Great article. So weird how plastic got to be in everything in so little time…
Any ideas for toothpaste containers? It would be nice if you could just “refill” your toothpaste at the store, but that’s clearly not an option.