Materials News
A report says that biodegradable plastics are not necessarily better for oceans than traditional plastics.
landfills, in nature, there is no such thing as ideal conditions for the products to degrade. Also, biodegradable plastics sink and therefore do not get exposed to UV rays to help them degrade. Plastics labelled as biodegradable do not degrade rapidly in the ocean, the UNEP report says. There are some common polymers that are nonbiodegradable, such as PE. To enable more rapid fragmentation, PE is sometimes manufactured with a metal-based additive. However, UNEP says that there is no independent scientific evidence that biodegradation will occur any more rapidly than unmodified PE. A prior report also stated that “the adoption of products labelled as biodegradable or oxo-degradable would not bring about a significant decrease either in the quantity of plastic entering the ocean or the risk of physical and chemical impacts on the marine environment, on the balance of current scientific evidence.” As for biodegradable packaging, the New Plastics Economy espoused by EMF is unwrapping a “bio-benign” plastic packaging – one that would reduce its negative impact on natural systems when leaked, while also being recyclable and competitive in terms of functionality and costs. EMF revealed that the current biodegradable plastics rarely measure up to that objective, as they are typically compostable only under controlled conditions. Sustainability focus on packaging Packaging can play a significant role in the New Plastics Economy, since it is the largest use in the industry, accounting for 26% of the total volume, the EMF report says. The volume growth for the sector is forecast to reach 318 million tonnes annually by 2050. The flipside of this growth is that recovery remains low, with about 72% of plastic packaging not recovered and about 40% going into landfills, with the remaining 32% leaking out of the collection system. At least 8 million tonnes of plastics leak into oceans/year. If left
unmitigated, the volume per minute of litter dumped into the oceans will double by 2030, and quadruple by 2050. There are ways that the packaging industry is ruminating to contribute to the New Plastics Economy, through a low-carbon production process, with the utilisation of plants or organic resources, with less reliance on non-renewable resources. A recent report from Smithers Pira shows that sustainability factor is becoming increasingly important across packaging value chains; and is at the crux of the economic, environmental and social objectives of the packaging industry. Environmental consultancy Trucost in its study, Scaling sustainable plastics: Solutions to drive plastics towards a circular economy, finds that sustainable plastics use could potentially generate US$3.5 billion in environmental savings. On the other hand, the environmental cost of using plastics is almost five times over or U$75 billion, due to climate change and pollution. It suggests that closed loop recycling, biobased and biodegradable plastics can bring on cost savings. These findings are aimed to scale up the market for sustainable plastics but for the solutions to be picked up by the majority of plastic value chain is the focus of other studies. A real solution in the long haul Though the New Plastics Economy highlights the benefits of espousing a circular economy to create “long-term systemic value by fostering a working after-use economy”, it is not an instantaneous solution. It could take years to happen. The process requires redesigning materials, formats and systems, developing new technologies and evolving global value chains. “But this should not discourage stakeholders or lead to delays — on the contrary, the time to act is now,” the report advises. Furthermore, UNEP suggests employing increased recycling collection, especially in countries that generate large volumes of waste plastic. Meanwhile, efforts to curb waste plastic contamination are ongoing, but are not guaranteed to deliver 100% positive results. For example, biobased, compostable or biodegradable plastics tend to encourage littering among individuals that rely on the materials’ eco-friendly nature to biodegrade naturally. The UNEP report says that there is limited evidence suggesting that some people are attracted by technological solutions as an alternative to changing behaviour. This is illustrated in labelling the product as biodegradable – a technical fix that takes away the responsibility from the individual to be more conscientious in disposing of waste plastics. Needless to say, the essence of a successful plastics economy starts from an individual’s action to recover, recycle or reuse plastics that are consumed. JUNE / JULY 2016
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