Top 5 Reasons to Get Plastic Out of Your Life

Even if we could give up plastic, why would we want to?

Originally, synthetic plastics were invented to replace natural polymers like elephant tusks or rubber. They were actually seen as a way to protect natural resources. But as the popularity of plastics has grown, their drawbacks have become more and more apparent. Two years ago, after reading an article about the plastic filling up our oceans and the harm caused to wildlife, I committed to buying as little new plastic as possible. Today, I am just as dedicated to living with less plastic as I was then.

Here are my top 5 reasons why:

1) Plastic is made from petroleum-based sources. Many people don't realize that most plastic comes from oil. And as we know, oil is a resource that is running out. In the next few years, if we don't find alternatives to oil voluntarily, we'll be forced to do so. In the meantime, the U.S. has 2% of the world's oil reserves, yet uses 25%. Reducing our dependence on foreign sources of fossil fuels is just one reason to cut back on our use of plastics.

2) Plastics often contain toxic chemical additives, and they can leach. Most plastic products and packaging contain chemicals which enhance the material's strength, flexibility, color, and even resistance to bacteria. All additives can leach from plastic, and many of them are harmful to our health. For example, PVC plastic, commonly known as vinyl, may be hardened with lead, which can damage the nervous system, or softened with phthalates like DEHP, which disrupt hormones and affect the liver, kidneys, lungs and reproductive system. Bisphenol-A, an endocrine disruptor, is another additive of concern that can leach from hard plastic water bottles, baby bottles and the linings of metal cans.

But what about "safe" plastics that are not known to cause harm? Unfortunately, our laws in the United States do not require manufacturers to prove that their chemicals are safe before putting them on the market, nor are manufacturers required to reveal what additives they use in the first place. Until we have laws mandating testing of products before they enter the market, we as consumers are wise to avoid plastic products and packaging whenever possible.

3) Plastic is not biodegradable. The plastic that we throw away never actually goes away. Because there is no naturally occurring organism that can break down plastic, it lasts in the environment virtually forever, filling up our landfills and taxing our over-burdened waste management system. Why create disposable containers and packaging out of a material meant to last forever?

4) Plastic waste harms wildlife and even humans. Plastic may not biodegrade, but it can break down into smaller and smaller pieces of plastic that fill up not only our landfills but also our oceans and cause harm to wildlife. While no organism can digest plastic, there are quite a few animals that are harmed while trying: Leatherback sea turtles choke on plastic bags they mistake for food; Laysan albatross chicks starve with their bellies full of plastic bottle caps and lighters. Even the fish we eat ingest plastic that has been caught in the zooplankton and passed up the food chain to us. And because plastic is lipophyllic, much of the plastic in the ocean is coated with oil-based pollutants like PCBs and DDT, chemicals which are even more harmful for us to ingest than the plastic itself.

5) Plastic is not truly recyclable. Most plastic recycling is actually considered "downcycling." Because of plastic’s low melting point, it can’t be heat-sterilized in the way that glass or metals can be, and therefore plastic food containers and bottles can only be downcycled into other products such as carpet or polar fleece or plastic lumber. That means that virgin plastic must be used to create each new bottle or container, and the recycling loop is never actually closed. And the truth is that most of our plastic “recycling” is shipped overseas to countries like China, where worker safeguards do not exist to protect whole towns from becoming toxic waste dumps for our discarded plastic.

Learning about the reasons to reduce our plastic consumption and plastic waste is important. But finding good plastic-free alternatives is crucial to solving these problems. Simply replacing disposable plastic products with disposable paper or bio-based plastics is not the answer. Reducing our overall consumption and opting for reusable bags, bottles, and containers is a good start.

Beth Terry writes about finding alternatives to plastic and tracks her own plastic consumption and plastic waste at www.fakeplasticfish.com. Why Fake Plastic Fish? "Because if we don't solve our plastic problem, they could be the only kind of fish we have left." Please stop by and leave a comment!