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In recent years, the absence of federal regulation has prompted many States and local governments to start banning or restricting "single use" plastic bags that are filling our landfills and helping to create "the Great Garbage Patch" in the Pacific ocean. Efforts to do so in the past have been effectively blocked by the petrochemical industry. "Industry groups stymied New York City’s attempt at a two-cent bottle tax, and in the following decade beat back restrictions in nearby Suffolk County on polystyrene cups and other tossable plastics. Industry trade groups have even lobbied for states to preempt bans on plastic bags." How Bad Are Plastics, Really? (Atlantic)
The change, really, has been the realization that "plastics and climate aren’t separate issues. They are structurally linked problems, and also mutually compounding, with plastics’ facilities spewing climate-relevant emissions and extreme weather further dispersing plastic into the environment." The real world effects of climate change are being felt everywhere and it is becoming harder to deny or lobby away that reality. "Plastics are poised to dominate the 21st century as one of the yet-unchecked drivers of climate change." Indeed, "More plastics have been made over the past two decades than during the second half of the 20th century." For every metric ton of plastic made 1.89 metric tons of greenhouse gasses are produced.
Plastic is a double-whammy: bad being made, bad after use.
The change, really, has been the realization that "plastics and climate aren’t separate issues. They are structurally linked problems, and also mutually compounding, with plastics’ facilities spewing climate-relevant emissions and extreme weather further dispersing plastic into the environment." The real world effects of climate change are being felt everywhere and it is becoming harder to deny or lobby away that reality. "Plastics are poised to dominate the 21st century as one of the yet-unchecked drivers of climate change." Indeed, "More plastics have been made over the past two decades than during the second half of the 20th century." For every metric ton of plastic made 1.89 metric tons of greenhouse gasses are produced.
Plastic is a double-whammy: bad being made, bad after use.