PLASTICS ARE POLLUTING our water, land and air at the rate of 57 million tons per year– enough to fill the New York City’s Central Park and as high as the Empire State Building, according to researchers at the University of Leeds in the UK.
These pollutants go to the deepest oceans and to the highest mountaintops and inside our bodies, about ⅔ of which comes from the Global South. The study examined wastes produced at the local level in over 50,000 cities and towns of the world.
The study examined plastics in the open environment– not those in landfills or those properly burned. For 15 percent of the world’s population, the governments fail to collect and dispose of waste — a big reason Southeast Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa produce the most plastic waste. That includes 255 million people in India.
In 2022, most of the world’s nations agreed to make the first legally- binding treaty on plastics pollution, including in the oceans with the final treaty negotiation having taken place in South Korea last November.
‘Roads are the heartbeat of economic and social activity and trade … If plastic trash can be used to build essential infrastructure, we can provide transportation to citizens and to a cleaner planet.’
IMPACT ON HUMANS
The study used AI to concentrate on plastics that were improperly burned, or 57 percent of the pollution, and those improperly dumped. In both cases tiny microplastics and nanoplastics turned the problem from a visual annoyance at beaches and a marine life problem to a human health threat.
Several studies have looked at the prevalence of microplastics in drinking water and in people’s tissue, such as hearts, brains, and testicles, but doctors and scientists are still uncertain on its impact on human health.
Experts worry that the studies focus on pollution, instead of plastic production, thus sparing the industry from the blame, whereas producing large amounts of plastics also produces greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change.
UNMANAGEABLE
Technical Advisor Theresa Karlsson of the International Pollutants Elimination Network, an advocacy group on environment, health and waste issues, called the volume of pollution “alarming” and “unmanageable.”
While plastic waste trade is decreasing– with China banning waste imports– Karlsson said overall waste trade (of plastics) is actually increasing with EU waste exports rising from 110,000 tons in 2004 to 1.4 MT in 2021.
Oceanography Prof. Kara Lavender Law at the Sea Education Association, who wasn’t involved in the study, agreed based on the US plastic waste trends while the plastic industry praised the study.
The United Nations projects that plastics production is likely to rise from about 440 MT/yr. to over 1,200 MT making “our planet choke on plastics.”
REUSING PLASTICS
The Philippines, which has often been blamed for being the top polluter of oceans and water bodies from plastic wastes, has since August 12 been using plastics as additives to cement for roads and bridges.
The DPWH has approved the use of plastic wastes for asphalt pavements to extend their lifespan amid the alarming rise in plastic pollution, a major cause of flooding in the metropolis.
Public Works Secretary (as of this writing) Manuel Bonoan ordered all regional field offices, district engineering offices and Unified Project Management Office Clusters to use shredded plastic in road construction projects, thus promoting recycling of low density polyethylene (LDPE) plastic bag wastes by shredding and using it as an additive to reduce the susceptibility to permanent deformation of bituminous concrete surface course or asphalt concrete.
Assuming that a ton of plastics is needed for 1 km of road, this can divert 57,803 single-use food containers, 2.5 million straws, or 166,667 single-use grocery bags from becoming ocean waste. Further, plastic roads are also expected to yield greenhouse gas reductions: one kilometer of plastic road saves three tons of CO2 versus incinerating plastic waste.
PLASTIC ROADS
Roads are the heartbeat of economic and social activity and trade, linking producers to consumers, people to jobs, kids to schools, and patients to hospitals, thereby boosting economic activity and reducing poverty. If plastic trash can be used to build essential infrastructure, we can provide transportation to citizens and to a cleaner planet.
India has led the way in plastic road construction, with Dr. Rajagopalan Vasudevan, “India’s plastic man” patenting a plastic road construction method in 2006. Since then, India has built over 2,5000 km (or half the width of the USA and globally) plastic roads and over 15 countries with projects being piloted or under construction.
Using plastic for roads, Bonoan said, is in line with the continuing efforts of the department to support sustainable engineering and upgrade construction technology through adoption of successful research studies.
The use of LDPE waste in asphalt cement mix has been successfully tested by the DPWH Bureau of Research and Standards.