PLASTIC MESS (Not Degradable)

by: Arun Bhatia

This article was on the editorial page of TOI(ME) dated: 20/01/2009
My earth-loving conscience hurts every time i go shopping. The store guys put the selected fruit in one plastic bag to keep it apart from the plastic cheese packet and the plastic milk sachet that is in another. The soap and insecticide are in another, and flour, dal and sugar in one-kilo plastic packs are put along with all those in the cloth bag one carries. My cloth shopping bag, full of plastic thingies, is just a salve for my conscience. Cashing in on the growing awareness of the public about the limited options for disposal of plastic packaging, there are many multinational companies now offering what they term as degradable and biodegradable plastics. These claims need a closer look. Degradable plastics, i.e. photodegradable (broken down by light) or biodegradable (broken down by decay) are neither made by changing the polymer chain chemically or by mixing ordinary plastic resin with cornstarch or similar vegetable material. Calling the latter biodegradable is false because only the cornstarch decays while the plastic remains. The landfills where most plastic waste is deposited have been studied. These landfills do not have light, water or air and therefore do not allow either photodegradation or biodegradation. In fact, some decades old landfills, studied by New York’s Cornell Waste Management Institute, have yielded newspapers that can still be read and banana skins that can be identified as such.
Moreover, plastics, made by styrene and vinyl chloride and other toxic varieties of chemicals have many types of additives e.g. flame retardants, reinforcing agents, plasticisers, stabilisers, fillers and pigments, which are toxic. Plastic pigments have chemicals including lead and cadmium. All such chemicals trapped in plastics remain inert, but when plastics are broken, toxics are released in the environment. Degradable plastics are thus more damaging to the environment. They are also more likely to be ingested by animals. While the so-called degradable plastics are worse for the environment, they are also weaker than virgin chemicals and are less likely to be recycled. In sum, the ‘degradable’ plastics are neither as good as regular plastic nor will they disappear, nor do they perform well, nor can they be recycled. They are merely gimmicks of commerce. Environmentalists would do well to change from plastics altogether, regardless of whether they are claimed to be degradable or otherwise.