The plastic is (not so) great!

[moinsdewatt]

LDemand figures for the consumption of plastic bottles in the world

ENRIQUE MOREIRA The 01 / 07 / 2017

According to a new report, to which The Guardian had access, by the end of the decade the number of bottles sold per year in the world will reach 500 billion.

A thousand billion or a million million ... however we turn it, this figure (1.000.000.000.000) remains disproportionate. And even half, 500 billion, is hard to conceive. Yet this is the result that the consumption of plastic bottles in the world, in 2021, could achieve if nothing changes.

The figures in the Euromonitor International report on the global packaging trend published by the British daily The Guardian are quite frightening. Every day in the world, not less than one million plastic bottles are sold. A figure that is expected to grow by 20% by the end of the decade.

Demand is growing rapidly. In 2016, for example, the number of plastic bottles sold in the world was 480 billion. Ten years earlier, their number was 300 billion.

For specialists, this offer, equivalent to 20.000 units every second worldwide, is driven primarily by water bottles and expanding Western take-away mode to the Asia Pacific region. In China alone, between 2015 and 2016, the number of bottles of water sold increased by 5,4 billion from 68,4 billion to 73,8 billion.



Too little recycling

A plastic consumption all the more alarming that a very small part of these bottles end up being recycled. The vast majority fails in the oceans of the world or in dumps, often in open air. Thus, "less than 7% of plastic bottles purchased in 2016 were collected and turned into new bottles," the report said.

Moreover, the authors estimate that between 5 million and 13 millions of tons of plastic are poured each year into the oceans. However, the share concerning bottles is not specified. However, according to the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, from here 2050, there will be more plastic than fish in the seas of the world.

From Plastic to Plate
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https://www.lesechos.fr/industrie-servi ... 098964.php

Original article in The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... ate-change Because ENRIQUE MOREIRA of Les Echos is lost between millions and billions .......

[Hannabella]

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[Moderation Flytox, the essential criterion is not to put commercial links !!! ]

[moinsdewatt]

To fight against pollution, Kenya banned plastic bags

Their use, manufacture and importation are now punishable by fines or imprisonment

Le Monde.fr with AFP | The 28.08.2017


In order to fight against pollution, Kenya banned, since Monday 28 August, the use, manufacture and import of plastic bags. The ban, which mainly targets bags distributed by traders and does not concern plastic wrapped goods or specific bags used for garbage, came into effect after the High Court dismissed on Friday a complaints from importers of plastic bags, who claimed a significant loss of jobs.

Dozens of other countries have already banned or restricted the use of plastic bags, such as Rwanda, South Africa, Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire ...


According to the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), Kenyan supermarkets distribute up to 100 million plastic bags a year. The director of UNEP, Erik Solheim, has since described the ban as a "gigantic step" to stop the pollution caused by plastic in a country where these bags often strew the aisles, are found regularly blocked in tree branches, obstruct certain sewers, are sometimes ingested by livestock and end up in streams and the Indian Ocean.

Ecological bags

The ban was announced six months earlier to give consumers and traders time to adjust to future legislation. The Kenya Environmental Management Agency (NEMA) has published advertisements in the main newspapers to explain this.
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http://www.lemonde.fr/afrique/article/2 ... _3212.html

[moinsdewatt]

Veolia expects to boost its plastics recycling business fivefold

MYRIAM CHAUVOT The 05 / 10 / 2017

The world leader in water and waste wants to bring 200 million to one billion euros turnover in pure recycling, excluding collection and sorting. Of which 300 millions in Asia, much better than North America.

If nothing is done, the plastic released into the oceans will weigh heavier than the fish that live there 2050 horizon. "From 1964 to 2014, global plastics production has multiplied by twenty and is expected to quadruple again by 2050 to reach 1,1 billion tonnes," said Veolia CEO Antoine Frérot at a business update group on this topic. "Plastics now account for 30% of waste but less than 20% is recycled worldwide and only 30% in Europe," he said.

The French giant for environmental services itself generates only 200 million euros of turnover on this activity. A drop of water in its 24 billion euros in turnover. It is also little in the light of the 31,5 billions of dollars already represented by the global plastic recycling activities in 2015.

A market of 57 billion

If recycled tonnages double by 2025, as predicted by a study by Grand View Research, the global recycling market will be worth 56,8 2025 billion dollars. This is why "Veolia plans to multiply by five its turnover in plastic recycling by 2025, to reach this horizon one billion euros," said Antoine Frerot. Growth will come from volumes handled, with an increase in the capacity of its three European sites and new sites, including one in France in preparation.

China good student

To boost its business fivefold, Veolia does not count on Europe alone. "On a billion euros, besides Europe, we should achieve about 300 million in Asia," said his CEO. Because Japan, South Korea and especially China are better students than North America, where Antoine Frérot does not expect any growth of activity in recycling. "There is, in the United States, little incentive to progress," he says, while China is concerned about the environment: pollution is today the main reason for contestation ", in front of the displacements of population or land catches.

Unrealistic goal

As for France, "Veolia has 45.000 tons of plastic recycling capacity, it is as much as in Germany and Japan, which has twice as many inhabitants, so we can not speak of French delay, ensures t -he. And our French capabilities should double by 2025. From there to saying that the government's goal of 100% recycled plastics is realistic, there is room for improvement. As long as there is no duty of eco-design of new plastic resins, most of them may, like opaque PET, be technically non-recyclable.

https://www.lesechos.fr/industrie-servi ... 119838.php

[moinsdewatt]

95% of the plastic in the oceans would come from ten rivers

Published 20 / 10 / 2017 lemarin.fr

According to a study published on October 11 in the journal Environmental science & technology, 95% of the plastic polluting the oceans comes from ten of the longest rivers in the world. All located in Asia and Africa.

http://www.lemarin.fr/secteurs-activite ... ix-fleuves

Here are the 10 rivers:

Prohibition of plastic bags in Europe while 95% of ocean waste comes from 10 rivers of Asia and Africa ...
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/ ... ivers.html

While China is responsible for 2.4 million tones of plastics, it makes it into the ocean, nearly 28 percent of the world total, the United States contributes just 77,000 tones, which is less than one percent, according to the study published in the journal Science .

[Christophe]

Rooooohhh but what bastards these poor who pollute so much !!!

And the factories that manufacture this waste, where are they? They enrich who huh?

[moinsdewatt]

Rooooohhh but what bastards these poor who pollute so much !!!

And the factories that manufacture this waste, where are they? They enrich who huh?

I am not aware that the Asian plastics industry needs to import plastics from industrialized countries ....

[Christophe]

In Asia no ... In Africa I am less certain ...

[moinsdewatt]

Isolated island of Henderson in the Pacific beats record of pollution by plastic

the 02 fev 2018 Futurasciences



The accumulation of waste on the beaches of Henderson Island. Most come from fishing equipment from Chile, China and Japan, say the authors of the study. In B, a detail of the line of the highest tide of the north beach. There is little debris because it is the quantity deposited in a day after cleaning up the place by the researchers. In C, a turtle (Chelonia mydas) is entangled in fishing nets and in C, a cenobite (Coenobita spinosa), cousin of the hermit crab, did not choose a piece of coconut, as the usually make his peers. © J. Lavers et al., Pnas

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read: https://www.futura-sciences.com/planete ... que-67352/

[moinsdewatt]

The heavenly beaches of Bali in a state of emergency against the waste carried by the ocean

29 dec 2017 Novethic

For a long time, the palm-fringed beaches along the shore of Kuta Beach in Bali have served as a tourist paradise. But the white sands are now littered with so much rubbish carried by the Indian Ocean that a state of "waste emergency" has been declared.


Every day, 700 cleaning employees and 35 trucks pick up about 100 tons of garbage on the beaches to dump them in a nearby dump.
SONNY TUMBELAKA / AFP

Plastic wrappers and other garbage are invading the beaches of Bali where tourists bask in the sun and bathe, while surfers glide on waves that carry all kinds of rubbish on Indonesia's most touristic island.

"When I want to swim, it's not very pleasant ...", tells AFP Vanessa Moonshine, Austrian tourist at the edge of a beach in the district of Kuta Beach, in the south of the island. "I see a lot of trash here, every day, all the time. It's always coming from the ocean, it's really horrible." The mounds that accumulate on the beaches damage Bali's reputation, presented as a dream island with turquoise waters, and highlight the problem of garbage in Indonesia.

The fourth most populous country in the world with some 255 million inhabitants, this Southeast Asian archipelago is the world's second largest producer of marine litter after China, with 1,29 million tonnes per annum thrown into the sea, causing immense damage to ecosystems and health.

In Bali, the phenomenon worsened to the point that local authorities declared in November a state of "waste emergency" along a six-kilometer shore comprising the beaches of Kuta, Jimbaran and Seminyak, the busiest districts. of the island - which has already welcomed more than five million tourists this year.

Every day, 700 cleaning workers and 35 trucks collect around 100 tonnes of garbage from the beaches to dump it in a nearby landfill. "People in green suits collect litter, but the next day the situation is the same," says German tourist Claus Dignas, saying that the amount of litter carried by the ocean increases every time he comes to spend a holiday in Bali.

The Clean Oceans Coalition

The problem gets worse during the rainy season, from November to March, when strong winds and ocean currents cause waste on the beaches and flooded rivers carry it to the coast, says Putu Eka Merthawan, agency for the protection of the environment.

"Garbage bothers tourists from an aesthetic point of view, but the plastic problem is much more serious than that: microplastics can contaminate fish which, if eaten by humans, can cause health problems such as fish. cancer ", explains the researcher.

To fight against this scourge, Indonesia has joined the forty countries participating in the UN campaign "Clean Oceans" launched in early 2017 to fight against marine litter.

The Indonesian government has pledged to reduce marine plastic waste from 70% by 2025. It aims to increase the recycling of rubbish - virtually non-existent at the moment -, launch cleaning campaigns and reduce the use of plastic bags in the retail trade.

For Eka Hendrawa, we should even "ban plastic bags in stores" and better mobilize the population: "the central government should step up the campaign to reduce the use of plastic packaging".

In Bali, there too, the regional government "should allocate more budgetary funds to sensitize the public to the protection of waterways and the need not to throw waste there", he believes.

http://www.novethic.fr/actualite/enviro ... 45257.html