Text and Photos By Henrylito D. Tacio
In the award-winning 1967 movie, The Graduate, the character portrayed by then-newcomer Dustin Hoffman (who earned an Oscar nomination for Best Actor for his performance) asked some advice on career direction. “Plastics, my boy. Plastics,” he was told.
Businesses all over the world are heeding the advice. “For more than 50 years, global production of plastic has continued to rise. Some 299 million tons of plastics were produced in 2013, representing a 4 percent increase over 2012,” writes Gaelle Gourmelon, communications and marketing manager of the Washington, D.C.-based Worldwatch Institute.
“Worldwide plastic production has been growing as the durable, primarily petroleum-based material gradually replaces materials like glass and metal,” the institute said in a statement. “Today, an average person living in Western Europe or North America consumes 100 kilograms of plastic each year, mostly in the form of packaging.”
In Asia, one person uses just 20 kilograms. “But this figure is expected to grow rapidly as the region’s economies expand,” the institute pointed out.
Perhaps plastic bags are the most ubiquitous consumer item that man has ever invented. “Their light weight, low cost, and water resistance make them so convenient for carrying groceries, clothing, or any other routine purchase that it is hard to imagine life without them,” wrote Brian Halweil in an institute’s State of the World report.
“Since they were introduced in the 1970s, plastic bags have infiltrated our lives,” wrote Caroline Williams in New Scientist. “Globally, we carry home between 500 billion and a trillion every year – about 150 bags for every person on earth, or, to put it another way, a million every minute and rising.”
The word plastic is derived from the Greek plastikos, which means “capable of being shaped or molded.” It refers to their malleability or plasticity during manufacture, which allows them to be cast, pressed, or extruded into a variety of shapes — such as films, fibers, plates, tubes, bottles, boxes, and much more.
Various plastics are used in the manufacture of each consumer item. For fibers and textiles, polyester (PES) is used while carbonated drinks bottles, peanut butter jars, plastic film, and microwavable packaging, the material used is polyethylene terephthalate (PET). High-density polyethylene (HDPE) is used for detergent bottles, milk jugs, and molded plastic cases.
When manufacturing plumbing pipes and guttering, shower curtains, window frames, and flooring, polyvinyl chloride (PCV) is used, while it is polyvinylidene chloride (PVDC) for food packaging. Outdoor furniture, siding, floor tiles, shower curtains, and clamshell packaging come from low-density polyethylene (LDPE).
Bottle caps, drinking straws, yogurt containers, appliances, car fenders (bumpers), and plastic pressure pipe systems are made of polypropylene (PP). Packaging foam, food containers, plastic tableware, disposable cups, plates, cutlery, and compact discs and cassette boxes come from polystyrene (PS).
High impact polystyrene (HIPS) is made for refrigerator liners, food packaging, and vending cups. Fibers, toothbrush bristles, tubing, fishing line, and low strength machine parts (like under-the-hood car engine parts or gun frames) are made from polyamides (PA) or popularly known as nylons.
If you’re wondering what those electronic equipment cases (e.g., computer monitors, printers, keyboards) and drainage pipe are made of, it’s acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS). Eyeglasses, riot shields, security windows, traffic lights, and lenses are made of polycarbonate (PC).
Polyurethanes (PU) is currently the sixth most commonly used plastic material. It is used in cars such as cushioning foams, thermal insulation foams, surface coatings, and in printing rollers.
But the most popular of them all is plastic bags. According to Halweil, these plastic bags start as crude oil, natural gas, or other petrochemical derivatives, which are transformed in plastic factories into chains of hydrogen and carbon molecules known as polymers or polymer resin. (HDPE resin is the industry standard for plastic bags.)
“The polyethylene is super-heated and the molten resin is extruded as a tube, sort of like the process of making pasta,” Halweil explained. “After the desired shape is achieved, the resin is cooled, hardens, and can be flattened, sealed, gusseted, punched, or printed on.”
Producing plastic bags uses about 20-40 percent less energy and water than paper sack production does, and generates less air pollution and solid waste, according to lifecycle assessments by both industry and non-industry groups.
Officials from the plastics industry also note that plastic bags take up less space in a landfill, and that neither product decomposes under the prevailing conditions in most landfills.
That’s one side of the coin. The other side: Given the proper conditions, however, the paper sack would decompose rapidly, while the plastic bag would not. In reality, many plastic bags do not find their way to landfills.
But many mischievous plastic bags do not find their way to landfills. Instead, they go airborne after they are discarded. A survey conducted by the EcoWaste Coalition and Greenpeace Philippines in 2006 discovered plastic bags and other synthetic packaging materials to comprise 76 percent of garbage retrieved from Manila Bay. In Laguna de Bay, plastic bags make up 25 percent of the solid waste that is polluting the lake.
Because they are usually buoyant, plastic bags are widely distributed by ocean currents and wind. A recent study conservatively estimated that 5.25 trillion plastic particles weighing a total of 268,940 tons are currently floating in the world’s oceans. This debris results in an estimated US$13 billion a year in losses from damage to marine ecosystems,
The World Wildlife Fund for Nature claimed that nearly 200 different marine species die due to ingestion and choking from plastic bags.
“Discarded plastic bands encircle mammals, fish, and birds and tighten as their bodies grow,” reminded the Washington, D.C.-based World Resources Institute. “Turtles, whales, and other marine mammals have died after eating plastic sheeting.”
In the United States, plastic gears, six-pack yokes, sandwich bags and Styrofoam cups are so abundant in the ocean that they kill up to one million seabirds and 100,000 marine mammals each year.
Discussing plastics in general term, a report which appeared in Environmental Action noted, “Many of the chemicals used in the production and processing of plastic are highly toxic, resulting in hazardous wastes, toxic air emissions and discharges of toxic effluents into waterways.”
The report further stated: “People don’t think plastic products are toxic because by the time they get to supermarket shelves, they’re not. But ingredients in plastic production have dangerous properties for those who work with them or live near plastic factories.”
Environmentalists caution against burning those plastics to get rid of them completely. Scientists say that chlorine-based plastics, when incinerated, contribute to the formation of dioxins, a poisonous waste that forms when chlorine is exposed to extreme heat.
Across the world, China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Nepal, Pakistan, Singapore and Taiwan are among the countries that ban the use of plastic. These countries have enacted local legislations to intensify their national law that prohibits plastic use.
In Davao City, the local government started the banning the use of non-biodegradable plastic bags and polystyrene foam three years ago. The ordinance was the execution of the two rules stated in the Implementing Rules and Regulations (IRR) of the Davao City Ecological Solid Waste Management Ordinance of 2009.
As stipulated in IRR Rule V: “All stores, as well as, ambulant vendors in Davao City shall sell or provide only the following as checkout bags or containers to customers: recycled or recyclable paper bags, biodegradable plastic bags, reusable bags (such as cloth bags), bags made of indigenous materials (such as buri, abaca, anahaw, bamboo and pineapple), or used corrugated boxes or cartons.”
Section 9 of IIR Rule V urges the participation of people buying items from malls and supermarkets. It said: “Shoppers or customers in all stores in Davao City are encouraged to provide for themselves reusable and recyclable shopping bags, when shopping or buying from stores. They are also encouraged to refuse a checkout bag from the store when buying small items that do not require a bag.”
The city ordinance also urges shoppers and consumers to properly disposed biodegradable plastic bags “like any other solid waste material.” They “should not be thrown in canals, water bodies, vacant lots and other public places.”
Those are just words of reminders.
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