At the mouth of the Russian River, which defines the watershed in which we all live, there is a mud and sand flat full of driftwood, large rocks and lots and lots of colorful items. These are soda bottles, lost toys, household containers, play balls, boat parts, piles of bottle caps, broken cases, bags, missing shoes and unidentifiable pieces of our modern life. They’re all made of plastic.
What this small trashy patch at Jenner represents is our contribution to mankind’s most vexing environmental problem. We are rapidly filling our oceans with plastic, just as fast as we are overflowing our landfills, parts of our food chain and most of our planet.
All these petrochemical compounds, foam beads and synthetic polymers are harmful to our health when ingested, inhaled or injected. Plastic, in all forms, is polluting our rivers, oceans, groundwater, soils and atmosphere.
We are covering our green and blue planet with a hazardous sheen of plastic. Since 1950 we have produced 8.3 billion metric tons of plastic. Almost all of it is still here. (We have only recycled nine percent of it.) It takes 500 to 1,000 years for plastic to decompose. We are putting 18 billion more pounds of plastic in our oceans every year. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is now twice the size of Texas.
We have traded a clean, healthy environment for the modern convenience of plastic. We cannot recycle our way out of this problem. We cannot legislate the disappearance of all the plastic in our landfills. We cannot save our ocean-based food chains where the fish we eat are now eating plastic, which means so are we. So, what can we do?
We need tons of education and broader awareness of the consequences of living this plastic life. McDonald’s, Starbucks and locally owned businesses are banning plastic straws. California and other states are banning plastic bags. What we really need to do is demand the end of all manufacturing of all single-use plastic items. These include beverage bottles, picnic utensils, package wrappings, Q-tips, paper clips and more.
The first wide use of plastic was for military aircraft, nylon stockings and household items. Today, 20 percent of most cars are plastic and many medical devices and most home utensils are now plastic. Wood, glass, metal and ceramics have been replaced by the lighter, cheaper and more durable plastic.
Plastic manufacturing represents eight percent of our annual oil consumption. Getting rid of some or most plastic uses and manufacturing is a complex social and economic equation.
Let’s say we all agree to pursue a zero waste future, which many of us are already adopting. Even then, there will be a place for plastic in our lives. Lighter vehicles save fuel consumption and reduce climate change. Some use of plastic saves lives in hospitals. Can you imagine lugging around a weighty metal smartphone?
Refuse, reduce, reuse or rot, should all come before recycle, but recycle we must do as well. Each of us throws away 185 pounds of plastic a year. We use one million plastic bags every minute of every day. About 300 million tons of plastic is manufactured each year and most of it ends up in places like our Jenner sandbar.
Almost all of us over age six (93 percent) test positive for BPA in our bloodstream. BPA (Bisphenol A) is an additive used in most forms of plastic that causes heart problems, insulin resistance and acts like a hormone. Destabilized plastic is known to cause cancer, birth defects and other health issues.
Getting rid of plastic straws is a very modest response to a global catastrophe. Toting reusable cloth bags and personal water bottles are also part of a good start, more of a fashion statement than a cure.
The plastic industry, like the tobacco industry, is very big and very lucrative. Only militant citizens and demanding consumers will save our oceans and ourselves.
