We live on a beautiful planet, but unfortunately it is increasingly difficult to find clean natural areas. Today, plastic is one of the most widely used materials, and it is also one of the ones that takes the longest to decompose; in fact, a simple plastic bag can take 150 years to degrade. And yet ... it seems that for now nothing is going to change.
And it should: we have created more than 8 billion metric tons of plastic since 1950 according to a study led from UC Santa Barbara by industrial ecologist Roland Geyer. Are we going to the plasticcene?
Well seen what is seen, it is more than likely. Geyer and his team found that global production of plastic resins and fibers increased from 2 million metric tons in 1950 to more than 400 million metric tons in 2015. And the pace of plastic production does not appear to be slowing down: Of the total resins and plastic fibers produced between 1950 and 2015, about half was produced in the last 13 years.
The worst thing is not the production itself, which is already worrying, but the fact that it takes more than a century to degrade, or even longer. In this regard, study co-author Jenna Jambeck, associate professor of engineering at the University of Georgia, said that "most plastics do not biodegrade in any meaningful sense, so human-generated plastic waste could be with us for hundreds or even thousands of years».
Where does all that plastic go? An important part, sadly, goes to the natural environment. In 2015 alone, 79% of production ended up in the seas and natural environments. In order for us to get an idea of how serious the problem is, we need to know that of the 275 million metric tons that were generated in 2010, about 8 million entered the ocean.
While it is not about eliminating plastic from our lives, researchers believe that it is urgent to take measures to avoid ending up living in a plastic world.
You can read the study here.