Under BAU We May Expect To Triple The Amount Of Plastic In The Ocean In Less Than 20 Years
Plastic pollution in the ocean is on track to get a lot worse: In two decades, if business continues as usual, there will be nearly three times as much plastic waste leaking into the ocean every year, according to a new analysis. By 2040, since the existing plastic in the ocean isn’t degrading, there could be a cumulative total of 600 million tons of plastic in the water. But solutions exist now to eliminate the vast majority of the new waste.
Plastic pollution is growing for several reasons, says Yoni Shiran, program director at Systemiq, a U.K.-based startup focused on sustainability that partnered with the Pew Charitable Trusts and others, including the plastic-focused Ellen MacArthur Foundation, on the report. As the global population grows, and as consumption grows quickly in many developing countries, people are using more plastic. “We’re also using cheaper plastics,” he says. “And those are just more difficult to recycle. If you take all those trends combined, you get an explosion in the amount of plastic going to the ocean.”
Many large companies have made recent commitments to use more recycled material in packaging, or switch to reusable or compostable alternatives. But company pledges to improve packaging are one piece of a much larger set of solutions that are needed: Even if all existing commitments from businesses and governments move forward, it will only reduce plastic “leakage” to the ocean by 7%, the report finds.
EDIT
Right now, the report found, the technical solutions already exist to reduce plastic pollution in 2040 by 80% compared to what it would be if nothing changed. The changes are economically and politically viable. (In the European Union, some are already beginning.) But they must happen now: The report calculates that if the world takes the actions outlined in the report but delays them by just five years, an additional 80 million metric tons of plastic will end up in the ocean by 2040. “The next two years are critical,” Shiran says. As with other sustainability initiatives, he argues that investments to cut plastic waste can help the world build back better in the wake of the pandemic. “It’s a scenario where we have more jobs,” he says. “It’s a scenario where we have less use of materials, less greenhouse gas, and better health implications both for the informal sector in the global south, but also for consumers everywhere in the world.”
EDIT/END
https://www.fastcompany.com/90528771/ocean-plastic-is-on-track-to-triple-by-2040
