<
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/19/climate/biden-administration-single-use-plastic-reduction.html>
"Calling plastic pollution one of the world’s most pressing environmental
problems, the Biden administration on Friday said that the federal government,
the biggest buyer of consumer goods in the world, would phase out purchases of
single-use plastics.
The administration also said it planned tougher regulations on plastic
manufacturing, which releases planet-warming greenhouse gases and other
dangerous pollutants.
The efforts, which the White House called the first comprehensive strategy to
tackle plastic use nationwide, aim to reduce demand for disposable plastic
items while also helping to create a market for substitutes that are reusable,
compostable or more easily recyclable.
Brenda Mallory, who heads the White House Council on Environmental Quality,
said in a statement that the changes would “require unprecedented action at
every stage of the plastic life cycle.” Because of its purchasing power, the
White House added, “the federal government has the potential to significantly
impact the supply of these products.”
The emphasis on curbing plastic use mirrors a growing recognition that the
world can’t recycle or manage its way out of a deluge of plastic waste. Global
plastic production rose nearly 230-fold between 1950 and 2019, to more than 400
million tons a year, and is expected to quadruple from current levels by 2050.
An estimated 40 percent of that is single-use plastic, which makes up the bulk
of the world’s plastic waste.
Around the world, the equivalent of one garbage truck of plastic enters the
ocean every minute, experts estimate. And as those materials break down in the
environment, microplastics are turning up in the stomachs of fish, birds and
other animals, as well as in human blood and tissue.
Negotiators trying to hammer out a global plastic-waste treaty have also tried
to include measures that would curb plastic demand and production, though that
approach has faced pushback from producers of oil and gas, because petroleum
makes up the building blocks of plastic."
Via
Fix the News:
<
https://fixthenews.com/goodnews-aids-lgbtq-south-korea-canada-marine-protection/>
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
