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The European Commission has proposed new rules to ban certain plastic products in order to reduce the waste filling our oceans, it announced Monday.
The EU's measures tackle the top 10 plastic products that wash up on Europe's beaches and fill its seas, including a ban on the private use of single-use plastics like plastic straws, plates and utensils and containers used for fast food or your daily takeaway coffee.
The measures would also have each country in the EU come up with a system that would collect 90 percent of plastic bottles by 2025.
"The proposed ban in the European Union of single use plastics, notably plastic straws and cotton buds, is welcome and very promising news," said Dr. Paul Harvey from Macquarie University in a press release. "Single use plastic pollution is one of the biggest environmental catastrophes of this generation."
You can see why the EU is making the proposal. Single-use plastic objects and fishing gear account for 70 percent of waste in the ocean, according to the EU. In 2017, researchers found 38 million pieces of plastic waste on an uninhabited South Pacific island. Figures from the same year showed that a million plastic bottles are bought around the world every minute, a number predicted to jump 20 percent by 2021.
Fortunately, others are tackling the plastic problem, including scientists and environmentalists who've come up with one solution involving mushrooms that can eat plastic.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Gaaark on Wednesday May 30 2018, @04:22PM (6 children)
Ummm...
you do realize that a lot of the plastic that DOES end up in the bin just gets dumped into the ocean?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pacific_garbage_patch [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Ocean_garbage_patch [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Atlantic_garbage_patch [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Pacific_garbage_patch [wikipedia.org]
Getting rid of single use plastic is A GOOD THING.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 3, Insightful) by unauthorized on Wednesday May 30 2018, @09:32PM (1 child)
Getting rid of our current garbage processing techniuqes is a good thing. I'm not a massive proponent of plastic wrappers, but what you are suggesting only addresses the symptoms, rather than the issues.
Either way, I wouldn't be surprised if most of that crap comes from the developing world, banning plastics in Europe isn't going to do much for those.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Thursday May 31 2018, @12:47AM
I know New York USED to barge all its garbage out into the ocean, but dunno if they still do.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by realDonaldTrump on Thursday May 31 2018, @06:28AM
Fake News! They call it the Garbage Patch, it's not the garbage you put in your garbage can. And it's not the garbage I put in mine. So much of it comes from foreign Countries. And it's not an island. Sounds like an island, it's not. They gave it a very fake name to sell newspapers. It's just loose plastic. And it's not great for our incredible fish. It's not a pretty picture, believe me. But it's nothing compared to what the wind turbines, the wind farms, are doing to the birds. Our bird lovers have given them the name "wing bangers." That's the name they've given to wind turbines for the thousands of birds they kill in the U.S.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 31 2018, @08:48AM (2 children)
1) Where's your proof that is really what is happening? There's a huge hole between your claim and your so called evidence.
2) If your garbage collectors are dumping the trash from bins into the rivers/oceans then that's the far bigger problem that should be urgently solved and not the use of single-use plastic.
3) Seems more likely that the plastic in the ocean comes from other places: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/stemming-the-plastic-tide-10-rivers-contribute-most-of-the-plastic-in-the-oceans/ [scientificamerican.com]
Some of you are starting to sound like those religious fanatics. Making leaps of faith and ignoring logic and facts (and often so that you can feel holier than others who don't follow your practices).
The fact is a plastic bag or straw in a landfill or burnt in an incinerator is extremely unlikely to choke a sea turtle or whale swimming in the ocean. The real danger to the sea life are people who litter and other improper garbage disposal, handling and storage.
Just China reducing their littering and similar by 30% will do more than the whole of Europe not using plastic. China still burns a lot of dirty coal so if they collected and incinerated their plastic trash for fuel it could help them and the rest of the world.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Gaaark on Thursday May 31 2018, @10:51AM (1 child)
So, China is the big polluter of the ocean? And where does that garbage come from? Your bin.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/05/09/chinas-crackdown-on-trash-could-make-it-harder-for-u-s-cities-to-recycle/?utm_term=.3bf3fa161081 [washingtonpost.com]
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 01 2018, @10:19AM
So see: "2) If your garbage collectors are dumping the trash from bins into the rivers/oceans then that's the far bigger problem that should be urgently solved and not the use of single-use plastic"
Doesn't come from my bin by the way. I don't live in the USA.