Production, use, and fate of all plastics ever made
Reads0
Chats0
TLDR
By identifying and synthesizing dispersed data on production, use, and end-of-life management of polymer resins, synthetic fibers, and additives, this work presents the first global analysis of all mass-produced plastics ever manufactured.Abstract:
Plastics have outgrown most man-made materials and have long been under environmental scrutiny. However, robust global information, particularly about their end-of-life fate, is lacking. By identifying and synthesizing dispersed data on production, use, and end-of-life management of polymer resins, synthetic fibers, and additives, we present the first global analysis of all mass-produced plastics ever manufactured. We estimate that 8300 million metric tons (Mt) as of virgin plastics have been produced to date. As of 2015, approximately 6300 Mt of plastic waste had been generated, around 9% of which had been recycled, 12% was incinerated, and 79% was accumulated in landfills or the natural environment. If current production and waste management trends continue, roughly 12,000 Mt of plastic waste will be in landfills or in the natural environment by 2050.read more
Citations
More filters
Journal ArticleDOI
Human footprint in the abyss: 30 year records of deep-sea plastic debris
Sanae Chiba,Sanae Chiba,Hideaki Saito,Ruth Fletcher,Takayuki Yogi,Makino Kayo,Shin Miyagi,Moritaka Ogido,Katsunori Fujikura +8 more
TL;DR: In this article, the authors report plastic pollution in the deep-sea based on the information from a recently developed database, which archives photographs and videos of debris that have been collected since 1983 by deep sea submersibles and remotely operated vehicles.
Journal ArticleDOI
Occurrence, sources, human health impacts and mitigation of microplastic pollution.
TL;DR: This study highlights the importance of personality traits and cognitive ability in reducing the entry of MPs into the environment and applicable regulations to mitigate impacts of MPs.
Journal ArticleDOI
Partitioning of chemical contaminants to microplastics: Sorption mechanisms, environmental distribution and effects on toxicity and bioaccumulation.
TL;DR: A higher partitioning to MPs of chemical contaminants in soil is expected in comparison to aquatic environments as well as the effects of combined exposure to chemicals and MPs on the toxicity and bioaccumulation in biota are discussed.
Journal ArticleDOI
COVID Pollution: Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Global Plastic Waste Footprint
TL;DR: In this article, the authors assess the environmental footprints of the global plastic wastes generated during the COVID-19 pandemic and analyze the potential impacts associated with plastic pollution, and estimate that approximately 3.4 billion single-use facemasks/face shields are discarded daily as a result of the pandemic.
Journal ArticleDOI
Polyethylene upcycling to long-chain alkylaromatics by tandem hydrogenolysis/aromatization
Fan Zhang,Manhao Zeng,Ryan D. Yappert,Jiakai Sun,Yu Hsuan Lee,Anne M. LaPointe,Baron Peters,Mahdi M. Abu-Omar,Susannah L. Scott +8 more
TL;DR: It is reported that a platinum/alumina catalyst can transform waste polyethylene directly into long-chain alkylbenzenes, a feedstock for detergent manufacture, with no need for external hydrogen.
References
More filters
Journal ArticleDOI
Plastic waste inputs from land into the ocean
Jenna Jambeck,Roland Geyer,Chris Wilcox,Theodore R. Siegler,Miriam E. Perryman,Anthony L. Andrady,Ramani Narayan,Kara Lavender Law +7 more
TL;DR: This work combines available data on solid waste with a model that uses population density and economic status to estimate the amount of land-based plastic waste entering the ocean, which is estimated to be 275 million metric tons.
Supplementary Materials for Plastic waste inputs from land into the ocean
Jenna Jambeck,Roland Geyer,Chris Wilcox,Theodore R. Siegler,Anthony L. Andrady,Ramani Narayan,Kara Lavender Law +6 more
Journal ArticleDOI
Accumulation and fragmentation of plastic debris in global environments.
TL;DR: Global plastics production and the accumulation of plastic waste are documented, showing that trends in mega- and macro-plastic accumulation rates are no longer uniformly increasing and that the average size of plastic particles in the environment seems to be decreasing.
What a Waste : A Global Review of Solid Waste Management
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors estimate that the amount of municipal solid waste (MSW) generated by urban populations is growing even faster than the rate of urbanization and that by 2025 this will likely increase to 4.3 billion urban residents.
Journal ArticleDOI
Microplastics in freshwater ecosystems: what we know and what we need to know
Martin Wagner,Christian Scherer,Diana Álvarez-Muñoz,Nicole Brennholt,Xavier Bourrain,Sebastian Buchinger,Elke Fries,Cécile Grosbois,Jörg Klasmeier,Teresa Marti,Sara Rodríguez-Mozaz,Ralph Urbatzka,A. Dick Vethaak,Margrethe Winther-Nielsen,Georg Reifferscheid +14 more
TL;DR: To assess the environmental risk associated with microplastics, comprehensive data on their abundance, fate, sources, and biological effects in freshwater ecosystems are needed.