Addicted to plastic

[pengo]

ADDICTED TO PLASTIC is a feature-length documentary about solutions to plastic pollution. The point-of-view style documentary encompasses three years of filming in 12 countries on 5 continents, including two trips to the middle of the Pacific Ocean where plastic debris accumulates. The film details plastic’s path over the last 100 years and provides a wealth of expert interviews on practical and cutting edge solutions to recycling, toxicity and biodegradability. These solutions - which include plastic made from plants - will provide viewers with a hopeful perspective about our future with plastic.

Trailer: " target="_blank

Anyone else catch this on DVD? Didn't know about the plastic island in the pacific until recently and what the microscopic broken down plastic in the ocean... Alarming!

What sort of world we leaving our children? Some interesting technologies out there to deal with the problem.

[tjg_marantz]

I think we had a thread about the plastic sea circle not too long ago.

[pengo]

So I finally got to watching the rest of this, damn this dvd is a rollercoast ride

It goes from alarming, to refreshing and to concerning to eye opening..

Some smart people out there working on plastics and recycling them, and hats off to the entrepreneur spirit in some of the people and businesses featured in trying to make money out of recycling plastic.

Heck there is one Indina lady, that turns plastic bags into fashion items. In doing so she has helped to employ a bunch of people and bring them out of poverty, make a spare quid or two and also help the enviroment as well as give Paris Hilton a new fancy bag to use at the next Hollywood Premiere!

Also the development of BIO-plastics is definately a step in the right direction and apparently it needs less arable land to grow the corn needed for bio-plastics compared to what bio-diesel needs.
Oh yeah good to see NEC and SONY getting behing bio plastics and trying to incorporate as much bio plastic it can in their products.

Whats also promising is the german scientist over in Hamburg developing a process to convert plastics back to their oil origins (ie crude oil and petroleum).

Its a bit depressing learning about the microscopic or small bits of plastic in the world's ocean being consumed by animals and bio-accumulation, I do like my tuna. Tho hopefully some of these smart people and entrenpreneurs can save us and the planet in time

Check out the DVD, if its hard to source check it out on Channel BT.

[Daehawk]

That Garbage Patch is scary .

[Kraken]

hopefully some of these smart people and entrenpreneurs can save us and the planet in time

In time for what?

[WAW]

Never could get in to plastic but damm I miss Suck.com.

[The Preacher]

hopefully some of these smart people and entrenpreneurs can save us and the planet in time

In time for what?

It'll be back before you know it.

[Daehawk]

hopefully some of these smart people and entrenpreneurs can save us and the planet in time

In time for what?

It'll be back before you know it.

Time to sharpen up the old nut cutters and unfold the triangle sheets.

"whaddaya mean theres no spaceship!?"

[Kraken]

hopefully some of these smart people and entrenpreneurs can save us and the planet in time

In time for what?

It'll be back before you know it.

I intend to be safely dead long before then. The planet just needs to keep on spinning for another 20-30 years, tops.

[SpaceLord]

Not true.

I can quit anytime I want.

[pengo]

in time before? We totally fuck the planet and all life on it.

[LawBeefaroni]

in time before? We totally fuck the planet and all life on it.

If you buy movies about the danger of plastic on DVD...





Was it in a paper sleeve at least?

[pengo]

I didn't get this on DVD......

[Kelric]

I didn't get this on DVD......

Where does the energy to power your computer (and home) come from?

[LawBeefaroni]

I didn't get this on DVD......

So you burned it to DVD? Why do you hate the Earth?

Anyone else catch this on DVD?

[Kraken]

I didn't get this on DVD......

So you burned it to DVD? Why do you hate the Earth?

Anyone else catch this on DVD?

Ooooo Burn!

[Isgrimnur]

There's a great future in plastics.

[pengo]

This was showing on the BT Channel, so I didn't burn it to DVD.

[nasai]

I thought this was gonna be about somebody's dildo collection.

[JonathanStrange]

I though it was going to be about credit card addiction.

The garbage Saragasso has been news for years and years.

[pengo]

I thought dildos were made of rubber.

[Grey Fox]

My greatest fear for when the oil runs out was that there would be no more plastics.
But I guess we are all ok now that they are perfecting other means to make plastic. *phew*

[pengo]

Oil running out could be the best thing for this planet, like it will become profitable to use bio fuel sources also profiable possibly to re-process existing plastics into new plastics. And whell "mine" the garbage dumps and the oceans for plastics to re-process.... cleaning up the enviroment in the process (while also making a quid).

[FishPants]

I thought dildos were made of rubber.

You should send Vorret a PM and let him know the proper polymer to use..

[Hispanicgamer]

Oil running out could be the best thing for this planet, like it will become profitable to use bio fuel sources also profiable possibly to re-process existing plastics into new plastics. And whell "mine" the garbage dumps and the oceans for plastics to re-process.... cleaning up the enviroment in the process (while also making a quid).

Not when we have all of that oil in Alaska, you betcha!

[pengo]

I thought dildos were made of rubber.

You should send Vorret a PM and let him know the proper polymer to use..

I havee no idea but I get the impression you seem to know? ;P

[silverjon]

I thought dildos were made of rubber.

You should send Vorret a PM and let him know the proper polymer to use..

I havee no idea but I get the impression you seem to know? ;P

Medical grade silicone.

[Isgrimnur]

Guardian

Sea salt around the world has been contaminated by plastic pollution, adding to experts’ fears that microplastics are becoming ubiquitous in the environment and finding their way into the food chain via the salt in our diets.

Following this week’s revelations in the Guardian about levels of plastic contamination in tap water, new studies have shown that tiny particles have been found in sea salt in the UK, France and Spain, as well as China and now the US.

Researchers believe the majority of the contamination comes from microfibres and single-use plastics such as water bottles, items that comprise the majority of plastic waste. Up to 12.7m tonnes of plastic enters the world’s oceans every year, equivalent to dumping one garbage truck of plastic per minute into the world’s oceans, according to the United Nations.

New studies indicate that the fibers in our clothes could be poisoning our waterways and food chain on a massive scale. Microfibers – tiny threads shed from fabric – have been found in abundance on shorelines where waste water is released.
...
In an alarming study released Monday, researchers at the University of California at Santa Barbara found that, on average, synthetic fleece jackets release 1.7 grams of microfibers each wash. It also found that older jackets shed almost twice as many fibers as new jackets. The study was funded by outdoor clothing manufacturer Patagonia, a certified B Corp that also offers grants for environmental work.
...
Microbeads, recently banned in the US, are a better-known variety of microplastic, but recent studies have found microfibers to be even more pervasive.
...
While Patagonia and other outdoor companies, like Polartec, use recycled plastic bottles as a way to conserve and reduce waste, this latest research indicates that the plastic might ultimately end up in the oceans anyway – and in a form that’s even more likely to cause problems.

Breaking a plastic bottle into millions of fibrous bits of plastic might prove to be worse than doing nothing at all.
...
Of the almost 2,000 aquatic samples Barrows has processed, about 90% of the debris was microfibers – both in freshwater and the ocean.

Microfibers are also the second most common type of debris in Lake Michigan, according to Sherri Mason’s research.

[UsulofDoom]

Nooooo! No more snuggle blankets! No more hoodies! They are made from Polyester.

I like to use to cotton myself.

[Daehawk]

Trump tells me plastic is fake news and there is no plastic to worry about. Its made up. I feel safe .

[Isgrimnur]

BBC

When you add it up, the total amount of synthetic microfibres going into the wider environment as we wash our clothes is an astonishing number.

US scientists estimate it to be 5.6 million tonnes since we first started wearing those polyester and nylon garments in a big way in the 1950s.

Just over half this mass - 2.9 million tonnes - has likely ended up in our rivers and seas.

That's the equivalent of seven billion fleece jackets, the researchers say.

But while we fret about water pollution, and rightly so, increasingly this synthetic "fluff" issue is one that affects the land.

The University of California, Santa Barbara, team which did the calculations found that emission to the terrestrial environment has now overtaken that to water bodies - some 176,500 tonnes a year versus 167,000 tonnes.

The reason? Wastewater treatment works have become very good at catching the fibres lost from washing machines. What's happening is those captured fibres, along with biosolid sludge, are then being applied to cropland or simply buried in landfills.
...
And think for a moment how many of the garments in an individual's wardrobe are actually routinely worn (and therefore cleaned), and how many stay on the shelf and rarely get an outing? That favourite old fleece almost certainly sees much more action than the office jacket and tie. It's thought a quarter or more of a person's clothing store probably isn't being worn at all or only very, very infrequently.
...
In 1990, say the researchers, the global average stock of garments per capita was 8kg. By 2016 it was 26kg per head.

[Lassr]

BBC

When you add it up, the total amount of synthetic microfibres going into the wider environment as we wash our clothes is an astonishing number.

US scientists estimate it to be 5.6 million tonnes since we first started wearing those polyester and nylon garments in a big way in the 1950s.

Just over half this mass - 2.9 million tonnes - has likely ended up in our rivers and seas.

That's the equivalent of seven billion fleece jackets, the researchers say.

But while we fret about water pollution, and rightly so, increasingly this synthetic "fluff" issue is one that affects the land.

The University of California, Santa Barbara, team which did the calculations found that emission to the terrestrial environment has now overtaken that to water bodies - some 176,500 tonnes a year versus 167,000 tonnes.

The reason? Wastewater treatment works have become very good at catching the fibres lost from washing machines. What's happening is those captured fibres, along with biosolid sludge, are then being applied to cropland or simply buried in landfills.
...
And think for a moment how many of the garments in an individual's wardrobe are actually routinely worn (and therefore cleaned), and how many stay on the shelf and rarely get an outing? That favourite old fleece almost certainly sees much more action than the office jacket and tie. It's thought a quarter or more of a person's clothing store probably isn't being worn at all or only very, very infrequently.
...
In 1990, say the researchers, the global average stock of garments per capita was 8kg. By 2016 it was 26kg per head.

Sounds like the world should be one big nudist colony...

[hepcat]

The only real solution

[Isgrimnur]

What are those straps made from? And was that wood harvested sustainably?

[Jeff V]

More importantly, does that even count as a shirt for a "no shirt, no shoes, no service" policy? He already lacks the shoes, but perhaps wrapping his feet in banana leaves would suffice.