Plastic pollutants make up a lot of waste in our land and water, and they are bad for plants, animals, humans, and whole ecosystems.
Pollution made out of plastic is called “plastic pollution.”
Plastic pollution is a buildup of plastic products that harms natural habitats for humans and wildlife. Many people don’t think about how much plastic pollution is bad for the environment. Plastic is very hard to break down, and it ends up in landfills and the ocean, where it hurts marine life, so we need to be careful. Most of the plastic that people throw away can’t be recycled by waste management. This means that most plastic waste ends up in landfills or the ocean.
3 things happen when plastic is thrown away
Here are some of the negative effects of global plastic pollution on our environment:
Wildlife is harmed by it
Animals often eat plastic that they think is food, which could cause health problems inside their bodies. Many animals like birds and sea turtles get stuck in plastic products, making it hard for them to live or run away from predators. Please find out how to use less plastic by reading about seven different ways to do it.
Not good for the health of any living thing at all
There are many ways to get rid of plastic. Most of the time, plastic is burned or dumped in landfills, releasing toxic chemicals. Every year, 154 million pounds of plastic are burned, releasing toxins into the air. This causes a rise in greenhouse gas emissions, which speeds up and worsens climate change. In addition, plastics can get into our food and water, which can cause developmental, neurobiological, or reproductive problems for both animals and humans. This cannot be good for both animals and humans.
Invasive species need to get around
Floating plastic debris can harm marine life and make it easier for invasive species to get to new places. As waste moves across the sea, it brings non-native bacteria and other organisms to new places that can be dangerous.
10 Facts About Plastic Waste
There have been over eight billion pieces of plastic made since 1950. Most of them end up in landfills or the ocean. Here are some of the most important things you need to know about plastic pollutants:
Microplastics are a big deal
When plastic breaks down, it turns into small pieces of plastic called “microplastics.” These pieces of plastic are called “microplastics.” People can’t see these tiny pieces of plastic because they’re so small. They can mix with sand or other sediments, causing more pollution that can’t be seen by the naked eye.
Accidental plastic ingestion is more likely in animals that dig through the sand or skim the water for food, such as albatrosses and other seabirds. Microplastics contaminate our drinking water and food, causing the detrimental consequences of plastic pollution to spread farther up the food chain.
Plastic use is on the rise
When people went shopping for water bottles in 2017, they bought at least one million of them every minute. In addition, more than 500 billion plastic bags are bought around the world each year, but some countries and US states have banned the use of single-use bags to cut down on plastic waste.
Single-use plastics are all over the place
Plastic packaging, like food wrappers, makes up almost half of all the plastic waste thrown away. For example, people use 500,000 plastic straws every day. People use plastic all the time, but most of it is based on chemicals made from fossil fuels, called petrochemicals. When you throw away a lot of plastic, these toxins get into the ground and water, making it dangerous to do so often.
Biodegradable plastics are also bad for the environment
In the long run, biodegradable plastic is a chemical substance that can break down over time through living organisms. It eventually breaks down into water, carbon dioxide, and a material called biomass. However, not all biodegradable plastics degrade simultaneously, and several conditions may influence how rapidly they degrade.
Since 1950, the amount of plastic being made has gone up a lot more
According to a study that looked at plastic production worldwide from 1950 to 2015, an estimated eight billion tons of plastic were made over the 65 years. Only nine percent of the plastic was reused, and the rest went to landfills and other places.
Only 20 countries are to blame for most of the plastic waste
China, Indonesia, the Philippines, and the United States make a lot of plastic waste each year. A single American throws away about 185 pounds of plastic each year, about half of which is single-use.
A lot of the beach litter is made of plastic
Around 73% of the trash that is found on beaches all over the world is made of plastic products and plastic debris. Plastic bottles, grocery bags, and other things made of plastic are often thrown into the world’s oceans. This eight million metric ton of plastic waste ends up on our shores at some point in time.
Many things in the ocean are made out of plastic
There are now four times as many dead zones in our oceans because of plastic waste in the water. Dead zones are places in the sea where there is not enough oxygen. If there is not enough oxygen in the water, marine animals can choke to death, leading to their extinction and making things more difficult for other animals. This isn’t the only thing that can hurt marine mammals and fisheries. Seabirds and seabirds can also be killed by plastic debris.
It is made of plastic waste
Almost 335,000 pieces of plastic were found per square mile in the North Pacific Central Gyre, a huge ocean current in the northern Pacific Ocean between San Francisco, California, and Hawaii. It’s important to know that there are five plastic waste islands worldwide. The North Atlantic and South Atlantic are two of them. The North and South Pacific are two of them. The North and South Pacific are two of them, as well.
Fishing gear is a big source of plastic waste
Every year, it takes 640,000 tons of plastic waste from the ocean because fishers use nets and lines to catch fish. According to one study, about 46,000 tons of mega plastics are in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. More than 80% of that is fishing gear.
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