Plastic Atlas Second Edition: Facts & Figures About the World Of Synthetic Polymers

Publication Date: December 2019 | Heinrich Böll Foundation, Break Free From Plastic

It this point in modern life, we touch plastic more than we touch our loved ones. Plastic is everywhere: it is in our air, our water, and in our soils. It is the vehicle for globalization, and the epitome of unregulated late-stage capitalism—a system that externalizes costs to people and the environment for the sake of profit. Even for the conscious citizen, plastic is almost unavoidable, and living plastic-free requires a certain amount of access and privilege enjoyed by very few in the world.

We are only just beginning to understand the effects of our global reliance on this material. What makes plastic useful is exactly what makes it harmful: it persists. It is designed to fool nature itself, made from molecular chains that are too resilient to biodegrade in a meaningful timeframe. Indeed, plastic degradation has adverse effects on nature itself and mankind. No matter where scientists go looking for plastic, they find it—at the farthest reaches of the earth. It is not just ubiquitous in the environment but also in our own bodies.

We as a species are contaminated with plastic, and not just indirectly by eating fish that have ingested it. Plastic pollutes at every stage of its lifecycle from when the oil and gas is extracted to produce it, all the way to the end-of-life where plastic waste is littered, landfilled, downcycled, burned.

Plastic use and production have accelerated at breakneck speed, with more than half of all plastics having been manufactured after 2005. The market is controlled by a few major multi-national corporations that are collectively investing over 200 billion US dollars in additional capacity to produce even more petrochemicals, the majority of which will become plastic. Capitalizing on shale gas from the United States, their plan is to build out more than 300 new production facilities or expansions, in hopes of adding 40 percent more plastic to commerce by 2025. The supply for plastic far outweighs the demand. Read More >>