National Recycling Day

Today is National Recycling Day! And while there is no doubt that we need to make fewer plastics to prevent plastic pollution, to tackle our plastic pollution crisis we need recycling to work too. So, “Is recycling beyond fixing?” No, it’s not. But it is going to take all of us to work together to make it work.

Why try to save recycling?

Because the science is clear: If we want to keep plastics out of the environment and break free from our dependence on fossil fuels, successfully collecting, managing and, yes, recycling plastics, is critically necessary. Again, we should eliminate unrecyclable, highly problematic single-use plastics like plastic grocery bags or plastic foam food containers. But so long as we are producing any plastics at all, the clear best choice for how to manage them is through recycling.?

Consider the other options: a landfill, an incinerator or the environment—including our ocean. All of these outcomes perpetuate the need for more fossil-fuel derived virgin plastics, and all of them have environmental consequences of their own. Incineration and landfills cause air and water pollution, especially in surrounding communities, and plastics in the environment entangle and suffocate wildlife and break up into microplastics that make their way into the food chain and even our bodies.?

With 11 million tons of plastic flowing into our ocean every year, we cannot afford to give up on recycling. We must approach the plastic pollution crisis with a “yes, and” approach. Yes we need to reduce plastics production, and yes we need to recycle, and yes we need to clean up what’s in the environment.

We are glad to see states like California holding the fossil fuel industry accountable for their deception and driving role in the plastic pollution crisis. But we shouldn’t ditch recycling along the way. Instead, we need to use policy tools to ensure companies are designing their products to use less plastics, and to be recyclable when they do use plastics.

The U.S. must mandate that companies stop pumping plastics full of toxic, unmixable chemicals. We must push for policies that make recycling plastics easier, safer, more accessible and more effective by requiring the plastics we do use to be actually reusable or recyclable.

Read more about the three (not-so-easy, but straightforward) steps to solving the plastic pollution crisis. Spoiler alert: recycling is a major piece! ??

https://oceanconservancy.org/blog/2023/07/12/solve-plastic-pollution-crisis-three-straightforward-steps/