Not This Plastic 2

In the article last week, we had presented the case to critically look at the metalized plastic packaging that is clogging our drains, waterways and minds. We pointed out its inability to get recycled effectively and economically in our country.

Every time we share this story with ordinary people, they ask “Is there no alternative. Can food not remain fresh in some other material?” and after a pause, “Why is the government not doing anything about this?”

Plastic manufacturers in India cite market demand as the reason to continue and the consumer knows no better. The environmental legislations and their enforcement is so lax that the manufacturers are able to keep “growing” their industry and also growing the pollution.

So we decided to find out more.

Well, there is an alternative and it is called Bioplastic. It is plastic made from sugar or starch derived from plant or animal sources. In fact, one research project is keen to make plastic out of chicken waste. So the world is working to move away from using a limited resource like petroleum to create plastic from renewable sources. In short, you now have a plastic bag or plastic packaging or products that are bio-degradable and compostable and photo-degradable and that much abused generic term “green for the environment”.

It is sold very much like the virgin chemical plastic – in pellet form.

You can watch a film on how one kind of bioplastic is made on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwc-n3W9rNY&feature=player_embedded#!

It seems perfect doesn’t it? The thought of all those large trucks in our congested cities, carrying loads of plastic mixed with leaves, and our kitchen waste reaching a dump site and then after 3 months that dumped pile just reduces to good rich compost! No pollution to the land, or water or air. No crows, flies and vultures hovering over the landfill dump. The land ready to grow food fit for consumption.

And more. Nobody telling you not to use plastic; so no more guilt-ridden conscience for all of us. This world free of worries of plastic flotsam, plastic bags killing off cows or plastic caps killing albatross chicks.

The sun seems to shine a bit with the thought of this positive direction. But, (of course there is always a but!)

There are three things everyone needs to know about this new, soon to be large industry.

1. The definitions
2. The raw material issues
3. The impact issues.

1.   Definitions:

When most of us read the words natural, biodegradable, green, compostable, eco-friendly, on packaging or products, we usually club the product under one general category in our heads “less guilty choice” or “safer than the other one, choice”.

But it is now becoming important to understand the distinctions between these terms.

To begin with don’t trust the term “green” and “eco-friendly”. They mean nothing.

But it is important that you and me and our children understand the distinction of the following words: degradable, biodegradable, photodegradable, oxo-degradable compostable, recyclable.

The distinction between biodegradable and degradable is illustrated by this example.

A banana skin biodegrades (this means that it is reduced to smaller elements through microbial activity and eventually becomes safe nutrient rich soil).

A stone degrades (this means it becomes smaller pieces by physical means, crushing or chemical means, like in the case of mineral stone dissolving in water).

Photo-degradable materials – like a photodegradable plastic breaks down into smaller and smaller sizes through contact with the sun. But it does not become soil eventually. It remains as small particles that are not visible to the naked eye. These are dangerous, as they tend to hold toxic molecules and can reach water streams in large numbers and contaminate our water sources.

Oxo-degradable materials claim that microbial activity begins after the material reaches the small particle size and becomes good compost. But these claims when tested show that some oxo-degradable materials have failed the EN 13432 test.

Any product that claims to be compostable must pass the EN 13432 industrial standard test to be able to be sold in Europe. In summary, it requires biodegradation of 90% of the materials in a commercial composting unit within 180 days.

The American counterpart of this test is called ASTM 6400 and sets a less stringent threshold of 60% biodegradation within 180 days, again within commercial composting conditions.

We now come to the next term – “compostable”. Any material that comes from a living thing is potentially compostable. So even human hair is compostable, it just takes some time. Biodegration of natural materials creates compost in the right conditions. (please remember if a plastic bag is merely biodegradable, it cannot be composted)

Composting is nature’s way of recycling. 

2. Raw material issues

So now when we just change our basic raw material and we make compostable bio-plastic packs and cups and bottles and films, it follows that when we just send a lot off to a landfill they will decompose and our nightmare of plastic piles will be over.

 “Not so,” says Dr. William Rathje, an archaeologist at the University of Arizona who has dug up many landfills across America to uncover some startling facts.

Newspapers are still readable after almost 40 years; ten year-old carrots are brown on the outside but bright orange on the inside; and 20 year-old steaks still have meat on the bones, because they sit in an airless, dry environment and are mummified.  

Solid waste entering a landfill typically contains only 25 to 30 per cent moisture, whereas it takes about a 65 per cent moisture level to trigger biodegradation.

Modern landfills entomb municipal garbage. They are not, nor for safety’s sake should they be, biological reactors, which promote decomposition.

Where then should our trucks laden with this compostable, recyclable, labeled bio-plastic products go? They should reach industrial composting plants. This is because most of the bio-plastics need controlled conditions to fully decompose, or they will take upto 100 years sometimes to break down.

So, if you have a plastic bag that is made of a bio-plastic that needs such conditions, and this data point is omitted on the label, then you risk the chance of contaminating your home composting pit or pots with this material.

So does India have such plants and are they economically viable?

Since we do not have proper segregation practices in place, industrial composting is still not a viable business proposition. Given the shortage of manpower especially in the area of mixed waste sorting and the mess and time it involves, the waste haulage contractor lobby finds it easier to haul and dump instead of segregate, recycle, compost, haul and dump. Decision makers in municipalities do not understand the urban planning implications of the second option. Most decision makers think that taking the waste “away” is what it is all about. So we do not have spaces earmarked in our cities where decentralized industrial composting and sorting of waste can be done efficiently.

For our context then, just having a new kind of fully compostable plastic material does not necessarily translate to less garbage in our water, land and streets.

There are already oxo-degradable bags in the Indian market and others made of corn starch. These are not certified by the standards mentioned above.

The market of “bio-plastic” will grow to be sure, but we as consumers need to ask these manufacturers for more details on their tests and conditions for compostability of their so called “recyclable, green, eco and bio-degradable” products.

3. Impact issues

These are still early days to clearly state that bio-plastics are more “green” than traditional petroleum based plastic. Most bio-plastics still rely on petroleum based energy to be produced and since they use plant sources as raw material they may create a new kind of threat to the environment if not managed well.

But for India, we also have another reality that we must take into consideration. We have a huge informal network, which recycles post consumer waste plastic. This network is tooled and efficient (not clean) but efficient. It takes care of large volumes of waste plastic and down cycles it many times over. The workers in this unrecognized sector toil very hard to remove impurities before they prepare a batch of plastic for feeding into the last stage of the process of recycling.

These new bio-plastic bags look no different from the regular plastic ones, so are difficult to pick out of a pile of mixed plastic bags. They become contaminants to a pile of regular plastic. Therefore there is a real danger of larger batches of semi-processed plastic going waste and not able to be really recycled. Which will just mean more garbage on our streets, drains and rivers.

Also the ordinary consumer, will think that since these so called “biodegradable bags” are harmless, there is no problem using more of these. Sales of bio-plastic products will increase, not decrease and it follows if there are no end solutions for proper disposal, the mess will pile up.

This piece meal approach leaves us no closer to real solutions.

Plastic showed us its ugly side or did we show ourselves our ugly side by not using a systems approach to managing this quite wonderful material?

If we can’t take some steps to fix the way we look at the world, the mere introduction of bio-plastic may end up creating more pollution than we can imagine.

Our incapability to see the larger interconnected picture - is not helping.

Bio-plastics are just a band-aid for a much larger problem.

We believe that waste can only be solved in the Indian context if we address it as a behavioral and social issue first. Technologies will follow.

Bio-plastic is a technology, not a way of making us more respectful of our water, land and air and life.

Poonam Bir Kasturi

www.dailydump.org

REFERENCES

https://www.ides.com/generics/PLA/PLA_suppliers.htm

https://www.bpiworld.org/BPI-Public/Members/Directory.html

https://www.oxobioplast.com/index.php

https://www.plastobag.in/products.htm#bio