Introduction and overview
From GreenPlastics
To understand green plastics, you have to understand plastics: that is, you have to understand what common, day-to-day plastics are made of, what goes into their production, and why they are a matter of concern for the environment.
Although plastics as we know them today are a relatively recent invention, they have become an important part of modern life and are here to stay. In the l967 movie The Graduate, Dustin Hoffman's character was advised to go into "Plastics!" if he wanted a promising career and a prosperous future. That future is now.
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The age of plastics
Today, 200 billion pounds (100 million tons) of plastics are produced worldwide every year. Plastics are used for packaging, building materials, and virtually every type of consumer product. Past ages of human society have been called the Stone, Bronze, Copper, Iron, and Steel Ages, based on the material that was relied upon the most during that time. Today, the total volume of plastics produced worldwide has surpassed that of steel and continues to increase. Without a doubt, we have entered the Age of Plastics.
Some common plastic items include: sunglasses, tooth brushes, super glue, paint brushes, tennis shoes, Frisbees, 2-liter bottles, Honda CRX's, Astroturf, photographs, street signs, pens, automobile paint, video tapes, rubber bands, balloons, bicycle tires, umbrellas, guitar strings, carpeting, shower doors, hearing aids, Scotch Tape, fishing lines, trash bags, and toilet seats. Plastic can be found in everything from clothing to machinary.
It is important to understand the nature of plastics, and the consequences of their production and use. Virtually all plastics are made from nonrenewable resources, such as oil, coal or natural gas, which will eventually become exhausted.
Plastics waste is increasing, adding to the already burdensome problems of waste management. And the use of plastics continues to grow, raising the important question: how can we balance convenient living with concern for ecology? To understand this concern, it is helpful to understand what plastics are.
Why green plastics?
Green plastics are the focus of an emerging industry focused on making convenient living consistent with environmental stability. One reason to make a shift toward the use of green plastics is the availability of raw materials. Green plastics can be made using polymers that come from agricultural and marine feedstocks. These are abundant natural resources that are constantly being replenished. This, in turn could revitalize rural economy, both agricultural and marine, by providing additional demand for currently underutilized land or low-valued biomass commodities.
Another favorable property of green plastics is their biodegradability, making them a natural material for use in such applications as compostable collection bags, such as for food or yard waste.
But bioplastics have to possess adequate physical properties. Their properties have to be managed and controlled with technological means through the development of adequate formulations and processing. The commercial ventures already under way in the United States, Canada, Europe, and Japan indicate that there is confidence technological advances are possible. The key to solving technical problems is often simply knowing what the problems are.
Bioplastics also have to be cost-competitive. Commercially available biopolymers are typically more expensive than synthetic polymers, often significantly so. Currently only starch competes with synthetic polymers in terms of cost. It is too early to tell how much the costs of raw materials might be brought down by a growing industry and the resulting increased demand.
Interest in the development of bioplastics will grow largely to the extent that there is real interest in and concern over the environment. Societal concern over the environment is already being reflected in governmental restrictive legislation on the use of plastics, particularly aimed at plastic packaging. Legislation has begun at the local, state, federal, and international levels, and legislation will undoubtedly increase in the future. New legislation will likely contain restrictions aimed at materials that are neither recyclable nor biodegradable. Labeling legislation may lead to an "ecolabel," based on a product's raw material usage, energy consumption, emissions from manufacture and use, and waste disposal impact.
Most of all, what is needed is a paradigm shift. We have grown accustomed to having a wide variety of useful plastic materials that are attractive, long lasting, and inexpensive. On the other hand, we are coming to realize, in retrospect, that we may have had too much of a good thing, and have given too little thought about the effect their continually increasing use has on the future.
Making it a reality
Ignoring nature's way of building strong materials, we have, for many applications, over-engineered our plastics for stability, with little consideration of their recyclability or ultimate fate, and ended up transforming irreplaceable resources into mountains of waste.
There is another way. We can take nature's building materials and use them for our purposes, without taking them out of nature's cycles. We can be borrowers, not consumers, so that the process can continue indefinitely. If society is indeed becoming more and more committed to resource conservation, environmental preservation, and sustainable technologies, bioplastics will find their place in this Age of Plastics.
The widespread use of these new plastics will depend on developing technologies that can be successful in the marketplace. That in turn will partly depend on how strongly society is committed to the concepts of resource conservation, environmental preservation, and sustainable technologies. There are growing signs that people indeed want to live in greater harmony with nature and leave future generations a healthy planet. If so, bioplastics will find a place in the current Age of Plastics.
How to use this site
This site is the home to a network of articles containing introductory material on the topic of green plastics (in particular) and plastics and the environment (more generally). Click around on any of the links to read the articles and learn!
You can also find links to other information resources, as well as companies involved in the production of green plastics. We also encourage you to contribute to the site, whether by writing articles or just telling us about a link that you would like to see added to our list!
Have fun, and please contact us if you have any questions!