I think the lesson from around 4:48 is important to learn. Ethanol and ethylene can both be made into polyethylene. One is bio-based, one is petrol-based. One is artificially created, the other naturally occuring. Both end results are identical. They are not just equivalent, they are the exact same chemical compound! Synthetic or natural doesn't matter, it is the resulting compound, or its effects, that matter.
@@arthurmani From a manufacturing standpoint, yes it matters. We should probably try to avoid the oil. What I mean is that many people (sometimes it feels like MOST people) have a belief that the manufacturing process will result in a different end product. Just look at all the people who prefer their sugar to be from beets or canes or honey rather than fructose syrup. The end compound used is still sugar, the same sugar, but people think it is somehow healthier because of how it was manufactured. So, to reiterate: I'm not talking about the impact of the manufacturing process, but the differences (or lack thereof) in the end product.
@@morphman86 I am assuming you are talking about a very specific bioplastic type that would come from bio-ethylene (the PET that Coke was talking about?) not PLA (Polylactic Acid, the most common bioplastics)? I believe you cannot make PLA from petroleum so the end product is also different and more eco-friendly in its majority? I am not an expert so please correct me if I am wrong.
@@hi-ve1cw not denying that. I'm just saying if the end product is the same, they are both having the same impact (as the end product). Synthetic or natural doesn't matter, if both end products are identical.
And rule 2 is recycle. And rule 3 is improve recycling. If we don't do all those, we're literally doomed (but if we're being real here we're doomed whatever we do)
Agree, reduce/no waste, repair, reuse, buy 2nd hand..veg, fruit, beans/lentils, nuts/seeds, mushrooms and (didn't know about tea bags, thought they were paper😮😳) tea in loose weight using reusable containers, if buying processed foods go for glass jars or paper cartons or just limited packaging and mention it at the grocers, market or shop...
The company I work for created a bioplastic based of wood that is actually biodegradable. And no, we don't destroy forests, so it isn't harming food production or anything of the sorts. I feel proud to work here. Thanks for the info in this video! :)
But they didn't care about co2 emissions. Glass bottles need huge amounts of energy to be made, transported, recycled, etc. Because they are extremely heavy and very breakable. So they end up being a problem in themselves! This problem didn't pop up out of nowhere, there is no stepping back anymore.
@@bettievw yes but we do have much better energy resources, and instead of glass(in most cases) we don't need packaging at all, like zero waste grocery stores
@@fallenshallrise I didn't say that at all. I am as low waste as I could be, but waste isn't something we just invented one day for the fun of it! It's just what happened when we started globalising, and the most advantageous way to do that in the capitalist world we live in was to create massive amounts of waste. We didn't waste less in the past because we were being more eco friendly, but because we couldn't waste more. We didn't use to have materials that were so inexpensive to produce and waste, so everything had to be reused. Aluminium is certainly a very good option, but it is usually lined with plastic (as I recently found out, to my dismay, as I had been buying cans of drinks thinking it was better for the planet), that is burned off in the recycling process. I don't think it's useful to idealise the past so unrealistically, and we should, instead, look at the ways we can innovate with the huge amounts of new inventions and knowledge we have acquired. The idea of returning to a better time certainly comes from a good place, and also has quite a bit of truth to it, but we simply can't go back to the past without giving up some of the most important inventions of our time. I wouldn't be alive now without things like disposable needles, refrigerated medicines kept in extremely wasteful plastics, and other modern inventions because of my many health conditions. So, instead of trying to find the ideal things we might return to, I believe we should look at what new ideas we can use to be more eco friendly. Like, for example, low or zero waste refrigerants, which would cut out huge amounts of industrial waste. Or making changes to the economical structures in place that benefit companies that pollute and waste more, and so on and so forth. I hope that explains it a bit more, I'll try to be a bit more clear about my positions in the future, but I also recommend not picking fights over comments you haven't properly read.
@@hopscotchbunny8198 zero waste stores still produce waste, the rice might not be sold in individual bags but it is still transported in plastic. Also, the waste produced when we buy products as individuals (like end-stage packaging) accounts for a very insignificant amount of waste. 40% of ocean plastic comes from fishing nets, and over 80% comes from other industrial pollutants. That doesn't mean that individuals don't make a difference, we absolutely do, but that by looking only at the consumer side of waste, we omit the majority of the pollution that is created in the world.
Nice video! What about bioplastics made from algae? Agriculture often leads to too much Nitrogen and Phosphorus in the water, causing excessive growth of algae, so we could collect that instead of growing crops.
@@davidho1258 What about if you replace the land that is being used to produce tabacco to plant for bio-plastics ? Tabacco is not food and thousands of hectares of good land are being used for it.
@@FeldwebelWolfenstool "Civilized" countires became that was from all the resources they stole for centuries from the"clowns". "Clowns" also have real world problems to deal with and recycling is last in the priority list. Even then, many "civilized" countries don't really recycle and all the plastics just end up in landfills.
@@SSchithFoo ...the clown states allow their citizens...encourage their citizens to dump their szchiddt into rivers. I guess it would be racist to criticize them.
The plastic shown in the video appears to be plastic from PLA material. PHA, which decomposes without heat, looks better in the future than PLA, where raw plastic is decomposed only by heat. In the future, PHA materials will be more perfect eco-friendly materials.
@@leptonsoup337 I have been researching PLA for 15 years now, have 60+ publications on that. But I am also considering to open research on PHA. It is still too expensive for industrial applications.
This video did not discuss PHA and is therefore poor journalism. Viewers leave thinking they understand bioplastics but are actually misled into thinking that bioplastics are either non-biodegradable or must be industrially composted, which is nonsense.
40% of plastics used is packaging? Neat. Is that consumer oriented packaging like the bag my bread and hotdogs come in, or is that wrapping that goes around crates when they are shipped in bulk? Not sure if this is one such scenario but there have been so many other causes of pollution that's dominated by industries/companies it's hard not to be cynical. Can we as consumers really make a difference or is this yet another attempt to shift the focus away from where the real problems lie?
I used to work in a DIY store and the amount of plastic wrap that goes around pallets of goods is just ridiculous. I swear, the amount we used to remove in the space of a week could be used to wrap the entire building.
I think the consumer is the key, but most of us want have things and able to buy that things cheaper. We can didctate, but only a huge part of us wanted that, and i believe that will not happen since most of the population have only money that is necessary to survive, and i belive that will not change in the future. But in some time the costs of renewble/biodegradablee will be lower than petro-based, until the petroleum go up, i hope.
We have all the materials to avoid plastic. Glass, metal, wood, paper, and many more. The problem is the Industry not willing to use other materials because of money and the people who are either unwilling or to poor to afford those. And there's simply no option for many essential products to have without plastic.
Buy from farmers. Go to bakery, go to butcher (if you eat meat), go to milk farmer. You can do a lot. Not buying plastic is a good option. There is a solution for the plastic. That is finding only a solution for the cause and not finding solutions for the effect. Probably most companies are government sponsored, so why would they stop producing plastic? It is the consumer that can stop buying, with as effect no plastic. And it start with 1 person. Giving an example is the best solution. Show people how to do it! Really people love copying what others do. Take advantage of it. Much love.
@@irmabronder If you care about nature and biodiversity we should avoid wheat and other monocultures which require a lot of space or what. So no bread anymore. That would be interesting.
@@jonasarnesen6825Not true, we'd just get wheat from mixed used feed lots. Getting rid of monoculture just means we won't grow one type of plant in one area prone to disease and excessive land use
What is sad is even if we reduce our plastic use, it's just small amount and seems not to effect the environment at all. But if we act eco-friendly way, some around us realize and follow us!! This video was so exciting and made me realize how complicated plastic problem is. Thank you so much!!
Thing is that it's not the consumer plastics that make up the bulk of the plastic use or waste. It is the industrial plastic we need to curb. That is why we've seen less than 1% decline in plastic dumping following 5 major countries banning single-use consumer plastic 4-5 years ago. If it was the plastic spork you get with your little plastic fruit cup that was the culprit, we would see a massive reduction in plastic dumping and plastic consumption, but we haven't. Not even locally in the regions that banned them.
Biodegradable bags are sh*t: Lidl has switched to them (Greece) and it is nightmare - they cannot even hold kilo of apples because they are so flimsy, u cannot reuse them because they are flimsy AND glue in itself, so instead of using ONE normal plastic bag that u can re-use, u have to take two for a kilo AND THROW THEM AWAY. Fabric bags are usually made of COTTON - one of crops that needs the most chemicals to grow and very NON-environmentally friendly.
Several years ago, I tried to compost 'supposedly' biodegradable plastic magazine wrappers. After about 3 years at the bottom of the heap, they were still as good as the day they were buried and I had to fish them all out. Instead, I now try to buy as many products as I can in card boxes or tins. However, I'd really like to see the plastic bags that wrap freezer products, veg and fruit be changed to fully biodegradable.
Oh wow. Honesty, who's to say that regular plastics won't be stamped with bioplastics by some scum? Science is great but I don't think I will ever be able to wholeheartedly trust industry.
@@crazydragy4233 hemp plastic, hemp concrete, hemp fuel, mix hemp fiber with cotton and you get shirts and fabrics that feel like cotton with durability that is unparalleled (I have had a cotton/hemp shirt for a decade now) obviously the medicinal and edible applications of the plant, hemp paper, the list goes on. Assuming you had the facilities you could likely build and furnish an entire house out of different forms of hemp and it is not too unbelievable especially to anyone who has ever touched the stalk of a mature plant.
I've seen other people complain about this and I wonder if maybe they just got scammed. I've had the opposite problem with compostable plastic bags. They started degrading before I even got a chance to really use them.
Forget all the other plants, You should just use hemp fiber and if you need an oil base the hemp seed oil. Most everything can be made out of the Hemp Plant.
Ikr? Hemp is amazing. The paper industry could literally throw out wood consumption almost entirely but it's just "too expensive" to repurpose the factories. Wow
@@armorhide406 It isn't perfect everywhere of course, but it is an environmentally viable and sustainable option, especially in the Northern hemisphere, where it was practised for thousands of years to begin with. It yields more and has more uses+ doesn't destroy soil quality.
@@armorhide406 I am trying to find a good counter argument to hemp plastic and I have been scouring the internet. I noticed no mention of hemp in this video. They said that statistic about corn but Hemp is a very different plant with very different properties and would have different land/water usage than other crops. Still though, if anybody reading this can find me a counter argument against using hemp plastic I would really appreciate it for my research.
@@crazydragy4233 It was practised until White people colonised the planet. In Asia banana leaves are used to wrap food. Humans had things figured out before White people colonised the planet. Image what the planet would be like if White people didn't destroy everything they touch.
Things that I feel like I'm doing good with... Bought an RO system Use reusable grocery bags Use a 64oz water canteen Minimize store bought candy, snacks, and drinks. Opt out of plastic bags at convenient stores if I do buy from them. Use actual silverware at work that I keep in a lunch box. Minimize paper towel use Reuse produce bags Things that I think could use some work...(I'm open to suggestions) Minimize needless engine idling Ride bike to work more
Absolutely agree… the best way to cure the plastic problem is to just not use plastic. Bioplastic is not a silver bullet - it competes for the same products that we eat, or uses land that could otherwise be used for food, and it uses a lot of water… and disposal remains a problem… so not a solution really… back to the drawing board. We will find a solution - we just need to agree that we need one.
Perhaps you want to check out starch-based plastics such as bin bags? I actually used them in school to show that they actually are biodegradable: They test positive with iodine solution, and if you soak snippets of it in alpha-amylase, you can actually detect carbohydrate monomers such as glucose fairly quickly.
TL;DW Basically, it doesn't matter if it's bioplastic or regular plastic, what matters is if it's biodegradable. Bioplastic does not mean it's biodegradable... but the manufacturers want you to think that's what it means. My note: Also remember that just because it says "biodegradable" doesn't always mean it is. There are sometimes scams involved and sometimes, it's "biodegradable" but only with specific tools or environments... so they can claim that they technically aren't lying.... but it's still a scam.
Stunning! WOW love EVERYTHING about your videos! From the host (who is fun, friendly, engaging, natural, clear to understand, and more) to the content, the visuals, the background sound, the holistic full-spectrum perspective, I can go on and on! Thank you
I assumed that bioplastics and composites can be made from biomass of any plant not just corn. Besides a soy car, Henry Ford also made a hemp car! The true solution for all our packaging needs may be in hemp paper and hemp waxed paper and glass!
@@crazydragy4233 becuase they don't really want to tell you the truth. They want to sound like they are to justify their position. (Example being they seem to say that it would use up all the corn but never mentioned anything about using the biproduct/the stalk which is just as useable)
Great video, except you didn't mention hemp or algae at all. Which from what I have heard would be far better plant materials than any of the one's mentioned in the video to make bio-degradable plastic. Hemp is literally one of the easiest things to grow (it's a weed) and requires way less pesticides and algae could be grown in giant off-shore ocean farms that are way more eco friendly and won't take up additional space in agriculture.
Thanks for the input, we are actually planning a video on algae and its potential use as a fossil-based plastic substitute. It's a very new and exciting field that we wanted to dedicate a separate video to!
The point is that just putting the word "bio" in front of something like plastic but creating the same polimer that will never degrade in a million years doesn't solve anything. Algae, hemp, potatoes, soy, whatever, makes no difference what the source is.
Thank you for your research, honesty and accessible educaation for the public that this world need, thank you to all researchers and people on set bring us current and lifechanging information each friday!
More zero waste shops needed! I get so annoyed with vegetables wrapped in plastic. My local greengrocer uses brown paper bags - I know I can put them in my home composting. My organic veg and fruit usually come loose in the brown paper sack ( which I return each week, as they re-use them). Many of our magazines now come in a film that says it's compostable - I don't know if this is right, so I put them in my garden compost bins, to see what happens. I note that my Radio Times which used to come in the potato starch film has now changed to using a paper envelope instead ( I hope it's made from recycled paper).
I can't help but think this video was sponsored by the petroleum industry. The technology is obviously gonna evolve. A few years ago a compostable bioplastic store shopping bag cost $1-$3 per bag. Now its down to $0.01-$0.02 per bag and continues to get better in quality. This video erroneously says we have to grow more corn to fit needs while ignoring all the agriculture and food processing that throw away parts of plants not used, but which can be used for bioplastics. Again, no one is advocating for non-degrable bioplastics except companies greenwashing.
Big corporations should be the one responsible for contributing great to plastic pollution, the people or consumers are always blamed yet they dont have a choice
Canada passed a law that puts the burden of waste on the company that made it. Walmart plastic bags found as litter for example means the company will be fined even if they were not the one who disposed of the bag. Let's see how effective this method will be.
I had actually come to this conclusion a few years ago -bio-plastics are still . . . plastic. If I can't throw it in my home compost pile and have it degrade (implying that it would also naturally degrade in the environment,) it's not a solution.
Very nice video. Have you ever heard about PHAs (Polyhydroxyalkanoates)? The behaviour of this material is different compared to other bioplastic like PLA.
To add some more data, half of all global corn production represents 1/15th of global food production (Caloric values per crop/animal vary, though a global average for each of them would be great to make this data useful). Though considering a shift towards less per capita red meat consumption is needed, in order to account for a wealthier and more populated world, the savings in caloric efficiency (feeding cattle isn't as efficient as crops) might make bio-plastics more viable than it sounds.
All that "eat less meat" bullshit had already been debunked. The vegan agenda will disappear faster than trans athletes fleeing weightlifting competitions.
@@besouniveirs.1643 The GHG impact of a red-meat intensive diet, comparable to a no red meat omnivore diet exists. Just because you can’t stomach peer reviewed studies that contradict your world view doesn’t make them fake. And to gaoeln, I’m Argentinian, not Filipino. I’m not vegan, or vegetarian, as a matter of fact, my country has probably the cheapest access for quality meat in the developing world (after Uruguay), but just because I enjoy a product, doesn’t mean I don’t understand it’s environmental impact and it’s long term sustainability.
Let's not forget a lot of our crops are complete bullshit too, and even if they're any good the way they're farmed just makes that difference irrelevant.
Honestly I do not think that using bioplastics for coffee capsules, one way cups and tea bags is not a good idea. It's still waste, increases the amount of transportation (just compare one bag of coffee with the same amount of coffee capsules) - and there are quite good alternatives (e.g. tea eggs, actual coffee machines, ...). Using bioplastics for these situations is just green washing.
It is the laziness of the consumer. It can be so fun to grind coffee beans yourself. But for all solutions we have to find a solution for the cause, not the effect. That is no solution, that is just making it worse.
The only thing I worry about, especially with Covid and other diseases/sickness is that you almost have to use throw aways when sanitarily cleaning them isn't an option. Hospitals and even people stuck at home with others are more likely to use one time based takeout or needle caps. Is there any way to work around the crisis and still move forward?
For takeout people could bring their own container. Maybe make the containers themself more eco-friendly, if possible biodegradable. And give a discount to people who bring their own. If hospitals have to use some non-degradable plastic (and the degradable version is not good enough quality) thats sadly just how it is for now. But a whole bunch of unnecesary single time plastic use could be cut out. And I think maybe we should not be THAT fanatic about hygiene in everyday life (not hospitals), we need to go a bit more back to normal, disease will always be part of life and we cant stop spread entirely. But more people should get vaccinated, that could help with disease a lot
The concept of bio-plastics is only just taking off. Imagine if they actually have the same funding are petroleum companies. Or imagine if the US didn’t have such a hatred towards hemp.
@@tjmarx yeh, but you fail to recognize how fucking big the us actually is, the entirety of Britain, France, Italy, Japan, etc. Etc. Can fit within, if we don't get the us involved, then all of your efforts mean fuck all, not to mention they never once even implied that the us was the entire world, your just an insecure bastard who is projecting.
@@tjmarx dude. do you realize that the sheep who buy into all this eco-friendly bullshit cannot comprehend a simple message of a video such as this. All in all, it's just another method of making money off of fools. Create "bio-plastic" and people will buy it better, regarless of the fact how biodegradable it is.
@@tjmarx give me one example in the history of humanity where "people" have realized something and made a change that didn't bring them immediate benefit (real or perceived). There are none. The climate change thing is too complex and people are programmed by natural selection to be extremely selfish (we wouldn't have survived otherwise) to ever really consider to do something about it. The only logical and surefire solution is to decrease the number of people. But no one will ever consider this option because people are valuable. People themselves will never consider it as an option due to base instincs and powers who govern the world will not consider it because it will decrease their profits. Every country tries to increase its birthrate and decrease the deathrate. Not because they care about their people, but because the more people you have, the more workers you have, the more taxes they pay. I don't understand how people don't see these simple truths. Well nevermind, i do. Some people are stupid and actually believe that they can make a change. Others simply like to feel superior and show their superiority by being morally "better" to others by "combating the climate change".
we humans will NEVER get away from plastics, petroleum-based anything.... the computer being used, the steel water bottle top, (the rubber gasket), cell phones, and whatever, where-ever...
So, what I have guaged from this is that for this to really work we need to go back to small sustainable communities where products are produced locally and disposed of locally. That or the best solution I believe is instead of pushing the carbon footprint onto the consumer or offsetting in other ways - the manufacturer needs to take responsibility of the disposal of their products. If you want to solve environmental problems, the quickest and easiest way is to make the supplier of products responsible for the disposal and the environmental impact.
This makes a vital argument: the fork that appears briefly at the very end is stainless steel but could probably be used for over a hundred years and still be recycled afterwards. A truly circular economy will need to include a massive reduction in production of materials from natural resources. As always it comes down to how we run our economy. The first steps have already been taken - see Kate Raworth's book "Doughnut Economics" - and there are enormous political hurdles that need to be overcome. If only we had more time! But, that said, we did have time and didn't use it well.
@@mikeyvesperlick6982 I mean the whole system is trash so like, no wonder good ideas aren't viable. If only our economy wasn't based purely on the interest of the richest individuals.
Or cans. Or put a pound of coffee beans in a single bag instead of 5 grams of ground coffee in a little plastic cup and all those plastic cups into another plastic bag, in a box, in plastic wrap, in another box.
I don't know... I created a rapid liquid digester, and the compostable bioplastics are totally gone in a few days. Not as fast as most food items that might be gone in a few hours, but on par or slightly faster than corn husks for example. Seems pretty reasonable to me.
Thankyou for this great point of view, it makes me think hard :D, but i'm enjoy it to brainstorming about this case. I got your point, yeah, the result are identical because it have a same of chemical compound. so it doesn't have any differences about BIO-PET and PET. Let's trying to discussing about conventional plastics and bioplastics. We know, that the main ingredient of conventional plastics (plastic bag type) is a polyethylene and you cannot make plastic, just from polyethylene, it have to be added some adictives, like a, if you want to make a LDPE (ex: plastic bag) you have to make the plastic more flexibile, it have to be added pthalate ester and you have to added another aditives, to increase the durability of the plastic too. But if you want to make a biodegradable plastic, the main ingredient is a celulose from plant or pati from cassava, etc. but again, we have to added some additives, to make plastic more flexible we have to added glyserol or sorbitol and to increase more durability it have to be added chitosan. chitosan is not a toxic and biodegradable and pthlate ester is a toxic one. So, i think when we used a point of view about the ingredient effect of bioplastic, i will say that was enviromentally friendly but conventional plastic is'nt enviromentally friendly.
Companies and Government must make sign or sticker on every bio-plastic made product to easily determine which is bio or petro plastics by consumers. But also just like speaker of the video said , it is also easily to use conventional ways to use-less plastic in our daily life little by little until to its our habit. And also make or implement or redo a new strict, specific, and easily to understand policy or law that makes plastic use-less in private and public sectors even more. Make an advertisement or public pamphlet to give people idea of what , when , how , why we need to use bio-plastic as solution or permanent replacement of petro-plastic in our daily lives.
A couple years ago I saw a lot of green tinted compostable plastic. People got so confused. They weren't sure if they should throw it in the recycle or city compost. Now I don't see them as much.
This is very informative! Thank you for showing us facts/nonbiased info in regard to this topic. I am doing a bioplastic experiment with my 5th and 6th graders and this definitely makes me rethink how I will present the topic.
One of the big problems with plastics oil based or plant based.. is additives to enhance their properties. These additives seep out of the plastics as they degrade. This will not change immediately with plant based plastic, as it takes a lot of research to know what to start from and how to treat it to get a certain property, that we could get so cheaply from the toxic additives we know work..
Let's try to shift the focus to reducing the amount of plastics produced as opposed to go in circles attempting to implement occasionally-applicable solutions to their disposal! That's what the plastic producer industry should be looking at, but who's there to make them?
The real long term solution it will be to reduce the production of plastics, and consumers, overpopulation plays a huge role in the environment degradation
Important to balance this video with a few facts (happy to give sources): PLA bioplastics are made from fermented plant starch such as corn, cassava, sugarcane or sugar beet pulp which are all renewable and sustainable resources, contrary to petroleum which depletes over time. The renewable resources used for PLA Bioplastics are natural carbon sinks, contrary to petroleum based plastics which releases excess carbon when first extracted, distilled from crude oil and when burned in incinerators (source 1 - source 2). More than 50% of carbon emission in the U.S. incinerator plants come from petroleum based plastics. PLA is up to 30 times less toxic than petroleum based plastics when heated (When heated, PLA gives off a non-toxic chemical called Lactide - source 3) PLA is biodegradable (It can degrade naturally over time. Warm temperatures, high humidity and small particle sizes will make biodegradation even faster). Big pieces break down slowly as the microorganisms don't have high surface area available for enzymatic action. If the conditions for fast natural degradation are not met, PLA can be sent in industrial composts to accelerate the process. PLA is therefore a "cradle to cradle" material (it comes from earth and can be brought back to earth without harming natural habitats, including marine habitats). A PLA bottle left in the ocean would typically degrade in six to 24 months. Compared to conventional plastics (which in the same environment can take several hundred to a thousand years to degrade). Fungus can even grow on PLA particles in water after two weeks. Soil mixed with composted PLA remains suitable for plant growth (source 4) despite a slight lowering of PH levels (The optimum pH range for many plants is between 5.5 and 7.5, PLA based soil is within this range). PLA Bioplastic does not contain the hormone disruptors often found in traditional plastics - bisphenol A (BPA) . PLA is mechanically stronger (stronger/stiffer) than most petroleum-based plastics. Recycling alone cannot be a long term solution for any plastics: All plastics cannot be recycled forever, they have a limited cycles before their long chains of polymers are broken and cannot be used structurally. The material is then discarded or burnt whereas PLA can be brought back to earth.
I absolutely skip buying those products which I see are over packaged with plastic. Formed this habit as a new year resolution. And if it is helping nature then I am happy.
An interesting idea but in the large scale of things it's barely an afterthought. Sadly if we want to make actual change then the system needs to be critically changed. And most people aren't on board with that.
My husband is a terror for buying carrier bags, and not the paper ones either, despite the bags for life we have at home. I got sick of it and have just bought a jute shopping bag and two string bags - now surely he can have no excuse. Our mothers had shopping bags and trolleys and brown paper bags with string handles when necessary; well he rejects the latter and I wait with bated breath the result of the shopping bags. Come on everyone make it acceptable again.
Wow, really really it's very informative for me. Because tomorrow I'm gonna show a presentation about plastic pollution solving to the Grand Final of Idea Generation Contest. So thank you thank you so much. It's very special for me♥️♥️♥️
As usual, a very half-baked product from DW. While yes, the final idea of reducing the use of plastic at all is right, everything else is just...questionable. Some things, that are made from plastic are not supposed to be easily degradable at all. Why would it be a bad idea to replace petrochemical long-lasting plastic with bio-derived one? More so, the mention of how much corn we need to replace petrochemical plastic with biobased one is very debatable and there are two reasons for that: 1. We already produce more food, than we need. And a giant amount of food is wasted instead of being consumed. 2. There are starch-based plastics, cellulose-based plastics, protein-based plastics, lipid-derived polymers, etc. Many of those are made out of waste and garbage. Also, no mentions of cellophane?
The supermarket I work with has corn based plastic bags for fruit. A shame that there’s still quite a lot of plastic packaging esp in the meat sections
I wish I had seen this video when it first came out. The gentlemen in the video snippets you present is John Bissel, co-founder and co-CEO of Origin Materials. His company has solved both the beginning-of-life and end-of-life plastic problems. They are in the process of commercializing these solutions at large scale. The company uses pulpwood (waste material) -- extremely inexpensive and available in massive quantities -- and converts this lingo-cellulosic feedstock into CMF and HTC. The CMF can be carried through to PEF, which is a bio-degradable plastic that can degrade in nature (no need for a composting plant). I wish you did additional research into the organization and scientist that you've included in this video. More thorough research would have certainly led you to a different -- and far brighter -- conclusion with respects to the feasibility of transitioning to bio-plastics. @DW Planet A
I've said it before and I'll say it again 'plastics isn't the problem its the solution, and if we want to use less plastic we need other solutions to what ever problem it is solving in a given circumstance.' and then use 'better plastics' for those problems that don't have better solutions. I don't know a nurse alive that would call for a return to glass bottles and rubber hosing in phlebotomy conditions.
TLDR make plastic into trees. There was a certain college who had did a project on a powerplant. They redirected the flue gas into a mini algae farm. (The algae farm looked wierd it had tubes and stuff) Anyhow, since algae eats up Co2 and toxic heavy metal they basically made the would-be pollutive air...-cleaner. The algae then could be used to make non edible fertilizer. I was thinking what if we burned plastic and send the exhaust to an algae farm. (Since plastic is made from fossil fuel or ancient algae the algae would eat it as nutrients.) The algae could then be used as non edible fertilizer. We can use the non edible fertilizer and make trees.
DW, consumers are not good at separating trash. My city has three waste options. We supposedly recycle most plastics, paper, etc., compost, and have a landfill option. It's very confusing for people. I've seen regular plastic thrown in with the compost bins at our apartment complex. I've seen plant based compostable plastic thrown in the regular recyclable plastics. I wonder how does the city deal with this??
So when foodstuffs are not consumed as food but for plastics how is that a good idea? Non foodstuff plastics like algea or bioplastic are the way to go... less energy required and food is not being taken out of circulation. Could we go back to glass or alternatives? Glass can be recycles and biodegrades too. this report was good.. facts and no BS!
PLA is what you want, we don't want our plastics, like our car to spontaneously degrade, but we do want to have them degrade completely in a compost heap. These compost heaps also produce heat, which can be harvested.. we have the technology for ideal curcumstances.. we just don't see it and therefore don't have the infrastructure
we must learn how to convert rocks and sandto replace plastics. we are now in the most advanced time of our generation, so we must be able to do it now.
I like your point about the best solution being using less of any sort of plastic, but there is a solution you didn't mention in this video that solves ALL the problems you mentioned that the other bioplastics have....check out plastic made of industrial hemp. Growing hemp returns carbon into the soil, it can be composted completely within 3 to 6 months, with zero toxic chemicals released. Hemp requires no pesticides or fertilizers to grow, uses far less water than any crop in existence, and it is four times stronger than conventional plastics. It is considered a net zero carbon emission since it takes carbon from the air and returns it to the soil naturally, through photosynthesis, and it actually gos one step further and removes heavy metals and toxins and even radiation from the soil, healing the earth. Hemp grows incredibly quickly in all sorts of biomes, even in northern climates like Canada, and it requires and releases absolutely no toxic chemicals into the air, soil or water at any stage of its existence. Every part of the plant has many uses. The seeds are also considered a superfood. Talk about a miracle super plant! It has more than 50,000 uses and more each day. I truly believe hemp will revolutionize every industry. Correction on one point in the video ... Ford used Hemp, not plastic derived from soy bean plants, to make a car in the 1940's, and even used a hemp derived ethanol fuel to power it.
What about the carbon footprint of using alternatives to plastic? Although I agree that ideally we need to just avoid plastic entirely, the fact is that if we just exchange plastic for e.g. glass, this doesn't solve the problem, in many cases it makes it worse. We need to consider the environmental cost of producing plastic alternatives, the impact on transporting goods in alternative containers (glass is heavier and bulkier and requires more packaging so it wastes more fuel to transport it), and the impact on shelf-life (plastic has been used so extensively *because* it so effectively seals food allowing it to last longer). The point is that this is not a simple problem to solve, and simply avoiding plastic at this stage may cause a larger ecological disaster. I think one area that we can concentrate on now which may help solve the problem in the short-term while we find a long-term or permanent solution to these problems is pushing for greater advances in soft-plastic recycling. If we transition to using much more soft-plastics and invest in perfecting the recycling techniques, we can dramatically reduce plastic waste in the short-term, and simplify the consumer's job in sorting garbage and recycling. Of course we need to massively overhaul our recycling system as well given the manifold issues with that, but it's a viable short-term solution while we work to develop the long-term solutions that forever remove all plastic from our daily lives.
@@DWPlanetA Ah ok, I watched the video. No real new info there - I mean the video was posted this year but contains information that was widely known like 10 years ago. Still appreciate you posting it and helping to keep raising awareness. Not really sure how it relates to my comment above which agrees completely with the content of that video - that we need consumer choices to push government and industry to start putting into effect better systems that reduce carbon emissions on a mass scale.
@@EfHaichDee when glass was used, milkmen refilled bottles. They didn't make new bottles. If they did, we'd run out of glass. Beside, we used to use lots of paper. And nobody was drinking coca cola before the twentieth century.
@@موسى_7 Yeah, there's also 7 x as many people in the world now. Still think we have enough glass? Even if we made enough bottles, that's glass that's locked into a single purpose and can't be used for anything else. We're already making significant progress towards making plastics infinitely recyclable. We've found worms and fungi that can break down styrofoam and plastic. The science is new, but this is a more realistic long-term solution to the problem. We just need to do something in the short-term to reduce the immediate issue. As in my comment above, yes, reducing plastic plays an important part, but replacing everything with glass isn't going to work - it's just not practical for most use cases, and it has a much much larger environmental impact (the waste issue only makes up about 5% of the entire environmental footprint of a product. Most of the impact has already occured during manufacturing and extraction of materials, and plastic has a much smaller impact across every step in the lifecycle except the last one)
Ship all non-biodegradable plastic back to the company that sold it to you. If we ALL do that you can be sure that the company will find a way to a) dispose of it, and with the attendant press coverage most likely in a responsible way, and b) come up with a better method for packaging their products. Same thing for grocery stores. Just start dumping your waste plastic from the store onto the floor of the department from which it was purchased.
Wonder how much petroleum it takes to grow, harvest, transport, and make the plants into plastic. They say 2/3 -to 3/4, but immediately correct themselves to just say really it is less.
I'm curious, what if we burned all of our regular trash in power plants to generate electricity to power recycling facilities to recycle plastics, glass and paper products? Would that be economical? Or should we just burn all of our waste, plastics, trash, wood, tyres etc. to generate electricity and free up space and eliminating a need for landfills.
I think the lesson from around 4:48 is important to learn.
Ethanol and ethylene can both be made into polyethylene. One is bio-based, one is petrol-based. One is artificially created, the other naturally occuring.
Both end results are identical.
They are not just equivalent, they are the exact same chemical compound!
Synthetic or natural doesn't matter, it is the resulting compound, or its effects, that matter.
But one comes from a finite source and the other comes from renewables. It's also worth noting that Coke could have made PLA instead of PET.
@@arthurmani From a manufacturing standpoint, yes it matters. We should probably try to avoid the oil.
What I mean is that many people (sometimes it feels like MOST people) have a belief that the manufacturing process will result in a different end product.
Just look at all the people who prefer their sugar to be from beets or canes or honey rather than fructose syrup. The end compound used is still sugar, the same sugar, but people think it is somehow healthier because of how it was manufactured.
So, to reiterate: I'm not talking about the impact of the manufacturing process, but the differences (or lack thereof) in the end product.
@@morphman86 I am assuming you are talking about a very specific bioplastic type that would come from bio-ethylene (the PET that Coke was talking about?) not PLA (Polylactic Acid, the most common bioplastics)? I believe you cannot make PLA from petroleum so the end product is also different and more eco-friendly in its majority? I am not an expert so please correct me if I am wrong.
@@arthurmani I did specify polyethylene, so yeah, PET.
@@hi-ve1cw not denying that. I'm just saying if the end product is the same, they are both having the same impact (as the end product).
Synthetic or natural doesn't matter, if both end products are identical.
Remember, the first rule is to REDUCE, not RECYCLE
Recycling usually ends up in a landfill anyways
@@armorhide406 It depends. There's some pretty good recycling going on around the world, just not enough
And rule 2 is recycle. And rule 3 is improve recycling. If we don't do all those, we're literally doomed (but if we're being real here we're doomed whatever we do)
Then resuse.
If we reused everything once we'd have half as much waste. That's not enough, but it's one hell of a step forwards.
Agree, reduce/no waste, repair, reuse, buy 2nd hand..veg, fruit, beans/lentils, nuts/seeds, mushrooms and (didn't know about tea bags, thought they were paper😮😳) tea in loose weight using reusable containers, if buying processed foods go for glass jars or paper cartons or just limited packaging and mention it at the grocers, market or shop...
The company I work for created a bioplastic based of wood that is actually biodegradable. And no, we don't destroy forests, so it isn't harming food production or anything of the sorts. I feel proud to work here. Thanks for the info in this video! :)
What is the name of the company? That kind of solution should be better known
Do you work for Origin Materials? @♡ L.
@@danielabreu it's Dongnam Realize!
@@danielbendheim no, I work at Dongnam Realize! It's a Korean company :)
Could you tell us about the methods of making the bioplastics and the materials you need to get the bioplastics
Just 50 years ago they knew nothing else but sustainable solutions for packaging etc. Maybe we just go a step backwards?
But they didn't care about co2 emissions. Glass bottles need huge amounts of energy to be made, transported, recycled, etc. Because they are extremely heavy and very breakable. So they end up being a problem in themselves! This problem didn't pop up out of nowhere, there is no stepping back anymore.
@@bettievw yes but we do have much better energy resources, and instead of glass(in most cases) we don't need packaging at all, like zero waste grocery stores
@@bettievw Lol this is the first pro-plastic, anti-glass post I've ever seen. Congrats on that. What about aluminum? Not heavy, not breakable.
@@fallenshallrise I didn't say that at all. I am as low waste as I could be, but waste isn't something we just invented one day for the fun of it! It's just what happened when we started globalising, and the most advantageous way to do that in the capitalist world we live in was to create massive amounts of waste. We didn't waste less in the past because we were being more eco friendly, but because we couldn't waste more. We didn't use to have materials that were so inexpensive to produce and waste, so everything had to be reused. Aluminium is certainly a very good option, but it is usually lined with plastic (as I recently found out, to my dismay, as I had been buying cans of drinks thinking it was better for the planet), that is burned off in the recycling process. I don't think it's useful to idealise the past so unrealistically, and we should, instead, look at the ways we can innovate with the huge amounts of new inventions and knowledge we have acquired. The idea of returning to a better time certainly comes from a good place, and also has quite a bit of truth to it, but we simply can't go back to the past without giving up some of the most important inventions of our time. I wouldn't be alive now without things like disposable needles, refrigerated medicines kept in extremely wasteful plastics, and other modern inventions because of my many health conditions. So, instead of trying to find the ideal things we might return to, I believe we should look at what new ideas we can use to be more eco friendly. Like, for example, low or zero waste refrigerants, which would cut out huge amounts of industrial waste. Or making changes to the economical structures in place that benefit companies that pollute and waste more, and so on and so forth.
I hope that explains it a bit more, I'll try to be a bit more clear about my positions in the future, but I also recommend not picking fights over comments you haven't properly read.
@@hopscotchbunny8198 zero waste stores still produce waste, the rice might not be sold in individual bags but it is still transported in plastic. Also, the waste produced when we buy products as individuals (like end-stage packaging) accounts for a very insignificant amount of waste. 40% of ocean plastic comes from fishing nets, and over 80% comes from other industrial pollutants. That doesn't mean that individuals don't make a difference, we absolutely do, but that by looking only at the consumer side of waste, we omit the majority of the pollution that is created in the world.
Nice video! What about bioplastics made from algae? Agriculture often leads to too much Nitrogen and Phosphorus in the water, causing excessive growth of algae, so we could collect that instead of growing crops.
Hey Jean-François, thanks for the suggestion! We are actually planning a video on algae and its potential right now, so stay tuned!
instead of growing food?
@@davidho1258 What about if you replace the land that is being used to produce tabacco to plant for bio-plastics ? Tabacco is not food and thousands of hectares of good land are being used for it.
That'd be another Wuhan lab for gene exchange by germs, unless we make sure this doesn't happen.
@@amandarodrigues7097 Tobacco is a drop in the bucket for farming acreage. But we should still growing tobacco anyway because it's terrible
Man, what the hell are we doing to our planet... Pretty depressing.
We're turning earth into a Wuhan lab🔬 under plastic wastes.
@@solapowsj25 We've been treating the planet like a lab for centuries. *The Wuhan labs are just like any other labs other than zip codes
...Who is "we"? A lot of CIVILIZED countries manage their waste, but it's all the clowns that dump their crap in the ocean.
@@FeldwebelWolfenstool "Civilized" countires became that was from all the resources they stole for centuries from the"clowns". "Clowns" also have real world problems to deal with and recycling is last in the priority list. Even then, many "civilized" countries don't really recycle and all the plastics just end up in landfills.
@@SSchithFoo ...the clown states allow their citizens...encourage their citizens to dump their szchiddt into rivers. I guess it would be racist to criticize them.
Nice to really know the benefits and issues that remain with these options, Good stuff as always!
Thanks Goni983, you can already look forward to the upcoming videos.
The plastic shown in the video appears to be plastic from PLA material. PHA, which decomposes without heat, looks better in the future than PLA, where raw plastic is decomposed only by heat. In the future, PHA materials will be more perfect eco-friendly materials.
@@nexustom5823 Yes.
Polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs) are the future. I've transitioned damn near my entire research group into studying PHAs ;)
@@leptonsoup337 I have been researching PLA for 15 years now, have 60+ publications on that. But I am also considering to open research on PHA. It is still too expensive for industrial applications.
This video is a massive fail for not including PHA. I don't get the sense she even knows about PHA.
60+ publications but half of it are review papers?
Thank you for the honest investigating: sadly rare in journalism today.
This video did not discuss PHA and is therefore poor journalism. Viewers leave thinking they understand bioplastics but are actually misled into thinking that bioplastics are either non-biodegradable or must be industrially composted, which is nonsense.
@@duanelinstrom83 How much of bioplastics is PHA a a percent?
40% of plastics used is packaging? Neat. Is that consumer oriented packaging like the bag my bread and hotdogs come in, or is that wrapping that goes around crates when they are shipped in bulk?
Not sure if this is one such scenario but there have been so many other causes of pollution that's dominated by industries/companies it's hard not to be cynical. Can we as consumers really make a difference or is this yet another attempt to shift the focus away from where the real problems lie?
I think the best we can do as individuals is of course first change our lifestyle but also pressure companies to make changes
I used to work in a DIY store and the amount of plastic wrap that goes around pallets of goods is just ridiculous. I swear, the amount we used to remove in the space of a week could be used to wrap the entire building.
@@debbiehenri345 Do you want to get your product in one piece or not?
I think the consumer is the key, but most of us want have things and able to buy that things cheaper. We can didctate, but only a huge part of us wanted that, and i believe that will not happen since most of the population have only money that is necessary to survive, and i belive that will not change in the future. But in some time the costs of renewble/biodegradablee will be lower than petro-based, until the petroleum go up, i hope.
@@flowgangsemaudamartoz7062 I can wait an extra day or two
Or, you know, we can use things that aren't single use plastics
We have all the materials to avoid plastic. Glass, metal, wood, paper, and many more. The problem is the Industry not willing to use other materials because of money and the people who are either unwilling or to poor to afford those.
And there's simply no option for many essential products to have without plastic.
Buy from farmers. Go to bakery, go to butcher (if you eat meat), go to milk farmer. You can do a lot. Not buying plastic is a good option. There is a solution for the plastic. That is finding only a solution for the cause and not finding solutions for the effect. Probably most companies are government sponsored, so why would they stop producing plastic? It is the consumer that can stop buying, with as effect no plastic. And it start with 1 person. Giving an example is the best solution. Show people how to do it! Really people love copying what others do. Take advantage of it. Much love.
@@irmabronder If you care about nature and biodiversity we should avoid wheat and other monocultures which require a lot of space or what. So no bread anymore. That would be interesting.
@@jonasarnesen6825Not true, we'd just get wheat from mixed used feed lots. Getting rid of monoculture just means we won't grow one type of plant in one area prone to disease and excessive land use
My mind is absolutely blown... you need a tv show!
What is sad is even if we reduce our plastic use, it's just small amount and seems not to effect the environment at all. But if we act eco-friendly way, some around us realize and follow us!! This video was so exciting and made me realize how complicated plastic problem is. Thank you so much!!
Thing is that it's not the consumer plastics that make up the bulk of the plastic use or waste. It is the industrial plastic we need to curb.
That is why we've seen less than 1% decline in plastic dumping following 5 major countries banning single-use consumer plastic 4-5 years ago.
If it was the plastic spork you get with your little plastic fruit cup that was the culprit, we would see a massive reduction in plastic dumping and plastic consumption, but we haven't. Not even locally in the regions that banned them.
Over here in country Georgia (NOT the state of the US) we use biodegradable bags and reusable cloth bags, maybe make a vid about that?
Good
I'll interest to watch that
@@mshofyanefendi2792 we have been doin this past so many years
Biodegradable bags are sh*t: Lidl has switched to them (Greece) and it is nightmare - they cannot even hold kilo of apples because they are so flimsy, u cannot reuse them because they are flimsy AND glue in itself, so instead of using ONE normal plastic bag that u can re-use, u have to take two for a kilo AND THROW THEM AWAY.
Fabric bags are usually made of COTTON - one of crops that needs the most chemicals to grow and very NON-environmentally friendly.
@@BLAQFiniksnowadays cotton is produced chemically it doesnt requires chemicals
Several years ago, I tried to compost 'supposedly' biodegradable plastic magazine wrappers. After about 3 years at the bottom of the heap, they were still as good as the day they were buried and I had to fish them all out.
Instead, I now try to buy as many products as I can in card boxes or tins. However, I'd really like to see the plastic bags that wrap freezer products, veg and fruit be changed to fully biodegradable.
Oh wow. Honesty, who's to say that regular plastics won't be stamped with bioplastics by some scum? Science is great but I don't think I will ever be able to wholeheartedly trust industry.
Hemp plastic. Idk why they didn't mention hemp once in this video.
@chris rhodes Hemp is seriously underrated, but this is the first time I hear of hemp plastic?!
@@crazydragy4233 hemp plastic, hemp concrete, hemp fuel, mix hemp fiber with cotton and you get shirts and fabrics that feel like cotton with durability that is unparalleled (I have had a cotton/hemp shirt for a decade now) obviously the medicinal and edible applications of the plant, hemp paper, the list goes on. Assuming you had the facilities you could likely build and furnish an entire house out of different forms of hemp and it is not too unbelievable especially to anyone who has ever touched the stalk of a mature plant.
I've seen other people complain about this and I wonder if maybe they just got scammed. I've had the opposite problem with compostable plastic bags. They started degrading before I even got a chance to really use them.
Forget all the other plants,
You should just use hemp fiber and if you need an oil base the hemp seed oil.
Most everything can be made out of the Hemp Plant.
Ikr? Hemp is amazing. The paper industry could literally throw out wood consumption almost entirely but it's just "too expensive" to repurpose the factories. Wow
Hemp is a cure all? Sounds too good to be true and it is. Logistically shifting to hemp everything will bring its own issues
@@armorhide406 It isn't perfect everywhere of course, but it is an environmentally viable and sustainable option, especially in the Northern hemisphere, where it was practised for thousands of years to begin with.
It yields more and has more uses+ doesn't destroy soil quality.
@@armorhide406 I am trying to find a good counter argument to hemp plastic and I have been scouring the internet. I noticed no mention of hemp in this video. They said that statistic about corn but Hemp is a very different plant with very different properties and would have different land/water usage than other crops. Still though, if anybody reading this can find me a counter argument against using hemp plastic I would really appreciate it for my research.
@@crazydragy4233 It was practised until White people colonised the planet. In Asia banana leaves are used to wrap food. Humans had things figured out before White people colonised the planet. Image what the planet would be like if White people didn't destroy everything they touch.
Things that I feel like I'm doing good with...
Bought an RO system
Use reusable grocery bags
Use a 64oz water canteen
Minimize store bought candy, snacks, and drinks.
Opt out of plastic bags at convenient stores if I do buy from them.
Use actual silverware at work that I keep in a lunch box.
Minimize paper towel use
Reuse produce bags
Things that I think could use some work...(I'm open to suggestions)
Minimize needless engine idling
Ride bike to work more
If you like tea you should try growing some simple herbs like mint which you can do on your windowsill :D
Absolutely agree… the best way to cure the plastic problem is to just not use plastic. Bioplastic is not a silver bullet - it competes for the same products that we eat, or uses land that could otherwise be used for food, and it uses a lot of water… and disposal remains a problem… so not a solution really… back to the drawing board. We will find a solution - we just need to agree that we need one.
Perhaps you want to check out starch-based plastics such as bin bags?
I actually used them in school to show that they actually are biodegradable: They test positive with iodine solution, and if you soak snippets of it in alpha-amylase, you can actually detect carbohydrate monomers such as glucose fairly quickly.
TL;DW Basically, it doesn't matter if it's bioplastic or regular plastic, what matters is if it's biodegradable.
Bioplastic does not mean it's biodegradable... but the manufacturers want you to think that's what it means.
My note: Also remember that just because it says "biodegradable" doesn't always mean it is. There are sometimes scams involved and sometimes, it's "biodegradable" but only with specific tools or environments... so they can claim that they technically aren't lying.... but it's still a scam.
Another ad I wouldn’t skip
There was a time when we not only didn't use plastic but we thrived.
Some thrived but let's not glorify the days before plastics. They have dramatically changed our lives for good and ill
@@TheBenjaca True
That reaction u used to show how bioplastic end up plastic after removal of water was perfect..... 👍🏻Awsm video ❤️
Stunning! WOW love EVERYTHING about your videos! From the host (who is fun, friendly, engaging, natural, clear to understand, and more) to the content, the visuals, the background sound, the holistic full-spectrum perspective, I can go on and on! Thank you
Thanks a bunch! Really appreciate it :)
I assumed that bioplastics and composites can be made from biomass of any plant not just corn. Besides a soy car, Henry Ford also made a hemp car! The true solution for all our packaging needs may be in hemp paper and hemp waxed paper and glass!
Indeed. I'm really surprised why hemp is just not being brought up in these conversations??
@@crazydragy4233 becuase they don't really want to tell you the truth. They want to sound like they are to justify their position.
(Example being they seem to say that it would use up all the corn but never mentioned anything about using the biproduct/the stalk which is just as useable)
Any starch can be used - corn, potato, tapioca, beet, arrowroot, whatever.
Great video, except you didn't mention hemp or algae at all. Which from what I have heard would be far better plant materials than any of the one's mentioned in the video to make bio-degradable plastic. Hemp is literally one of the easiest things to grow (it's a weed) and requires way less pesticides and algae could be grown in giant off-shore ocean farms that are way more eco friendly and won't take up additional space in agriculture.
Thanks for the input, we are actually planning a video on algae and its potential use as a fossil-based plastic substitute. It's a very new and exciting field that we wanted to dedicate a separate video to!
@@DWPlanetA Awesome.! I look forward to watching it when it's out
@@DWPlanetA Is the video (on algae) available now? Would love to watch it.
The point is that just putting the word "bio" in front of something like plastic but creating the same polimer that will never degrade in a million years doesn't solve anything. Algae, hemp, potatoes, soy, whatever, makes no difference what the source is.
Thank you for your research, honesty and accessible educaation for the public that this world need, thank you to all researchers and people on set bring us current and lifechanging information each friday!
Thank you! :)
More zero waste shops needed! I get so annoyed with vegetables wrapped in plastic. My local greengrocer uses brown paper bags - I know I can put them in my home composting. My organic veg and fruit usually come loose in the brown paper sack ( which I return each week, as they re-use them). Many of our magazines now come in a film that says it's compostable - I don't know if this is right, so I put them in my garden compost bins, to see what happens. I note that my Radio Times which used to come in the potato starch film has now changed to using a paper envelope instead ( I hope it's made from recycled paper).
Excellent having this kind of videos explaining such keen environmental themes!
Oh, surprise. Companies have to owe it up when plastic is unavoidable. You can't leave it to the consumer.
I can't help but think this video was sponsored by the petroleum industry. The technology is obviously gonna evolve. A few years ago a compostable bioplastic store shopping bag cost $1-$3 per bag. Now its down to $0.01-$0.02 per bag and continues to get better in quality. This video erroneously says we have to grow more corn to fit needs while ignoring all the agriculture and food processing that throw away parts of plants not used, but which can be used for bioplastics. Again, no one is advocating for non-degrable bioplastics except companies greenwashing.
Nothing will change until we make plastic biodegradable and make it large scale
Big corporations should be the one responsible for contributing great to plastic pollution, the people or consumers are always blamed yet they dont have a choice
Canada passed a law that puts the burden of waste on the company that made it. Walmart plastic bags found as litter for example means the company will be fined even if they were not the one who disposed of the bag. Let's see how effective this method will be.
I had actually come to this conclusion a few years ago -bio-plastics are still . . . plastic. If I can't throw it in my home compost pile and have it degrade (implying that it would also naturally degrade in the environment,) it's not a solution.
Very nice video. Have you ever heard about PHAs (Polyhydroxyalkanoates)? The behaviour of this material is different compared to other bioplastic like PLA.
Watching these videos just reminds me there is no way to shop ourselves out of our major problems.
To add some more data, half of all global corn production represents 1/15th of global food production (Caloric values per crop/animal vary, though a global average for each of them would be great to make this data useful).
Though considering a shift towards less per capita red meat consumption is needed, in order to account for a wealthier and more populated world, the savings in caloric efficiency (feeding cattle isn't as efficient as crops) might make bio-plastics more viable than it sounds.
All that "eat less meat" bullshit had already been debunked. The vegan agenda will disappear faster than trans athletes fleeing weightlifting competitions.
@@besouniveirs.1643 The GHG impact of a red-meat intensive diet, comparable to a no red meat omnivore diet exists. Just because you can’t stomach peer reviewed studies that contradict your world view doesn’t make them fake. And to gaoeln, I’m Argentinian, not Filipino.
I’m not vegan, or vegetarian, as a matter of fact, my country has probably the cheapest access for quality meat in the developing world (after Uruguay), but just because I enjoy a product, doesn’t mean I don’t understand it’s environmental impact and it’s long term sustainability.
Let's not forget a lot of our crops are complete bullshit too, and even if they're any good the way they're farmed just makes that difference irrelevant.
Honestly I do not think that using bioplastics for coffee capsules, one way cups and tea bags is not a good idea. It's still waste, increases the amount of transportation (just compare one bag of coffee with the same amount of coffee capsules) - and there are quite good alternatives (e.g. tea eggs, actual coffee machines, ...). Using bioplastics for these situations is just green washing.
It is the laziness of the consumer. It can be so fun to grind coffee beans yourself. But for all solutions we have to find a solution for the cause, not the effect. That is no solution, that is just making it worse.
The only thing I worry about, especially with Covid and other diseases/sickness is that you almost have to use throw aways when sanitarily cleaning them isn't an option. Hospitals and even people stuck at home with others are more likely to use one time based takeout or needle caps. Is there any way to work around the crisis and still move forward?
For takeout people could bring their own container. Maybe make the containers themself more eco-friendly, if possible biodegradable. And give a discount to people who bring their own. If hospitals have to use some non-degradable plastic (and the degradable version is not good enough quality) thats sadly just how it is for now. But a whole bunch of unnecesary single time plastic use could be cut out. And I think maybe we should not be THAT fanatic about hygiene in everyday life (not hospitals), we need to go a bit more back to normal, disease will always be part of life and we cant stop spread entirely. But more people should get vaccinated, that could help with disease a lot
The concept of bio-plastics is only just taking off. Imagine if they actually have the same funding are petroleum companies. Or imagine if the US didn’t have such a hatred towards hemp.
@@tjmarx yeh, but you fail to recognize how fucking big the us actually is, the entirety of Britain, France, Italy, Japan, etc. Etc. Can fit within, if we don't get the us involved, then all of your efforts mean fuck all, not to mention they never once even implied that the us was the entire world, your just an insecure bastard who is projecting.
@@tjmarx Ok
@@tjmarx dude. do you realize that the sheep who buy into all this eco-friendly bullshit cannot comprehend a simple message of a video such as this.
All in all, it's just another method of making money off of fools. Create "bio-plastic" and people will buy it better, regarless of the fact how biodegradable it is.
@@tjmarx give me one example in the history of humanity where "people" have realized something and made a change that didn't bring them immediate benefit (real or perceived). There are none.
The climate change thing is too complex and people are programmed by natural selection to be extremely selfish (we wouldn't have survived otherwise) to ever really consider to do something about it.
The only logical and surefire solution is to decrease the number of people. But no one will ever consider this option because people are valuable. People themselves will never consider it as an option due to base instincs and powers who govern the world will not consider it because it will decrease their profits.
Every country tries to increase its birthrate and decrease the deathrate. Not because they care about their people, but because the more people you have, the more workers you have, the more taxes they pay.
I don't understand how people don't see these simple truths. Well nevermind, i do. Some people are stupid and actually believe that they can make a change. Others simply like to feel superior and show their superiority by being morally "better" to others by "combating the climate change".
we humans will NEVER get away from plastics, petroleum-based anything.... the computer being used, the steel water bottle top, (the rubber gasket), cell phones, and whatever, where-ever...
I was wandering how biodegradable plastics are made and how it will interact with nature.Now I know.Thanks for bringing this topic.
So, what I have guaged from this is that for this to really work we need to go back to small sustainable communities where products are produced locally and disposed of locally. That or the best solution I believe is instead of pushing the carbon footprint onto the consumer or offsetting in other ways - the manufacturer needs to take responsibility of the disposal of their products. If you want to solve environmental problems, the quickest and easiest way is to make the supplier of products responsible for the disposal and the environmental impact.
It is funny how she didn't mention hemp and show it is made and talk about its biodegrablity.
Heyyy, we did a whole video on hemp you can watch here 👉 ua-cam.com/video/0O-IodgG8a4/v-deo.html 🍀
This makes a vital argument: the fork that appears briefly at the very end is stainless steel but could probably be used for over a hundred years and still be recycled afterwards. A truly circular economy will need to include a massive reduction in production of materials from natural resources. As always it comes down to how we run our economy. The first steps have already been taken - see Kate Raworth's book "Doughnut Economics" - and there are enormous political hurdles that need to be overcome. If only we had more time! But, that said, we did have time and didn't use it well.
You mean like putting
milk, soda, beer etc in glass?
Seems like I remember.... 🤔
Yeah because multiton economy tankers can carry around infinite weight on their backs and only volume matters
@@mikeyvesperlick6982 I mean the whole system is trash so like, no wonder good ideas aren't viable. If only our economy wasn't based purely on the interest of the richest individuals.
Or cans. Or put a pound of coffee beans in a single bag instead of 5 grams of ground coffee in a little plastic cup and all those plastic cups into another plastic bag, in a box, in plastic wrap, in another box.
If it looks like plastic
If it react like plastic
If it feels like plastic
And it smells like plastic
Its probably plastic !!!!!!
Hey DW your anchors are so friendly , we easily understood them
I don't know... I created a rapid liquid digester, and the compostable bioplastics are totally gone in a few days. Not as fast as most food items that might be gone in a few hours, but on par or slightly faster than corn husks for example. Seems pretty reasonable to me.
Thanks so much. I wished more people like you would have a voice in the European Parlament to help making better decisions
Thankyou for this great point of view, it makes me think hard :D, but i'm enjoy it to brainstorming about this case. I got your point, yeah, the result are identical because it have a same of chemical compound. so it doesn't have any differences about BIO-PET and PET.
Let's trying to discussing about conventional plastics and bioplastics.
We know, that the main ingredient of conventional plastics (plastic bag type) is a polyethylene and you cannot make plastic, just from polyethylene, it have to be added some adictives, like a, if you want to make a LDPE (ex: plastic bag) you have to make the plastic more flexibile, it have to be added pthalate ester and you have to added another aditives, to increase the durability of the plastic too. But if you want to make a biodegradable plastic, the main ingredient is a celulose from plant or pati from cassava, etc. but again, we have to added some additives, to make plastic more flexible we have to added glyserol or sorbitol and to increase more durability it have to be added chitosan.
chitosan is not a toxic and biodegradable and pthlate ester is a toxic one.
So, i think when we used a point of view about the ingredient effect of bioplastic, i will say that was enviromentally friendly
but conventional plastic is'nt enviromentally friendly.
Companies and Government must make sign or sticker on every bio-plastic made product to easily determine which is bio or petro plastics by consumers. But also just like speaker of the video said , it is also easily to use conventional ways to use-less plastic in our daily life little by little until to its our habit. And also make or implement or redo a new strict, specific, and easily to understand policy or law that makes plastic use-less in private and public sectors even more. Make an advertisement or public pamphlet to give people idea of what , when , how , why we need to use bio-plastic as solution or permanent replacement of petro-plastic in our daily lives.
Amazing channel, keep up the exceptional work!
A couple years ago I saw a lot of green tinted compostable plastic. People got so confused. They weren't sure if they should throw it in the recycle or city compost. Now I don't see them as much.
This is the kind of information that consumers need to know. But it does all start with the producers, no getting away from that.
Most people and companies are so money focused that they forget to not kill all life on earth in the process. Sad.
Great video by the way!
This is very informative! Thank you for showing us facts/nonbiased info in regard to this topic. I am doing a bioplastic experiment with my 5th and 6th graders and this definitely makes me rethink how I will present the topic.
Yes, the first R is the best R, I really like the message here. Also, Kiyo is a natural, that is how one should present! ☺
One of the big problems with plastics oil based or plant based.. is additives to enhance their properties. These additives seep out of the plastics as they degrade. This will not change immediately with plant based plastic, as it takes a lot of research to know what to start from and how to treat it to get a certain property, that we could get so cheaply from the toxic additives we know work..
Thanks DW!
Lets not forget Fossil fuels were also once upon a time derived from organic biomass.
Let's try to shift the focus to reducing the amount of plastics produced as opposed to go in circles attempting to implement occasionally-applicable solutions to their disposal! That's what the plastic producer industry should be looking at, but who's there to make them?
The real long term solution it will be to reduce the production of plastics, and consumers, overpopulation plays a huge role in the environment degradation
The biggest issue is human stubborness. Still thinking we can just bend nature to our will and engineer/science all our problems away.
Important to balance this video with a few facts (happy to give sources):
PLA bioplastics are made from fermented plant starch such as corn, cassava, sugarcane or sugar beet pulp which are all renewable and sustainable resources, contrary to petroleum which depletes over time.
The renewable resources used for PLA Bioplastics are natural carbon sinks, contrary to petroleum based plastics which releases excess carbon when first extracted, distilled from crude oil and when burned in incinerators (source 1 - source 2). More than 50% of carbon emission in the U.S. incinerator plants come from petroleum based plastics.
PLA is up to 30 times less toxic than petroleum based plastics when heated (When heated, PLA gives off a non-toxic chemical called Lactide - source 3)
PLA is biodegradable (It can degrade naturally over time. Warm temperatures, high humidity and small particle sizes will make biodegradation even faster). Big pieces break down slowly as the microorganisms don't have high surface area available for enzymatic action. If the conditions for fast natural degradation are not met, PLA can be sent in industrial composts to accelerate the process. PLA is therefore a "cradle to cradle" material (it comes from earth and can be brought back to earth without harming natural habitats, including marine habitats). A PLA bottle left in the ocean would typically degrade in six to 24 months. Compared to conventional plastics (which in the same environment can take several hundred to a thousand years to degrade). Fungus can even grow on PLA particles in water after two weeks.
Soil mixed with composted PLA remains suitable for plant growth (source 4) despite a slight lowering of PH levels (The optimum pH range for many plants is between 5.5 and 7.5, PLA based soil is within this range).
PLA Bioplastic does not contain the hormone disruptors often found in traditional plastics - bisphenol A (BPA) .
PLA is mechanically stronger (stronger/stiffer) than most petroleum-based plastics.
Recycling alone cannot be a long term solution for any plastics: All plastics cannot be recycled forever, they have a limited cycles before their long chains of polymers are broken and cannot be used structurally. The material is then discarded or burnt whereas PLA can be brought back to earth.
I absolutely skip buying those products which I see are over packaged with plastic. Formed this habit as a new year resolution. And if it is helping nature then I am happy.
Great video. Of course the message of reduce the use of plastic goes against the whole consumerist mentality
Currently doing my fyp about bioplastics, thankyou you!!
An interesting idea but in the large scale of things it's barely an afterthought. Sadly if we want to make actual change then the system needs to be critically changed. And most people aren't on board with that.
I watched and I subscribed - it's a great production!
Many thanks! :)
My husband is a terror for buying carrier bags, and not the paper ones either, despite the bags for life we have at home. I got sick of it and have just bought a jute shopping bag and two string bags - now surely he can have no excuse. Our mothers had shopping bags and trolleys and brown paper bags with string handles when necessary; well he rejects the latter and I wait with bated breath the result of the shopping bags. Come on everyone make it acceptable again.
Wow, really really it's very informative for me. Because tomorrow I'm gonna show a presentation about plastic pollution solving to the Grand Final of Idea Generation Contest. So thank you thank you so much. It's very special for me♥️♥️♥️
Hope your presentation went well! 🍀
As usual, a very half-baked product from DW.
While yes, the final idea of reducing the use of plastic at all is right, everything else is just...questionable.
Some things, that are made from plastic are not supposed to be easily degradable at all. Why would it be a bad idea to replace petrochemical long-lasting plastic with bio-derived one?
More so, the mention of how much corn we need to replace petrochemical plastic with biobased one is very debatable and there are two reasons for that:
1. We already produce more food, than we need. And a giant amount of food is wasted instead of being consumed.
2. There are starch-based plastics, cellulose-based plastics, protein-based plastics, lipid-derived polymers, etc. Many of those are made out of waste and garbage.
Also, no mentions of cellophane?
The supermarket I work with has corn based plastic bags for fruit. A shame that there’s still quite a lot of plastic packaging esp in the meat sections
I wish I had seen this video when it first came out.
The gentlemen in the video snippets you present is John Bissel, co-founder and co-CEO of Origin Materials. His company has solved both the beginning-of-life and end-of-life plastic problems. They are in the process of commercializing these solutions at large scale.
The company uses pulpwood (waste material) -- extremely inexpensive and available in massive quantities -- and converts this lingo-cellulosic feedstock into CMF and HTC. The CMF can be carried through to PEF, which is a bio-degradable plastic that can degrade in nature (no need for a composting plant).
I wish you did additional research into the organization and scientist that you've included in this video. More thorough research would have certainly led you to a different -- and far brighter -- conclusion with respects to the feasibility of transitioning to bio-plastics.
@DW Planet A
I've said it before and I'll say it again 'plastics isn't the problem its the solution, and if we want to use less plastic we need other solutions to what ever problem it is solving in a given circumstance.' and then use 'better plastics' for those problems that don't have better solutions. I don't know a nurse alive that would call for a return to glass bottles and rubber hosing in phlebotomy conditions.
TLDR make plastic into trees.
There was a certain college who had did a project on a powerplant. They redirected the flue gas into a mini algae farm. (The algae farm looked wierd it had tubes and stuff)
Anyhow, since algae eats up Co2 and toxic heavy metal they basically made the would-be pollutive air...-cleaner.
The algae then could be used to make non edible fertilizer.
I was thinking what if we burned plastic and send the exhaust to an algae farm. (Since plastic is made from fossil fuel or ancient algae the algae would eat it as nutrients.) The algae could then be used as non edible fertilizer.
We can use the non edible fertilizer and make trees.
Simple solution, reduce plastic usage as much as possible. Use 100% recyclable cardboard, bamboo utensils, glass storage containers, etc.
DW, consumers are not good at separating trash. My city has three waste options. We supposedly recycle most plastics, paper, etc., compost, and have a landfill option. It's very confusing for people. I've seen regular plastic thrown in with the compost bins at our apartment complex. I've seen plant based compostable plastic thrown in the regular recyclable plastics. I wonder how does the city deal with this??
I loved the presenter. She is so easygoing
This is a nice helpful documentary. I never knew anything about any of these things
So when foodstuffs are not consumed as food but for plastics how is that a good idea? Non foodstuff plastics like algea or bioplastic are the way to go... less energy required and food is not being taken out of circulation. Could we go back to glass or alternatives? Glass can be recycles and biodegrades too. this report was good.. facts and no BS!
PLA is what you want, we don't want our plastics, like our car to spontaneously degrade, but we do want to have them degrade completely in a compost heap. These compost heaps also produce heat, which can be harvested.. we have the technology for ideal curcumstances.. we just don't see it and therefore don't have the infrastructure
Thank you for this contribution!
we must learn how to convert rocks and sandto replace plastics. we are now in the most advanced time of our generation, so we must be able to do it now.
Sand to plastic? They call it glass I guess...
"Carbon footprint" just means more opportunity to plant trees to utilize that exhale. Good video overall.
Thank you for video like that...it have been exctining and informative
What about bio-plastic made from Hemp? Hemp requires almost zero water nor pesticide to grow. Would it be a good alternative?
the problem is that there is a too much demand
If you cannot tell the difference, how on earth can the different bottles be recycled sustainably?
Aren’t all plastics technically bio plastics? Only difference being production timescale
Very educational. But depressing at the same time. Reduce and Reuse plastics.
I like your point about the best solution being using less of any sort of plastic, but there is a solution you didn't mention in this video that solves ALL the problems you mentioned that the other bioplastics have....check out plastic made of industrial hemp. Growing hemp returns carbon into the soil, it can be composted completely within 3 to 6 months, with zero toxic chemicals released. Hemp requires no pesticides or fertilizers to grow, uses far less water than any crop in existence, and it is four times stronger than conventional plastics. It is considered a net zero carbon emission since it takes carbon from the air and returns it to the soil naturally, through photosynthesis, and it actually gos one step further and removes heavy metals and toxins and even radiation from the soil, healing the earth. Hemp grows incredibly quickly in all sorts of biomes, even in northern climates like Canada, and it requires and releases absolutely no toxic chemicals into the air, soil or water at any stage of its existence. Every part of the plant has many uses. The seeds are also considered a superfood. Talk about a miracle super plant! It has more than 50,000 uses and more each day. I truly believe hemp will revolutionize every industry. Correction on one point in the video ... Ford used Hemp, not plastic derived from soy bean plants, to make a car in the 1940's, and even used a hemp derived ethanol fuel to power it.
What we need to do is cut consumption of resources, period.
I think the solution is also to work towards bioplastics that are easily composted. for example, algae based plastics.
What about the carbon footprint of using alternatives to plastic? Although I agree that ideally we need to just avoid plastic entirely, the fact is that if we just exchange plastic for e.g. glass, this doesn't solve the problem, in many cases it makes it worse. We need to consider the environmental cost of producing plastic alternatives, the impact on transporting goods in alternative containers (glass is heavier and bulkier and requires more packaging so it wastes more fuel to transport it), and the impact on shelf-life (plastic has been used so extensively *because* it so effectively seals food allowing it to last longer).
The point is that this is not a simple problem to solve, and simply avoiding plastic at this stage may cause a larger ecological disaster. I think one area that we can concentrate on now which may help solve the problem in the short-term while we find a long-term or permanent solution to these problems is pushing for greater advances in soft-plastic recycling. If we transition to using much more soft-plastics and invest in perfecting the recycling techniques, we can dramatically reduce plastic waste in the short-term, and simplify the consumer's job in sorting garbage and recycling. Of course we need to massively overhaul our recycling system as well given the manifold issues with that, but it's a viable short-term solution while we work to develop the long-term solutions that forever remove all plastic from our daily lives.
If you would like to know more about carbon footprint, watch our video: ua-cam.com/video/vqZVCEnY-Us/v-deo.html
@@DWPlanetA Thanks, I'll check it out
@@DWPlanetA Ah ok, I watched the video. No real new info there - I mean the video was posted this year but contains information that was widely known like 10 years ago. Still appreciate you posting it and helping to keep raising awareness.
Not really sure how it relates to my comment above which agrees completely with the content of that video - that we need consumer choices to push government and industry to start putting into effect better systems that reduce carbon emissions on a mass scale.
@@EfHaichDee when glass was used, milkmen refilled bottles. They didn't make new bottles. If they did, we'd run out of glass.
Beside, we used to use lots of paper. And nobody was drinking coca cola before the twentieth century.
@@موسى_7 Yeah, there's also 7 x as many people in the world now. Still think we have enough glass?
Even if we made enough bottles, that's glass that's locked into a single purpose and can't be used for anything else.
We're already making significant progress towards making plastics infinitely recyclable. We've found worms and fungi that can break down styrofoam and plastic. The science is new, but this is a more realistic long-term solution to the problem. We just need to do something in the short-term to reduce the immediate issue. As in my comment above, yes, reducing plastic plays an important part, but replacing everything with glass isn't going to work - it's just not practical for most use cases, and it has a much much larger environmental impact (the waste issue only makes up about 5% of the entire environmental footprint of a product. Most of the impact has already occured during manufacturing and extraction of materials, and plastic has a much smaller impact across every step in the lifecycle except the last one)
Another good video, keep it up
Ship all non-biodegradable plastic back to the company that sold it to you. If we ALL do that you can be sure that the company will find a way to a) dispose of it, and with the attendant press coverage most likely in a responsible way, and b) come up with a better method for packaging their products. Same thing for grocery stores. Just start dumping your waste plastic from the store onto the floor of the department from which it was purchased.
This one I really loved! It was perfect, thanks.
Wonder how much petroleum it takes to grow, harvest, transport, and make the plants into plastic. They say 2/3 -to 3/4, but immediately correct themselves to just say really it is less.
I'm curious, what if we burned all of our regular trash in power plants to generate electricity to power recycling facilities to recycle plastics, glass and paper products? Would that be economical? Or should we just burn all of our waste, plastics, trash, wood, tyres etc. to generate electricity and free up space and eliminating a need for landfills.