• About
    • Which Energy Mix is this?
  • Climate News Network Archive
  • Contact
Celebrating our 1,000th edition. The climate news you need
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
No Result
View All Result
  FEATURED
EXCLUSIVE: Hydrogen is Up, Pieridae is Out as German Chancellor Preps for Canada Visit August 15, 2022
Historic Climate Bill Passes U.S. House, Goes to Biden for Signature August 15, 2022
BREAKING: U.S. Senate Passes Historic $369B Climate Package August 7, 2022
Researchers Point To ‘Dangerously Unexplored’ Risk of Global Climate Catastrophe August 2, 2022
Koch Network Pressures Manchin, Sinema as Advocates Praise ‘Game Changing’ Climate Deal August 2, 2022
Next
Prev

Fossils Fund $186-Billion Investment Binge on Future Plastic Pollution

January 4, 2018
Reading time: 4 minutes

hhach/pixabay

hhach/pixabay

 

Fossil companies are one of the main sources of financing behind a US$186-billion investment boom in raw material factories that will drive a 40% increase in plastics production and risk “near permanent pollution of the Earth”, The Guardian reports in an exposé published last week.

The cash infusion from companies like ExxonMobil Chemical and Shell Chemical dates back to 2010 and translates into a dramatic increase in a “global plastic binge which is already causing widespread damage to oceans, habitats, and food chains,” the UK-based paper states.

And the “cracking” facilities destined to produce raw materials for an array of everyday plastic products take in the very feedstock that anti-fossil campaigners, renewable energy advocates, and electric vehicle enthusiasts have been working with increasing success to keep in the ground.

“Around 99% of the feedstock for plastics is fossil fuels, so we are looking at the same companies, like Exxon and Shell, that have helped create the climate crisis,” said Carroll Muffett, President of the U.S. Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL). “There is a deep and pervasive relationship between oil and gas companies and plastics.”

He added that “we could be locking in decades of expanded plastics production at precisely the time the world is realizing we should use far less of it.”

Greenpeace UK Senior Oceans Campaigner Louise Edge agreed that “we are already producing more disposable plastic than we can deal with, more in the last decade than in the entire twentieth century, and millions of tonnes of it are ending up in our oceans.” The Guardian notes that plastics produced each year roughly equal the weight of all humanity.

For American Chemistry Council (ACC) Chief Economist Kevin Swift, the boom is easy explain.

“I can summarize in two words: shale gas,” he told The Guardian. “There has been a revolution in the U.S. with the shale gas technologies, with the fracking, the horizontal drilling. The cost of our raw material base has gone down by roughly two-thirds.”

“The link between the shale gas boom in the United States and the ongoing—and accelerating—global plastics crisis cannot be ignored,” agreed CIEL Staff Attorney Steven Feit. “All this buildout, if allowed to proceed, will flood the global market with even more disposable, unmanageable plastic for decades to come.”

A Guardian investigation last year revealed that most of the million plastic bottles sold around the world each minute end up in landfills or at sea. And “campaigners warn that despite the rising tide of concern, powerful corporations are pressing ahead with a new generation of plastic production facilities that will swamp efforts to move the global economy away from single-use, throwaway plastic products,” the paper now notes.

“Although the majority of the new investment is in the U.S., the impact will ripple outwards in the form of vast new supplies of raw materials for plastics being transported to Europe and China,” adds Guardian reporter Matthew Taylor. The ACC casts the increase as a source of hundreds of thousands of jobs that ultimately reduces environmental damage, citing a study it produced in 2016.

“Advanced plastics enable us to do more with less in almost every facet of life and commerce,” said Council Vice President of Plastics Steve Russell. “From reducing packaging, to driving lighter cars, to living in more fuel-efficient homes, plastics help us reduce energy use, carbon emissions, and waste.”

The Guardian report has at least one environmental design and sustainable product specialist half-serious about throwing in the towel, searching for ways to divert the cascade of new plastic waste rather than trying to cut it off at the source.

“When one is flooded with cheap plastic there is no incentive to recycle. There is also not a chance, with that kind of investment, that there is going to be any kind of ban of single-use plastics,” reasons TreeHugger’s Lloyd Alter. “If anything, there will be more bans of bans.” That means “about the only thing worth doing with it is probably going to be burning it like they do in Scandinavia, but that has a bigger carbon footprint per kWh than burning coal.”

With that in mind, Alter’s tongue-in-cheek “modest proposal” is for builders to turn away from natural materials with low embodied energy. “Perhaps it is better to turn it into foam insulation and plastic building materials than it is to burn it,” he writes, “since leaving it in the ground is obviously not an option that is on the table.”

There are enough other health and environmental problems with plastics that Alter says he doesn’t mean the proposal to be taken seriously. “But the fact is, we are faced with an insurmountable problem of an industry that insists on making more plastics, in a world with no room for it.”



in Buildings, Community Climate Finance, International Agencies & Studies, Oceans, Oil & Gas, Supply Chains & Consumption

The latest climate news and analysis, direct to your inbox

Subscribe

Related Posts

Suncor Energy Plant_Max and Dee Bernt:Flickr
Ending Emissions

Fossils Would ‘Bust the Paris Agreement’ with Inadequate Decarbonization Plans

August 18, 2022
2
Ken Hodge/Flickr
Oil & Gas

No Path for Canadian LNG Exports to Europe, IISD Analysis Concludes

August 18, 2022
3
Steve Jurvetson/flickr
International Security & War

The Other Kind of Climate Change: Even a ‘Limited’ Nuclear War Would Trigger Starvation, Kill Billions

August 18, 2022
75

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

I agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy.

Trending Stories

Brocken Inaglory/wikimedia commons

State-Wide Megastorm Driven by Global Heating Could Drench California for a Month

August 15, 2022
1.1k
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Coal_Carbon_Capture_Technology_In_Use.png

Carbon Capture a ‘Dangerous Distraction’, 500 Organizations Warn Canada, U.S.

July 23, 2021
617
TGEGASENGINEERING/Wikimedia Commons

EXCLUSIVE: Hydrogen is Up, Pieridae is Out as German Chancellor Preps for Canada Visit

August 15, 2022
1.1k
Vinaykumar8687/WikimediaCommons

Solar On Track for ‘Staggering’ 30% Growth This Year

August 15, 2022
315
Early stages of construction on the Flamanville 3 nuclear reactor in France

Failing French Nuclear Plants Drive Up Electricity Costs as Heat Waves Cut Production

August 14, 2022
753
rawpixel

Common Medications Foil Body’s Ability to Cope with Hot Weather

August 15, 2022
205

Recent Posts

Suncor Energy Plant_Max and Dee Bernt:Flickr

Fossils Would ‘Bust the Paris Agreement’ with Inadequate Decarbonization Plans

August 18, 2022
2
Ken Hodge/Flickr

No Path for Canadian LNG Exports to Europe, IISD Analysis Concludes

August 18, 2022
3
Steve Jurvetson/flickr

The Other Kind of Climate Change: Even a ‘Limited’ Nuclear War Would Trigger Starvation, Kill Billions

August 18, 2022
75
kris krüg/flickr

Guilbeault Considering Alternatives to Releasing Toxic Tailings into Athabasca River

August 18, 2022
2
Ford F-150 LIghtning

U.S. Utility Plans to Draw Power from Ford Electric Pickups

August 18, 2022
2
power pylons sunrise grid

Midwestern U.S. Grid Investment Supports Massive Increase in Renewables

August 18, 2022
3
Next Post

Dunkirk, France Fights Poverty, Air Pollution with Free Transit

The Energy Mix

Copyright 2022 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

Navigate Site

  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy and Copyright
  • Cookie Policy

Follow Us

No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities

Copyright 2022 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

Manage Cookie Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behaviour or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}