Write a paragraph on "Reuse of single use plastic".
Answers
Explanation:
Single-use plastics are in the spotlight, as more and more people opt to reduce them. This even includes businesses like Hyatt Hotels and McDonalds in the U.K. and Ireland—as well as Starbucks, whose plan to go plastic-straw-free by 2020 will save one billion straws per year.
Places around the world, like the U.K., Taiwan, Seattle, San Francisco, Montreal and Vancouver, are joining the plastic-free movement. That means reducing straws, cotton swabs, microbeads, and/or plastic bags. And for places like Ireland and Hong Kong, the movement is working. Plastic bag levies have lead to high reductions in plastic bags use. It has dropped as much as 90 per cent in Ireland since the introduction of the levy in 2002. Some cities and counties in the U.S. also have their own plastic bag bans and levies in place.
WHAT ARE ‘SINGLE-USE PLASTICS?’
Let’s take a step back and define ‘single-use plastics’ for a moment. What are they? A 2018 U.N. Environment report on single-use plastics defines them as plastic “items intended to be used only once before they are thrown away or recycled.”
Examples of single-use plastic include:
plastic forks and knives
plastic shopping bags
plastic coffee cup lids
plastic water bottles
Styrofoam and plastic take out containers
and, of course, plastic straws
According to the U.N. Environment, the most common single-use plastics found in the environment (in order of magnitude) are:
cigarette butts
plastic drinking bottles
plastic bottle caps
food wrappers
plastic grocery bags
plastic lids
straws and stirrers
other types of plastic bags
foam take-away containers
Why Are Single-Use Plastics Bad?
Single-use plastics may represent the epitome of today’s throwaway culture. The U.N. Environment reports just nine per cent of the world’s nine billion tonnes of plastic has been recycled. Most of our plastic ends up in landfills, our oceans and waterways, and the environment. Plastics do not biodegrade. Instead they slowly break down into smaller pieces of plastic called microplastics.
Research shows the effects plastic has on the Earth as well as on humans. It can take up to thousands of years for plastic bags and Styrofoam containers to decompose. In the meantime, it contaminates our soil and water. The toxic chemicals used to manufacture plastic gets transferred to animal tissue, eventually entering the human food chain. Styrofoam products are toxic if ingested and can damage nervous systems, lungs and reproductive organs.
For many animal species, plastic waste is simply a nightmare