Interesting Facts about Plastics

 Plastic discovery is the worst things ever discovered by scientists. Plastic was invented way back in 1907. Pollution due to plastics is most severe problem of the world now these days. Plastics are made from fossil fuels. Even now days we can’t expect life without plastics. Plastics has made revolutionary changes in human life such as it has changed the following: -

1.       Medicines

2.       Makes Vehicles lighter which ultimately saves fuel

3.       Lifesaving equipment such as helmets, equipment for clean drinking water

4.       Daily packaging items for daily use

There are very interesting facts about plastics which you must know: -

1.       The whole plastic which has been ever made still exits as life of plastic considered to be more than 450 years. So to naturally decompose the plastics it will take 450 years.

2.       Making plastics consumes lot of water. Approx. 22 gallons of water is required to make 1 pound of plastic.

3.       Now you will see that for making a water bottle double amount of water is required against packed quantity of water.

4.       Only 10% of plastic is recycled worldwide.

5.       50% of the plastic total available in the market is made in last 15 years.

6.       In oceans approx. 1 truck of plastic is getting dumped every minute, there is an approx. 17.6 billion pounds of plastic already in oceans

7.       According to estimates one plastic bottle if recycled will save an electricity of 360 W.

8.       One ton of recycled plastic will save following

(i)                  5700 kWh of electricity

(ii)                680 Gallons of oil

(iii)                95 million BTU’s of energy

(iv)               1 ton of plastic constitute 25000 plastic bottles

(v)                Saves 1.5 ton of carbon

9.       Plastic bags and plastic garbage is killing 1 million sea creatures every year.

10.    There are approx. 13 billion of plastic bags are legally issued i.e. 300 bags per adult.

11.   If by this rate we keep on dumping the plastic in ocean than by 2050 there will be more plastics than fishes and aquatic life in oceans.

12.   Plastics are made from natural material such as:-

(a)    Coal

(b)    Natural gas

(c)     Crude Oil

(d)    Cellulose

(e)    Salt

They are made after polymerization of polycondensation process.

13.   Apart from marine line other animals and birds also eat up the plastics and they ultimately died due to these plastics.

14.   Majority of plastics are non-biodegradable which means that they will break down into smaller and smaller particles but they don’t extinguish entirely from the environment. Recent studies have shown that in human bodies microplastics has been found i.e. those plastics which have size lower than 5 mm. Microplastics has been found in toothpastes, water bottles, cosmetics etc.

15.   Now we can see that Plastic has already entered into our food chain. As the micoplastics has been getting entered into animals and fishes and when people eat them these microplastics getting entered into the human body. The consequences of these are already we are seeing in our daily life.

 

To overcome this problem, we have to minimize the plastic usage.  You can avoid or minimize the plastic usage by following means: -  

(i)                  Always Remember to take cloth bags for buying something from the market.

(ii)                The Milk packing bags are recyclable so don’t throw them into dump collect them and deposit the same with recyclers.

(iii)               Avoid disposal made from plastics instead use disposal made from other biodegradable materials.

(iv)               Always fill drinking water in steel water bottles before leaving house in order to avoid buying a plastic bottle from market. This will save your money also.

(v)                Always try to buy packing’s with high quantity in order to generated lower waste from plastics.

(vi)               Replace your items made from plastics to steel or glass made items.

(vii)             Consider buying paper packing instead of plastic packing.

Above mentioned are simple ways of reducing the plastic usage and further you become own expertise in this field you try to reduce plastic usage.