{"id":8453,"date":"2019-04-17T14:00:28","date_gmt":"2019-04-17T13:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theoillamp.co.uk\/?p=8453"},"modified":"2019-04-17T14:00:28","modified_gmt":"2019-04-17T13:00:28","slug":"oxo-degradable-plastics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theoillamp.co.uk\/?p=8453","title":{"rendered":"Oxo degradable plastics"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"plastic<\/a>There was a letter in today’s Guardian about oxo degradable plastics.\u00a0 I’d never heard of the term before and decided to do a bit of research.\u00a0 Conventional wisdom is that plastics do not degrade.\u00a0 Or at least only on a geological timescale.\u00a0 Conventional wisdom is largely right.\u00a0 Polyvinylchloride (PVC) is degraded by heat and light and releases hydrochloric acid, which isn’t great.\u00a0 Polypropylene is pretty much regarded as non biodegradable.\u00a0 Most plastics do break down into small nano-particles.\u00a0 Then progress stops.\u00a0 Research this week has found these are present almost everywhere in supposedly pristine environments.\u00a0 Other research has found that they are in the food chain and therefore in us.\u00a0 The longterm biological effects of this are unknown.\u00a0 They are unlikely to be too serious for the plastic itself, which is as alluded to above is biologically inert.\u00a0 The problem is the effects of the plasticisers.\u00a0 These are chemicals that give the same plastic different physical properties.\u00a0\u00a0 These plasticisers mimic hormones in the body.\u00a0 Large pieces of plastic of course have detrimental effects on wildlife.<\/p>\n

A number of solutions have been proposed to this problem.\u00a0 The first has been so called bioplastics.\u00a0 These are polymers largely made from natural polymers (e.g cellulose) using renewable feedstocks.\u00a0 These are mostly, but not totally biodegradable.\u00a0 Broadly speaking compounds are biodegradable when bacteria or fungi have seen them in evolution before and therefore possess enzymes capable of degrading them.\u00a0 This is not the case for oil based plastics.\u00a0 We outlined the problems with bioplastics in our book<\/a>.\u00a0 Basically in replacing our massive plastic use we need a lot of plant based feedstock.\u00a0 This is not possible to do totally.\u00a0 But these materials will have a place in a post oil world.\u00a0 Another issue is that bioplastics do not have either the durability or entire range of properties of oil based plastics.<\/p>\n

The next solution to the problem is the circular economy.\u00a0 Recycle and reuse what we have in new products.\u00a0 Some progress is being made on this.\u00a0 One problem is that plastics do degrade when reused.\u00a0 Not enough to destroy them but enough to make them unusable.\u00a0 This is a particular problem in mixed recycling.\u00a0 So this is not a total solution either.\u00a0 Chemical methods of destruction using heat are being developed.\u00a0 These would allow the resulting material to be reused perhaps de novo<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The next solution is to find bacteria or fungi that can breakdown conventional plastics.\u00a0 Again some progress is is being made.\u00a0 This is probably of more interest in bioreactors as a means of disposing what we produce at some point in the future.\u00a0 But for what’s out there now it won’t work.\u00a0 Bacteria and Fungi will degrade compounds that are simpler, easier nad more abundant first.<\/p>\n

Of course we mustn’t forget the solution of using less in the first place.\u00a0 Under public pressure companies are starting to alter the way that packaging is used.\u00a0 Walkers Crisps and Guinness (this week) are too examples.\u00a0 But the reader will know progress on this front is slow.<\/p>\n

Finally this brings us to oxo degradable plastics.\u00a0 These are plastics that contain small amounts of salt or metals.\u00a0 These act as a catalyst and allow oxygen to break the plastic down to short chain molecules such as ketones or organic acids.\u00a0 These bacteria will readily use.\u00a0 It sounds to good to be true.\u00a0 And to some people it is.\u00a0 The EU don’t believe it works.\u00a0 Other countries such as some in the middle east think it does and require its use.\u00a0 Even if it does work its not a total solution.\u00a0 Potentially it solves the litter in the environment bit. But not the use of non-renewable resources problem.<\/p>\n

There is not one solution to the plastics issue.\u00a0 All of the above are required.\u00a0 We have become addicted to these highly convenient materials.\u00a0 We need to reduce our use of plastics and look for alternatives, fast.<\/p>\n

Neil<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There was a letter in today’s Guardian about oxo degradable plastics.\u00a0 I’d never heard of the term before and decided to do a bit of research.\u00a0 Conventional wisdom is that plastics do not degrade.\u00a0 Or at least only on a … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[210,15,1],"tags":[258,257,61],"class_list":["post-8453","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-plastic-waste","category-practical-low-carbon-living","category-uncategorized","tag-oxo-degradable-plastics","tag-plastics","tag-renewable-energy"],"yoast_head":"\nOxo degradable plastics - The oil lamp - shining God's light on peak oil<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theoillamp.co.uk\/?p=8453\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theoillamp.co.uk\/?p=8453\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theoillamp.co.uk\/?p=8453\",\"name\":\"Oxo degradable plastics - 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