The majority of the environmental influences of many consumer products, including soft drinks, are connected to the products inside, not the packaging, according to University of Michigan environmental engineer Shelie Miller.
Stand in the soft drink aisle in the supermarket, surrounded by rows of brightly colored plastic bottles and metal cans, and it’s easy to conclude that the key environmental problem here’s an overabundance of single-use packaging: If we simply recycled more of them, we would go a long way toward reducing consequences.
When it comes to single-use plastics in particular, the production and disposal of packaging frequently represents only a few percent of a product’s lifetime environmental effects, based on Miller, writer of an article in the journal Environmental Science & Technology.
“Consumers tend to focus on the impact of the packaging, rather than the impact of the product itself,” said Miller, an associate professor at the School for Environment and Sustainability and director of the U-M Program in the Environment. “But mindful consumption that reduces the need for products and eliminates wastefulness is far more effective at reducing overall environmental impact than recycling.”
“Nevertheless, it is fundamentally easier for consumers to recycle the packaging of a product than to voluntarily reduce their demand for that product, which is likely one reason why recycling efforts are so popular.”
The mistaken belief concerning the fundamental role of plastic packing is One of five myths that Miller tries to debunk in her traditional wisdom-shattering newspaper, “Five misperceptions surrounding the environmental impacts of single-use plastic.”
The five most common misperceptions, along with Miller’s insights about them, are:
Plastic packaging is the largest contributor to a product’s environmental impact. In fact, the product inside the package usually has a much greater environmental effect.
The environmental impacts of plastics are greater than every other packaging material. Actually, plastic generally has lower overall ecological impacts than single-use metal or glass in most impact categories.
Actually, reusable products have reduced environmental effects only when they are reused enough times to cancel the materials and energy used to create them.
Recycling and composting are the maximum priority. Truth be told, the ecological benefits associated with recycling and composting are inclined to be modest when compared with efforts to reduce overall consumption.
“Zero waste” attempts that remove single-use plastics decrease the ecological consequences of an event. In reality, the advantages of diverting waste from the landfill are modest. Waste reduction and mindful consumption, such as a careful consideration of the types and amounts of merchandise consumed, are a lot bigger factors dictating the environmental effect of an event.
In her review article, Miller challenges beliefs unsupported by present scientific knowledge while advocating other environmental engineers and scientists to broaden the conversation–in their own research and in talks that shape public policy.
“Efforts to reduce the use of single-use plastics and to increase recycling may distract from less visible and often more damaging environmental impacts associated with energy use, manufacturing and resource extraction,” she said. “We need to take a much more holistic view that considers larger environmental issues.”
Miller stresses that she is not attempting to downplay environmental concerns associated with plastics and plastic waste. But to put the plastic-waste difficulty in appropriate context, it is critical to analyze the environmental impacts which occur at each stage of a product’s lifetime–by the extraction of natural resources and the energy needed to remake the thing to its final disposal or reuse.
Life-cycle assessment, or LCA, is a tool that Miller uses to quantify lifetime environmental effects in numerous categories, including climate change and energy use, water and resource depletion, biodiversity reduction, solid waste generation, and human and environmental toxicity.
Boxes, bottles and cans each single day, though a wide range of other environmental impacts are largely invisible to them. But LCA investigations systematically assess the entire distribution chain, measuring impacts that might otherwise be missed,” Miller explained.
Packaged food items, by way of example, embody largely invisible impacts that can include intensive agricultural production, energy production, and refrigeration and transportation throughout the distribution chain, along with the processing and production associated with the food and its packaging, she said.
Miller points out that the well-worn adage “reduce, reuse, recycle,” Commonly called the 3Rs, was made to provide an easy-to-remember hierarchy of the preferable ways to reduce environmental effect.
However most environmental messaging doesn’t highlight the inherent hierarchy of the 3Rs–the simple fact that reducing and reusing are recorded ahead of recycling. Because of this, consumers frequently over-emphasize the significance of recycling packaging rather than decreasing product intake to the extent possible and reusing items to prolong their life.
“Although the use of single-use plastics has created a number of environmental problems that need to be addressed, there are also numerous upstream consequences of a consumer-oriented society that will not be eliminated, even if plastic waste is drastically reduced,” she said.
“The resource extraction, manufacturing and use phases generally dominate the environmental impacts of most products. So, reduction in materials consumption is always preferable to recycling, since the need for additional production is eliminated.”
Source: https://umich.edu/