If the constant hurricanes and wildfires didn’t get your attention, the scientific bombshell should have. In October the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its latest report, Global Warming of 1.5 °C. The panel is a UN body of thousands of scientists that analyses all the latest scientific papers to draw conclusions. They found that in order to have a decent chance of avoiding the runaway climate change found above 1.5 degrees Celsius of warmi
If you stay on top of world news, then you already know that countries, cities, and individual companies are trying to reduce the amount of plastic waste littering the planet. In many places, single-use plastic bags, plastic straws, and plastic eating utensils have already been axed, but it will take a far greater effort to make a sizable dent in the problem of plastic pollution.
New Plastics Economy’s vision.
Microplastics are in bottled water, tap water, fish and seafood, and even table salt. There are more microplastics littering the planet than stars in the sky; it’s impossible to avoid them. Most recently, researchers have discovered microplastics in human poop, and you probably have some in yours, too.
The average adult ingests about 2,000 microplastics each year through table salt, a study estimates. That’s because the same study found that microplastics were present in 90% of table salt brands sampled worldwide. It’s next to impossible to avoid adding plastic to your baked potato when you sprinkle it with salt. [1]
Contact lenses are so small that it’s easy to think you can flush them down the toilet and they’ll simply dissolve, but that’s far from the truth. The scientists behind a study presented at the American Chemical Society’s national meeting and exposition warn that flushing contact lenses add to the problem of microplastics littering both land and sea.
Free public transit could combat both economic inequality and climate disturbances. And, if paid for by fees on automotive junkies, fare-less transit could be part of a serious challenge to private-car-centred transit/urban planning.
Plastic pollution is so prevalent that there’s nary a place on earth that is untouched by it, and the problem goes far beyond unsightly beaches and parks. A new study has found that flying insects contribute to plastic contamination by eating microplastics in polluted waters and carrying them through the air.
The first statewide refillable bottle system has come to Oregon, where 7 breweries now offer beer in returnable, refillable bottles. The program cuts down on plastic waste and lets people enjoy an ice-cold adult beverage without BPA and the other harmful chemicals that can leach out of the plastic lining of aluminum cans. [1]
Joel Schoening of the Oregon Beverage Recycling Cooperative (OBRC) explained:
As the flooding from Hurricane Florence dissipates, North Carolina residents could face significant public-health and environmental crisis after at least 17 animal waste pits, coal ash facilities, and human sewage plants across the state released millions of gallons of toxic liquid into nearby communities.
For years now NSA and the Pentagon have feared foreign terrorists poisoning aquifers and municipal water supplies.
Come to find out, forget those foreign terrorists! The poisoning is already happening, internally, homespun! ISIS and al Qaeda are not needed. We’re poisoning our own people without the assistance of professional terrorists.
It’s homespun terrorism, right here in the good ole US-of-A, and the Trump administration is turbo-charging that terrorism by hacking apart the EPA.
Want proof: Ask any long-standing EPA employee about it: They’re aghast!
