Plastic Pollution and Prevention N.B.Nirmal Founder, ExNoRa International Environmental NGO,Chennai I am going to talk to you about plastic pollution. We call it plastic pollution prevention. P3. And it can be dealt very easily by M3. M3 stands for minimum use of plastic, with plastics I don t mean all kinds of plastics except the thin carry bag, which really causes, we should use thin plastic bags. And second M stands for maximum reuse of plastics, in case you get plastic bag, don t get along, its not a snake or bacteria, you can use it as long as you want. Finally, mandatory, the third M stands for mandatory recycling or safe disposal, the third option; fortunately, the central pollution control board has permitted the use of plastics fully only in the cement industry and not any other industry. Some people wrongly use it in brick; you should not do that, only in the cement industry. You can ask why, very simple, when you burn plastic, it emits smoke which they say is cause genic, but the temperature of cement industry doesn t cause pollution, its proved by scientist, so it s used by cement industries as fuel. P3 also has a nick name, as a child has a nick name, we call it pala pala, in Tamil it means glittery. Now where the exact problems lie, I want to say. Today relation between plastics and humans has become compatible; something like made for each other, not even a day could be without using plastic bags. It applies to you, me and everybody. It has become part and parcel of our life. People have become plastic bag addicts, as they are not aware of the hazardous nature of plastics. Using a plastic today People are eagerly accepting plastic bags and discarding them all around carelessly. While they travel, they throw plastic carry bags through the
windows of any modes of transport (trains, buses) making the whole nation a massive dust bin. Plastic pollution is indeed an insidious and the most ignored environmental health problem, P3 and M3. The planet and humans are getting wrapped by plastics; here see the pictures, a man wrapped by plastics you can see. It s a plastic world, grocery stores, textile shops, hotels, pharmacies, and vegetable and fruit vendors, supermarkets deliver goods in plastic bags. Even the flower vendor packs flowers in subtle plastic bags, the temple priests delivers prasadams including, we call it vibudhi, the white ash and kumkum in plastic bags and satchels. They do because plastic carry bags occupy very less space in the shop unlike other packing materials, think about cardboards, or even cloth bag or jute bag, it would occupy lot of space, the shop is already of less space. That is why they want to use plastic carry bags. It is easy to advertise on it, putting the sellers name, address, contact details and plastic bags are reusable again as shopping bag, trash bag, and in fact there are given 60 uses of plastic carry bag which I will be sharing with you now. And again packing is very easy; you just need to drop the things inside the plastic bag, unlike the newspaper. You can carry more goods as it expands. It is less expensive, reasonably strong and attractive. That is why we are using plastics, without knowing the problems of plastics. But let us see the darker side of plastics. Everyday items such as plastic bottles, toothbrushes, plastic bags, etc seem so harmless. But these items and others composed of plastic do not break down for tens to hundred years. They either persist in landfills or are eventually washed into the waterways and the ocean. In the ocean, plastics either remain in whole pieces or are broken down into tiny pellets. Ocean currents and storms carry theses plastic items far out to sea or where they accumulate in greys (large areas with water moving in a vortex pattern) or even wash up on remote islands. Tiney filter-feeding animals often ingest the plastic pellets. Larger animals such as sea turtles and sea birds mistake the larger plastic pieces for food, or prey on these smaller animals so that the plastic particles travel up the food chain. This is the plastic river, its not our country, fortunately, the dirtiest river they call it and here we see the plastic bags floating like jelly fish.
The polythene plastic carry bags is not bio degradable, it prevents water percolation in to the soil, the ground water recharges with plastics. Plastic dumped on the land; choke the earth for hundreds of years, making the soil unfertile. These are the pictures. Plastic strews in gutters and drains results in stagnation of water which in turn encourages the growth of disease causing bacteria and breeding of mosquitos. Plastic pollute ground water through leaching of toxic substances. Animals, particularly cattle eat plastics and die. Fishes prey on plastic carry bags as their food mistaking for jelly fish and face drastic disorder or die. Eating food like sambar or surd rice packing in plastic bags can cause serious health problems. Plastic bottles have bisphenol A. commonly abbreviated as BPA, it is an organic compounds with two functional groups of phenol. It is dysfunctional building block of several important polymers and polymer additives. It s being produced 2-3 million tonnes annually. It is an important monomer in the production of poly carbonate. Suspected of being hazardous to humans since the 1930s, concerning about the bisphenol A in consumer products grabbed headlines in 2008 when several governments issued reports questioning its safety and some retailers pulled products made from it off the shelves. But still more danger is people buying plastic for so many reasons, for people living in cold climate during winter, they use plastic to create heat. You can see in the picture and make a mistake that an easy way to dispose plastic is to burn it, if we burn it the plastic which causes problem at a particular location as a solid waste becomes cautious waste, the toxins spread around several square kilometres. The concept The P3 by M3ExNora has solved strategies to overcome the plastic menace particularly plastic carry bag. This is essentially an inventively driven idea. Though we all are well aware, that the indiscriminate use of plastics poses a grave threat to our society and planet the several hazards attributed to plastic have been ignored and suppressed, but it s time to raise the curtain as well as spread awareness, on this alarming problem.
Now let us go to the alternatives available to the plastic bags. When plastic come to stay, now you have to find other means of carrying products, the goods which you are buying. We have in madras number of women who are making waste cloth bag or rags bag, they are made from tailors and ready garment manufactures and stich it and make it. It s really attractive actually, when you stich rags of different colours it becomes attractive like a fancy bag. And the second option is of course the cloth bag, and you make a thick cloth bag and they are available in usual designs because now people consider it is out of fashion to carry bag. Before people when they leave the house they use to take bag now nobody takes bag, so cloth bag is the next alternative. Of course the next wonderful thing is the jute bag. India is one of the largest producers of jute, particularly the east India, Bengal. Jute industry is there, they make a lot of products out of jute. You see these bags how beautiful they are and in so many colours available this for people to carry from home jute bags when they go for shopping and bring their goods in that. In fact, now the members have made bags which we can fold it and keep it inside your purse and unfold it when you want to buy. In fact another excellent idea I would say that we have done with cloth and jute now I go to newspaper. Many women are unemployed they want livelihood; many wonderful environmental related vocational are available for them one is newspaper bag. In fact we use particularly the Sunday magazine section; it is every colourful. In fact to make a bag, if one is well versed it takes only 2.5 minutes to make a bag. The bags depending on the size and quality sold between 2 4 rupees, sometimes even 5, this is very attractive, and this is actually waste newspaper. And there are some women who are trained to make bags while they watch TV, they make the bag. So there is no loss of time and this is what will motivate the people who want to get into the vocation of newspaper bag we tell them that you can do this work along with some other work; listening to music or seeing TV you can do that or even talking with your friend you can make a bag. For the users we tell that if you use a newspaper bag, you not only save the environment but while you wait for bus or train you can read your bag, though the news may be old, still it would be interesting for you as you have nothing to do, you read an article your knowledge increases from old newspaper bag. In paper bag itself we have Sugar Bagasse paper bag,
sugarcane when extracted while making sugar, the bagasse remains as waste but this waste is used as paper pulp. So when we use it we can compare with it normal paper from forest trees as against this sugarcane paper. Number 2: sugarcane can be grown every year, unlike the forest trees which if we cut it we have to wait for 30 or 40 years so better we use this. Government call it tamil nadu news print; they make paper only out of sugar bagasse as its eco-friendly, so you don t kill trees. I want to share what happened with my daughter. In USA when you go to a shop they always ask a question whether you want a paper bag or plastic bag and people s awareness level is high. People who have aversion towards plastic bags, they go for paper bag but the truth is in case of plastic may be destruction will start after you take the bag. In case of paper it starts before you are going to make a purchase because they kill a tree and then the paper is made out of the tree. And in plastic bags, they find its place to the sea and many fishes mistake it for jelly fish and eat and die. The sales lady in the department store my daughter went to asked her, instead of asking normally a sales lady asks you want a paper bag or plastic bag, she asked you want to kill a tree or choke a fish. So the lady indirectly in a lighter way jokingly told both are wrong. So paper destruction starts even before you make a purchase and in case of plastic it starts afterwards. Do better carry your own bag. We have number of options like paper bag made out of waste paper bag, paper bag made out of bagasse and sugar bagasse. That is not all there are so many other renewable sources like banana tree. If you keep one beam of bamboo in front of the house, it will yield itself like a plant and they all grow very fast. It grows 85 feet tall, it will grow very fast, every year you can harvest and put new plants. It s excellent carbon zinc and it s a commercial crop it meets all ends. When we opt for paper bag instead of plastic it should not end in forest that is why I am giving these 2 options like banana tree or beam of bamboo. Of course then we have recycled paper bag. Why I put it 6, I will tell you that. Where I buy any things I see if it can be recycled, that thing is good option but it is not so.
You cannot be buying because it can be recycled, because recycling you don t get it free. Recycling is don t by spending a lot of natural resources. Recycling industries cause pollution, so this is very important. So here recycled paper bags come only in the 6th option because recycling itself causes pollution. I want to tell you an incident, if you are interested to know, cykies cycling or cyc cycling. What is cyc cycling? Even before you buy any product there should be something that runs over your mind, we should see whether my buying will affect Mother Nature. So cyc cycling if you make probably you may not buy many hazardous things. You will not like anything packed in hazardous material. So plastic you will definitely avoid if you do cyc cycling. The way you go with your own bag is called pre cycling and then of course the 7th option may be the last option which is the paper bag. Paper bag means, unlike the other option here you see it comes from well grown up trees, you get huge quantity of paper, no doubt. If you use tree you get paper so this is the 7th option and next is the other option which is the biodegradable plastic bag. Lot of research is going on that. How far it can be degradable and all needs to be tested we can t simply buy it because someone says it biodegradable bag. Need to check and verify and again if you ask me that it costs money, so its put as an 8th option biodegradable plastic bag. And then last time when you went to the shop they gave you a plastic bag, you this time take it when you go to the shop. Bring your own bag also includes plastic bag, it s come to you after all it can still serve strong and you take it. That way you avoid taking other plastic bags and causing plastic pollution. So there are many options so one must definitely suit you. So I spoke to you so far about the options available the substitutes available. You can t suddenly withdraw plastic bag there will be vacuum and people wonder how to do shopping. Now I have given you so many options and believe it or not this will create and generate hundreds of job opportunities. There are SHG s for women they can be trained in making newspaper bag, paper bag. So varieties of industries are there you can call them micro entrepreneurs, they can start micro enterprises, guidance like you can guide them to start and banks will be willing to finance them. These all need very less capital and intensive at all. Ok now I told you how to avoid
plastics but ultimately you have plastics for you to deal with it. So that is why we call it pala pala, pala pala means shine, it glitters; so whatever glitters is not gold. What all can we do with plastic? One we found out was we can extract oil from plastic. Second I told you already that cement industries have been permitted to use plastics as fuel because they need heat. Wood or coal they can also use plastics so it is very high value, it burns well. Latest now it started in Germany a professor of Madurai College made it very popular. Mix it with bitumen when you lay a road, it won t stay longer. When it rains the road makes itself into pieces so the invention was you mix the bitumen plastic waste, the road will last longer than what originally it used to be. The fact Chennai corporation they want to lay all the roads using plastic. So it is not plastic road, you are mixing bitumen with it. Ok now I told you about the dangers of plastics and the so many options available but the problem is that we have become plastic addicts and we go to shop and say give me one more bag and we keep asking and plastic pollutes and I saw all the plants with plastic bags and the time that we wake up so I am going to give a very innovative idea how to deal with that and I think the students should take u this as a mission a war against plastic. So now that you need to approach 2 sets of people, 1st the shop keepers you have to motivate a shop keeper to sell and deliver goods in non-plastic bags and the other option mentioned and any business man will not instantly agree because you know he will have the fear of losing his clients. Suppose a bakery says he will not give plastic bags because he have been motivated by you, next day another bakery delivers in plastic bag probably that person may get more clients, this person may lose his clients, he may have to close his shop as well. So that s the alternative. So one hand you have to go but simultaneously we can have a novel idea P3M3. Go and address school, communities, colleges wherever people gather we give him a simple message that message, we give an eco-start, in star shaped sign a very huge one 3feet by 3 feet, you can keep on both sides one side in English hand Tamil. You select a shop where you see a sign eco start. Eco start is given to those buyers who are willing to sell and deliver goods in neoplastic bags. This is
very important. So you can see some shops receiving this so a dozen of shops have taken this and kept it and they are selling through non plastic bags and they have e not lost business because what we have did was we went to people students, went to place of worship churches and told people that you have to patronize and told very beautifully, if you patronize this shop you patronize mother earth. This is a kind of transaction deal we strike at people and people are happy to do this. So this is what is called a sig which will be displayed. So we have this idea and this helps in many regards. Lastly in case you have plastic bags, you don t need to throw it. We have given a long list; I am not going to read it, probably by seeing the screen. What are the things we do is clay handicraft and junk art. Under waste, we do what is called a scare crow for the paddy field where birds come and long list of things, saplings, rain coat made of plastic bags and use as car cover, trash can bags, long list is there for old plastic bags, instead of discarding it see that it serves at least some ten or twenty times of discarding so that it will reduce the plastic litter and it can also be used in marriages as glove because you re serving food. This list is being shown to you at longer interval. You can go through that, I think in all there are 70 uses of plastics being given. It s all some students like you, when we had a brainstorming they came with these ideas and very interesting if you look at it. Now it s for you to increase the list to 100 or 120, the plastic bag what you can do. Finally it has to M3, the last M is mandatory, recycling save disposal. What is Recycling, it can go to recycling industry. Safe disposal means it has to go to a secure land fill; third one is being used as a fuel. I think it s a very big formula; it s already a very big success. Another point I want to say is that, why plastic bag you find everywhere. So normally in India what we do we try to treat the symptoms not the disease, we talk of the consequences not the causes. So what we did we wanted to eradicate the disease, we found why there is a demand for recycling then we found out very startling which I am going to share with you, this is an important thing in case of plastic waste we don t know. The plastic costs no money but the transportation costs money; it is very light but occupies a lot of space. So what we do In streets where we motivate people, we ask people to collect the plastic, we
shred the plastic, we make them into buts and pieces, the truck can carry four times more weight, it can take more volume. So we make it economical, the transportation cost is cut down. Finally if you see we can make a lot of fun out of plastic waste, junk art, a new combination for children. At least they will have a satisfaction that they did something.see the camel how beautiful it is. You can make so many things. You know the main advantage with plastic waste is it increases the brain of children, they become more creative, they creative a junk art. So these are the important aspects of plastic. And you can create a plastic demon at least once a year, of course after school is over, children all understand that thin plastic causes havoc and it is intruded in our life and cause havoc. So it s time to say no to it. So we have to attract, somebody made a huge man of plastic, you can see the man how tall it is. So this one gives a visible message. I want to say that one of our members uses pet bottle, you know the huts thatch, and it s so dark inside, so day time also if they need electricity, they put water in the pet bottle and close it tight and keep it in the roof, it will be equal to some 50 or 60 watts bulb. They get light; the sunlight comes through the pet bottle and illuminated the house. So we can create lighting impact out of per t bottles and create something funny with plastic waste art. So I conclude this session on plastic waste, if you want to save the planet, the plastic is part of it. Think globally, act locally, and do domestically. Think globally; join discussion forums on the internet. Act locally means you must keep your street clean that is act locally litter free. Finally do domestically; you must do all eco-friendly activities in your home. It includes your College your school, office. If you do all the three put together, Think globally, act locally, and do domestically, it gives the answer. So wish you all the best and join please in saving the planet. Say good bye to plastic and in case plastic comes use all the ideas by us and encourage people to go for the substitutes which are there in plenty, which will give also hundreds of job opportunities. Make many people happy, make them live happily, is the message.