Petsko, E. (2022, September 27). California’s bold move to Curb Plastic Pollution. Oceana. Retrieved January 29, 2023, from https://oceana.org/blog/californias-bold-move-to-curb-plastic-pollution/
Because of California’s big economy, California has a big plastic problem too. On June 30, The Plastic Pollution Prevention and Packaging Producer Responsibility Act or Senate Bill 54 was signed. The bill requires companies to reduce their plastic consumption by 25% over the next 10 years and it estimates that it will eliminate 23 million tons of plastic waste in this time frame. California spends $420 million annually to reduce and clean up plastic, but this law will finally implement a long term solution to this issue.
This article explains the plastic prevention act that was signed just in 2022 in order to eliminate plastic waste specifically in California. This relates to environmental science by showing the correlation between environmental clean up and our government. Environmental science exists to keep our world safe and our environment thriving, so ways to keep it in good conditions relates to environmental science. This article does a good job of explaining Senate Bill 54 and how it will help California in reducing plastic use and recycling plastic.
While this is definitely a good idea, American society already produces nearly 80 million metric tons of plastic yearly so 23 million tons in a 10 year span doesn’t seem that significant in amidst 800 metric tons of plastic on average per decade. But, progress is progress nonetheless and any attempt to curb plastic production, and later pollution, is welcomed. Do you think that it is plausible for companies to curb their plastic at an even higher percentage or do you think that any more than 25% plastic reduction would be economically unfeasible?
Thank you for reading my response! While I agree that eliminating 23 million tons of plastic is not going to solve everything, I think its one of the biggest steps we can take, so no, I do not think it is possible for companies to curb their plastic at a higher percentage rate.
I think this is an obvious win for pollution, given our plastic problem is out of control. My concern however is that this does not really seem to be that significant in the grand scheme of plastic waste. California is only a small part of the world, so eliminating a quarter of our plastic waste probably won’t make that big of a dent in say the pacific garbage patch for example. I’m wondering if these kinds of regulations are practical/scalable. I feel like these policies can be expanded with time and energy.
Thank you for reading my response! I think these regulations are pretty scalable and would be able to expand throughout the United States.