Plastics and Glass: A War Over Packaging’s Sustainability
The recent past had witnessed an important issue that came at the forefront of international deliberations. This kind of platform quite frequently saw the INC-5 meeting that was held at Busan, South Korea. Some of the issues over which world nations cannot put forward a consensus in an agreement treaty to combat this menace of plastic pollution are about restrictions in the production of plastics.
Though things are moving, there will still be a resumption of negotiations by 2025; plastic waste, however, is near the boiling point. Over seven billion tons of plastic have been produced to date. Only less than 10% of this gets recycled; the rest is mounting up in landfills, rivers, and oceans and contributes to pollution.
In this case, the interest has been focused on glass as a suitable alternative. But is glass intrinsically sustainable? Or is its environmental vulnerability too large to be dismissed? Let’s compare and contrast the environmental profiles of both these materials.
The Growing Plastic Problem
This would correspond to about 400 million tons of plastic waste being produced every year. These wastes are mainly produced through the generation of single-use plastic bottles. In the United States, for instance, 2.5 million plastic bottles are added to landfills every hour. In the environment, plastic bottles would take nearly 450 years to decompose. Persistence in the environment is one of the significant contributing factors to plastic pollution.
Global efforts toward plastic waste management involve recent discussions held at INC-5 negotiations but plastic waste just keeps piling up. According to United Nations Environment Programme, plastic packaging wastes an amount of around USD 80-120 billion every year. However plastic takes more time for degradation and damages the environment worse but still, there exists the problem: is glass a viable alternative?
Glass: The recyclable but heavier option
Many believe that glass is an eco-friendly material because it can be melted and reused a thousand times without losing its quality. However, just as glass may be more recyclable, then it also brings its own bag of problems. For example, 110 million bottles of glass are discarded every day in the U.S, out of which only third is recycled.
One of the environmental issues involving glass is its weight. The glass bottles weigh more than plastic bottles. This requires more energy in its production and transportation process; that is, more carbon is emitted during the production and transportation processes. Thus, the environment impact of glass is higher than that of plastic despite it being recyclable.
According to Echochain, a better comparison in terms of environmental impact is drawing up PET plastic bottles to glass bottles.
When in plastic, production would consume much energy but would weigh much less than glass. More material would therefore be required in packaging the same amount and that would mean higher transportation costs but bringing in emissions. The cost of energy in producing these glass bottles is much greater and the weight raises fuel consumption during transport as one strives to achieve carbon footprint ends.
Carbon footprint of Plastic and Glass
Carbon-wise, using glass bottles costs a lot. The glass bottle weighs so much and is this much more resource-intensive so much more dangerous in the long run. It may well be recycled but at every stage from its making to its movement as well from waste accumulation, its total burden far outweighs that of plastic.
PET plastic bottles consume more energy in their production process, but are lighter and require fewer raw materials. This will save them in transport costs and carbon emissions. According to a research conducted by Echochain, in a lifecycle of a PET bottle, at all stages of its lifecycle, it will have an environmental impact of nearly 90% lesser than that of a glass bottle, which is produced, transported, and then waste.
Recycling and Its Problems Although glass is recyclable, it is heavier and energy-intensive; therefore, recycling glass is not as effective. Plastic bottles are lighter and easier to transport and recycle at a relatively cheaper cost. The logistics of recycling glass are more complex and energy-intensive, which makes the whole process more environmentally degrading than plastic. For it, while glass too is environmental-friendly through the recyclability, plastic overshoots all this advantage since it is light, which will cost less transportation and make cheaper manufacturing; therefore could reduce the environmental cost but that issue is that neither of which has considerable infrastructure that can deal with the appropriate recycling in place, there must have a mechanism, therefore it must make the plastic at least better recyclable and in turn glass, too in that respect.
Reduce Waste, Increase Recycling: A Solution for the Future The effects would, therefore be determined in the way of producing, using, and discarding plastic and glass. Both have impacts on the environment: that of plastic for its long time degrading and low recycling rate while that of glass is heavy, energy-consuming both in production and transport. However, unless government actually begins to work on the recyclable plastics and glass, then it can only be an ideal approach with respect to environmental harm reductions. It includes raising the rate of recycling, developing high efficiency in recycling technologies, and enforcing policies that promote use in the entire life cycles. Aspects of life cycles, beginning from production up to waste management, bring us to even more informed and environmentally sustainable choices of packaging material.
Conclusion: The environmental impact of plastic and glass packaging is rather complicated. Although glass packaging can be reused in a cyclical manner for ever, it is very resource hungry due to its heaviness, not only in manufacture but also during movement. Plastic can be less robust in respect to recyclability, while its lightness is effective in minimizing carbon emission at the level of manufacture and movement. Finally, improvement in material recycling systems brings a very crucial function in managing the environmental impact and bringing it to sustainability.
Sources: United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)