‘Crucial week’: make-or-break plastic pollution treaty talks begin
By AFP
November 24, 2024
Plastic pollution litters our seas, our air and even our bodies, but negotiators face an uphill battle next week to agree on the world's first treaty aimed at ending the problem - Copyright AFP/File Martin BERNETTI
Sara HUSSEIN
A final round of talks on a treaty to end plastic pollution opens on Monday, with the diplomat chairing the difficult negotiations warning nations not to miss a “once-in-a-generation opportunity”.
Plastic pollution is so ubiquitous that it has been found in clouds, the deepest ocean trenches and even in human breastmilk.
And while almost everyone agrees it is a problem, there is less consensus on how to solve it.
Nations have just a week in South Korea’s Busan to solve thorny issues including whether to cap plastic production, a possible ban on chemicals feared toxic to human health, and how to pay for the treaty.
“There are some real differences on some key elements,” UN Environment Programme chief Inger Andersen acknowledged Sunday in a meeting with observers at the talks.
“I believe that we absolutely can land this, but that it will take everybody shuffling a little bit into the bus,” she said.
In 2019, the world produced around 460 million tonnes of plastic, a figure that has doubled since 2000, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.
Plastic production is expected to triple by 2060.
More than 90 percent of plastic is not recycled, with over 20 million tonnes leaking into the environment, often after just a few minutes of use.
Plastic also accounts for around three percent of global emissions, mostly linked to its production from fossil fuels.
– ‘Once-in-a-generation’ –
Some countries, including the so-called High Ambition Coalition (HAC) that groups many African, Asian and European nations, want to discuss the entire “lifecycle” of plastics.
That means limiting production, redesigning products for reuse and recycling, and addressing waste.
On the other side are countries, largely oil producers like Saudi Arabia and Russia, who want a downstream focus on waste alone.
The HAC wants binding global targets on reducing production and warned ahead of the Busan talks that “vested interests” should not be allowed to hamper a deal.
The divisions have stymied four previous rounds of talks, producing an unwieldy document of over 70 pages.
Luis Vayas Valdivieso, the diplomat chairing the talks, has produced an alternative document intended to synthesise the views of delegations and move negotiations forward.
It is a more manageable 17 pages, and highlights areas of agreement, including the need to promote reusability.
However, it leaves the thorniest issues largely unaddressed, angering some more ambitious nations and environmental groups.
Valdivieso nonetheless insisted on Sunday that “a shared understanding has been emerging,” while reminding nations they have just 63 working hours in a “crucial week” to land a deal.
“This treaty is a once-in-a-generation opportunity,” he said.
– ‘Treaty people are demanding’ –
Some observers believe the talks are likely to falter and be extended — especially after the difficult negotiations at UN climate and biodiversity conferences in recent weeks.
But both Andersen and Valdivieso insist a deal must be reached in Busan. That has some environmental groups worried that an agreement will be watered down to ensure something is signed.
Key to any accord will be the United States and China, neither of which have openly sided with either bloc.
Earlier this year, Washington raised hopes among environmentalists by signalling support for some limits on production, a position that is reportedly now being rowed back.
The election of Donald Trump has also raised questions about how ambitious the US delegation will be, and whether negotiators should even bother seeking their support if a treaty is unlikely to be ratified by Washington.
Some plastic producers are pushing governments to focus on waste management and reusability, warning production caps would cause “unintended consequences”.
But others back a deal with global standards, including on “sustainable” production levels.
Hours before the talks opened, environmental groups presented officials with a petition signed by nearly three million people urging a legally binding treaty.
“Governments can and must create the treaty people are demanding,” said Eirik Lindebjerg, WWF global plastics policy lead.
“One which decisively and definitely protects people and nature now and for generations to come.”
Plastic pollution talks must not fail: UN environment chief
By AFP
November 25, 2024
UN Environment Programme chief Inger Andersen said the world is facing a 'massive plastic crisis' - Copyright AFP ANTHONY WALLACE
Sara HUSSEIN
Talks to agree the world’s first treaty to curb plastic pollution cannot fail and must tackle both production and consumption, the UN’s environment chief told AFP on Monday.
Negotiators are deeply divided on issues including whether to limit new plastic manufacturing and phase out some chemicals, raising concerns that the talks could fail.
“I can’t entertain that it fails,” said Inger Andersen, evoking the “massive plastic crisis”.
“No one wants to find plastic in the placenta or in the blood of the unborn baby.”
The negotiations opened hours after COP29 climate talks in Baku that went into overtime and ended in a deal roundly condemned by many developing countries.
Battle lines were quickly drawn in Busan, with several countries initially objecting to a document intended to streamline negotiations.
Andersen said the tussling at COP29 and biodiversity talks before it this year would not “set a negative precedence in any way, shape or form.”
“Was it frustrating during some part of the day… of course,” she acknowledged.
But, “we are only in day one.”
“I’m not going to give up and say that the whole thing is the lost today, on the contrary.”
– ‘The stakes are high’ –
While the debate over procedure was resolved by late Monday, negotiators now move the real substance of their disagreements: whether to reduce plastic production, limit chemicals known or believed to be harmful, and how to finance implementation of the agreement.
Some countries — including Saudi Arabia and Russia — have been keen to limit the treaty’s focus to improved waste management, arguing that is the main cause of the plastic pollution that litters land, seas and skies.
Without addressing any one country, Andersen said the UN resolution establishing the talks was quite clear and delegates must “address sustainable production and consumption”.
“This is not a waste management treaty. This is not a treaty where we just do the downstream,” she said.
“These are the instructions to negotiators. It’s not like there’s wiggle room here.”
The depth of disagreement, as well as the time pressure, has raised concerns among some environmental groups that delegates could settle for a weaker treaty to win agreement.
Andersen said she was convinced that countries were committed to a strong deal.
“The stakes are high, but the commitment that we have in that hall in there is also high,” she said.
“Nobody wants a bad deal.”
Negotiators have until December 1 to agree a text, but the overrun at COP29 and biodiversity talks before it have left many sceptical the talks can wrap up on time.
“The truth is that, there are only so many hours in the day for these negotiators, and they work day and night,” Andersen said.
“We hope we won’t have to ask them to do that here, too. But it may happen.”
Petrol industry embraces plastics while navigating energy shift
By AFP
November 24, 2024
It is not clear if plastics can provide a sufficient lifeline for the petroleum industry - Copyright AFP/File Nhac NGUYEN
Julie CHABANAS
Amid the inexorable shift toward more electric vehicles, oil and gas producers are looking increasingly to plastics to help keep them afloat, even if that sector faces challenges of its own.
Plastics and chemical products now account for 15 percent of world demand for the refined petroleum products used to make them.
But as “robust growth” continues, that should rise to 25 percent by 2050, Guy Bailey, head of oils and chemicals markets for research firm Wood Mackenzie, told AFP.
This “reflects both the importance of plastics — which are integral to every facet of modern life and the delivery of the energy transition –- and the longer-term decline in the demand for fuels as the transport sector electrifies.”
Bailey added: “The petrochemicals sector plays an important role in the downstream sector.”
– Risky transition –
Whether plastics can provide a sufficient lifeline for the petroleum industry is less clear.
“If you take a barrel of oil, most of what that barrel of oil is used for is transportation fuels, gasoline, diesel, aviation fuel. Only a small share of that is used for plastics,” said Martha Moore, chief economist for the American Chemistry Council (ACC), an industry trade association.
But “that should change as electric vehicles become more affordable,” said Steven Fries of the Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE) and a member of Britain’s Climate Change Committee.
“Given that plastics make up only a modest fraction of a refined barrel of oil, they are unlikely to be the long-run solution for the industry,” said Fries, who is also with the Institute for New Economic Thinking.
Adding to the challenge, said Bailey of Wood Mackenzie, is that amid the global energy transition, the plastics industry itself faces risks both in “the need to lower its carbon footprint and address the challenge of plastic waste.”
Tom Sanzillo, a financial analyst with the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA), offered a similar caution, drawing a parallel between the petrochemical industry’s current situation and the decline of coal mining.
“They think that their new market is in petrochemicals, but even there the demand will not be as great as they think,” he told AFP.
– Recycling –
Whether plastics manufacturers buy needed raw materials or extract them themselves, they are turning increasingly to recycling to diversify their activity, analysts said.
Manufacturers hope a treaty on plastics being negotiated this week in Busan, South Korea, will chart a clear path for the future.
“Over time, our goal is to eliminate the need for new oil and gas into plastics,” said Ross Eisenberg, head of the ACC’s plastics-manufacturers division, who will be in Busan.
More and more manufacturers, he said, “are investing in recycling and are becoming recyclers themselves.”
“They realize that they can actually use the product as the feedstock and not have to pull new resources out of the ground.”
But that requires extensive infrastructure investments, Eisenberg said. “That’s what this global agreement can really help us do.”
Products will increasingly need to be designed with recycling in mind, the analysts said.
“More demand for plastics will be met through recycled and reused materials,” said Fries of PIIE, adding that “the changes confronting the industry are set to progressively ratchet up.”
For him, “There’s no easy solution for the oil and gas industry. They’ll have to change.”
Using sunlight to recycle black plastics
American Chemical Society
image:
Inside this reaction vial, spotlit by concentrated sunlight, a piece of black polystyrene from a foam tray breaks down into a recyclable material.
view moreCredit: Hanning Jiang
Not all plastics are equal — some types and colors are easier to recycle than others. For instance, black foam and black coffee lids, which are often made of polystyrene, usually end up in landfills because color additives lead to ineffective sorting. Now, researchers report in ACS Central Science the ability to leverage one additive in black plastics, with the help of sunlight or white LEDs, to convert black and colored polystyrene waste into reusable starting materials.
“Simple, visible light irradiation holds the potential to transform the chemical recycling of plastics, using the additives already found in many commercial products,” say the paper’s authors, Sewon Oh, Hanning Jiang and Erin Stache.
An emerging strategy for plastic recycling involves using light to help break down plastic into chemically useful materials that can be recycled into new products. This process requires a helper compound to convert light into the heat needed to break apart polymer bonds. However, finding the right helper that won’t create more waste and is easily incorporated into recycled materials remains a challenge for researchers. Seeking to create a circular economy for plastic recycling, Stache and a team of researchers took advantage of something already found in black polystyrene waste — an additive known as carbon black.
The researchers tested a method to recycle lab-made black polystyrene: They ground a mixture of polystyrene and carbon black to a fine powder, placed the powder in a sealed glass vial and then set the vial under high-intensity white LEDs for 30 minutes. The carbon black converted the LED light into heat. The heat then broke apart the polystyrene’s molecular structure, creating a mixture of shorter one-, two- and three-styrene units. And these three components cleanly separated within the reaction apparatus. In experiments, the team recycled the leftover carbon black and styrene monomer into polystyrene, demonstrating the circularity of the new method.
Applying the technique to post-consumer black plastic from food containers and coffee cup lids, the researchers cut the waste into small pieces and found that up to 53% of the polystyrene converted to styrene monomer. Waste samples contaminated with canola oil, soy sauce and orange juice broke down slightly less efficiently. When the researchers switched the light source from LEDs to focused sunlight outdoors, they observed a higher reaction efficiency (80%). Additionally, a multicolored mixture of black, yellow, red and colorless polystyrene waste converted to styrene in sunlit conditions at a higher rate (67%) compared to white LEDs (45%). The researchers attribute the higher efficiencies to the greater light intensity achieved by focused sunlight. By demonstrating sunlight’s ability to break down colored polystyrene waste, the researchers say that their method could create a closed-loop recycling process for this type of plastic.
The authors acknowledge funding from Cornell University and Princeton University as well as a Catalysis Science Early Career award from the U.S. Department of Energy.
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Journal
ACS Central Science
Article Title
“Recycling of Post-Consumer Waste Polystyrene Using Commercial Plastic Additives”
Article Publication Date
25-Nov-2024
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