All language subtitles for The Plastic Problem

The oceans are swimming in it. Rivers
are choked with it.

Coastlines are collecting it.

Landfills are clogged with it. Our trash
bags are filled with it. And it's even

floating in the air we breathe.

Imagine spreading out 9 billion metric
tons evenly.

We could cover an area the size of
Argentina or California six times over.

It's plastic.

The material we can't seem to live
without that also lasts longer than a

lifetime. Plastic can take hundreds of
years to break down, and even then, only

into microparticles. It's hurting
animals. It's in our food chain.

Plastic is everywhere.

For more than a year, my PBS NewsHour
colleagues and I traveled far and wide,

reporting on what experts call one of
the largest environmental threats to our

planet. In this special report, we go
farther.

Plastic pollution is becoming a
worldwide crisis.

And dig deeper.

So how is that really helping the
problem?

To figure out if and how we can fix our
plastic problem.

I think we can keep on living and moving
forward the way that we have.

I spent time with the Popa family in
Toronto, Canada, who are in the middle

plastic purge. Mom Vicki made a New
Year's resolution to consume less and

more. She's now working to get the
entire family on board.

Plastic gets into the ocean, and then
fishes eat it, and then they get sick.

We're sort of telling our family and
friends as well that we want to live

lifestyle. We're trying to reduce our
impact on the planet. We're trying not

accept packaging and plastic and bring
it into our household. And they do

actually listen.

And so I noticed a change.

But thousands of miles away from the
Popa family, on one of the most remote

islands in the world, the plastic
problem is only getting worse.

This is Easter Island, or Rapa Nui as
locals call it.

Sitting in the middle of the South
Pacific, its closest neighbor is more

thousand miles away.

All along the rocky coastline, chunks of
plastic are easy to spot.

Not so easy to spot? The microplastic
hiding in the sand, as my NewsHour

colleague Jeffrey Brown found.

This is microplastic, this is a rug,
this is a plastic.

For cleanup crews here, it's a never
-ending battle.

Maybe it's clean all day.

It's not possible.

Leaning all day is not enough. It's not
enough because the center for the

plastic is not here.

It's there.

It's horrific.

The trash is mostly coming from what's
called the South Pacific Garbage Patch,

an enormous swirling vortex of marine
debris swept up in ocean currents and

collected into a trash mass one and a
half times the size of Texas.

That patch was discovered in 2017, 20
years after scientists discovered the

Great Pacific Patch, two swirling masses
of debris three times the size of

France.

On the shores of Easter Island, Ana
Maria Gutierrez does what she can to

organize beach cleans.

It's depressing because you find all
kinds of plastics, from buoys to shoes,

even car parts, everything.

It's like a dump, but in the ocean. It
just arrives.

But the worst is that because the waves
hit the coast, the bigger plastics get

smaller and smaller, and it's very
difficult to remove them, because you

move very big rocks along the coast, and
the trash just gets inserted in them,

and it's becoming part of nature.

The world is trashing the ocean, and
that trash, we're receiving

it in our coast, in Rapa Nui.

It's like someone putting a gun in your
head and

telling you, you must receive that.

Pedro Edmonds Paua is the longtime mayor
of Hangaroa, Easter Island's one town.

He says over the years, the plastic
problem has only gotten worse.

It's coming from everywhere.

It's too much.

Every year is more and more.

And those tides of plastic aren't just a
blight on the landscape, they're

hurting wildlife around the world.

According to one study, if current
production trends continue, by the year

there will be more plastic than fish in
our oceans.

In Costa Rica, my colleague John Yang
learned how plastic affects an already

endangered species.

This is stuff you've just picked up on
the beach here. I literally just found

this here. This is a really clean beach.
Plastic gets into the marine

environment. It breaks down into tiny
little pieces called microplastics.

And anything that eats in the ocean will
inadvertently eat plastic.

And that's killing turtles.

Up in Florida, they've got a hospital
now where when a turtle comes in, they

longer say, does the turtle have plastic
in its belly? They now say how much

plastic is in the turtle.

Oh my God.

In 2015, a marine biologist's video went
viral, documenting the painful process

as she removed a plastic straw stuck in
a sea turtle's nose.

What happens is the turtle comes up to
breathe and inhales the straw, and then

they get lodged in their faces. And this
is becoming more and more common. It's

not a one -off anymore.

In the Philippines, a whale washed
ashore in 2019 with nearly 90 pounds of

plastic in its stomach.

Seals are getting caught in fishing nets
made out of plastic.

They're called ghost nets, abandoned by
the fishing industry, and an estimated

640 ,000 tons of them are floating in
the ocean. That's 10 % of all known

plastic. And it's not just turtles and
seals that are at risk.

Scientists say nearly every seabird now
eats plastic trash, mistaking it for

fish.

Even here, the Mariana Trench, in the
deepest part of the ocean, plastic has

found its way more than six and a half
miles down.

Oceans get a lot of attention, but
experts say the problem is much bigger

that, including here, the largest
freshwater system in the world.

On the shores of Lake Ontario, one of
the five Great Lakes, we combed the

water's edge for plastic with ecologist
Chelsea Rockman.

Here's some plastic.

Here's some plastic.

Here's some plastic.

You don't have to look very hard to find
this. On some beaches, we found big

chunks of plastic.

Along another part of the shore,
microplastics.

The thing that sticks out to me the most
here are all of these kind of perfectly

spherical little pellets. Yeah, what are
those? I noticed those too. They're

different colors, right? Yeah, they're
different colors. These are pre

-production pellets. There's a lot of
plastic production facilities just north

of here and in Toronto in general. And
so what we see here is basically

spillage. These things are lightweight.

They make a ton of them. When they're
moving them around on the shipping dock

in the facility or transporting them,
they blow away easily. They can end up

spilling on the dock. They go down the
drain and they end up here.

Okay, so this is all rinsed out now.

Rockman uses a sieve to collect samples
of the microplastics, then takes them to

her lab to study their makeup.

What happens is over time the sun
degrades the bigger things into smaller

smaller pieces. So this is like one
stage in the breaking down.

And then if we look in here, you can see
some bits of fragments that aren't

perfect pellets, you know, that are
further down in the process. They just

down smaller and smaller and smaller
until you have a greater quantity of

smaller pieces of plastic.

But the point is they never go away.

Yeah, like, you know, never is a strong
word, but the rate at which they break

down is incredibly slow.

So every piece of plastic that's ever
been produced, unless there's something

don't understand yet, is likely still
here today in some form.

Rockman began her career studying the
Great Pacific Garbage Patch, but a move

teach at the University of Toronto put
the Great Lakes in her backyard.

So when you think about the ocean, it's
this dilute body of water, the oceans

are vast.

Lakes, while this is vast, are quite
small in comparison.

Cities surrounding it are bringing trash
into the lake, and it's concentrating

in there and not diluting into a
different location, at least not at any

can understand.

So does that mean that the plastic in a
lake is more damaging to the

environment? We sample fish from the
ocean. We might find plastic in 1 in 4

fish, 1 in 10 fish.

Here, my students sample fish from this
lake.

They find it in every single fish that
they sample. Every single fish? Every

single fish that we sample from Lake
Ontario has at least one piece of

microplastic in its stomach, which to me
shocks me, right? And I've been

researching this for more than 10 years.

And that means fish aren't the only ones
eating plastic.

If humans are eating fish, are we
ingesting plastic too?

Part of Rockman's research is trying to
answer that by looking inside the fish.

We know there's plastic in the water. We
know that the fish eat the plastic.

We have no idea if when we eat the fish,
we're also eating plastic.

And how much do we know about what
effect it has on us?

So on humans, we know very little. There
are some researchers starting to get

into this field. That's something we're
trying to understand in our lab, is how

does plastic move through a food web? Is
it just staying in the gut content of

animals, and I'm only exposed when I eat
the gut, like an oyster or a mussel?

Or is it transferring out of the gut
into other parts of the body and

moving up the food chain the way like a
chemical contaminant does? We're still

trying to kind of understand that part.
It's kind of weird. It's like this is

black.

So can I ask you, knowing what you know
now, do you still eat fish?

I do eat fish. You do?

I do because we still don't know a ton
of information about the health effects.

The other reason I still eat fish is
because, yes, they eat plastic, but,

I know it's in my drinking water, and I
know it's in the air, like in the dust,

so if I eat a piece of fish, it's not
that different.

So plastic is in the fish.

It's at the bottom of the ocean. It's
even on your plate.

Where isn't it? Look, more than 9
billion metric tons of plastic have been

produced since 1950.

That's the weight equivalent of 27 ,000
Empire State Buildings or more than a

billion elephants.

So when and how did our addiction to
plastic first begin?

What can be made with plastics?

Cosmetic containers and cockpit houses.
Plastic was a new material that

transformed the consumer landscape.

When large -scale production began after
World War II, the potential for growth

seemed unlimited.

This paratrooper floating down to
welcome Mother Earth is depending on

to get him there safely. The durable
material did and does make some aspects

life safer. They take better care of
little cuts and scratches.

Not to mention more convenient.

And ultimately, over decades of use, a
disposable way of living evolved.

Its future was so limitless that by
1967, Dustin Hoffman received this

advice in the film The Graduate.

I just want to say one word to you.

Just one word.

Yes, sir.

Are you listening?

Yes, I am.

Plastics.

Exactly how do you mean?

There's a great future in plastics.

Think about it.

plastic has revolutionized the medical
field.

Disposable syringes help reduce disease
transmission.

Prosthetic limbs make life easier and
more comfortable for amputees. In

stores, plastic helps reduce food waste
by keeping foods fresher. And don't

forget, mobile phones have many plastic
parts.

Over time, the global appetite for
plastic has only grown.

It's very cheap to produce. It's very,
very useful.

Very versatile, so we just make a lot of
it.

Roland Geyer at the University of
California, Santa Barbara, is an

ecologist who quantified the problem.

He says of all the plastic, an estimated
60 % still exists on Earth today.

Of the 9 billion metric tons that
humankind ever produced, maybe 20 to 30

is still in use, and the rest...

So that's about six, six and a half
billion metric tons has become waste.

And it ended up in landfills. It ended
up either in landfills, in the

environment.

A tiny fraction was recycled.

And then an equally small fraction was
incinerated.

In 1950, world production of plastic was
a mere two million tons a year.

Since then, annual production of plastic
has increased by nearly 200 times,

jumping to 350 million tons a year.

Now we produce more plastic than most
man -made materials. Every year we make

six times more plastic than aluminum.

We make 20 times more plastic than
copper. And even metals corrode

and erode, so they would eventually go
back.

to the natural environment.

Plastic just stays plastic.

So all the reasons we like it and value
it and want to use it, those are all the

reasons that make it more difficult to
get rid of. I think you hit the nail on

the head, yeah. Some of these wonderful
properties, that it's so durable,

becomes a problem when we are trying to
get rid of it. Then suddenly we don't

like the fact that it's so durable.

As our dependence on this durable new
material has grown, so have the piles of

stuff in our landfills. But it hasn't
always been like this. Americans were at

one time very good at saving and reusing
materials.

In colonial times, the motto was waste
not, want not. During the Great

Depression, use it up, wear it out, make
it do, or do without.

In the throes of World War II, the U .S.
government ran campaigns to get

citizens to save and reuse everything
from scrap metal to rubber.

gasoline, paper, and even animal fat.

People who buy in large quantities and
truck it away in their car.

And then came the economic boom years,
coinciding with the rise of plastic.

It's the crystal clear plastic that lets
you see everything you wrap. And

disposable lifestyles became
fashionable.

Things like magic.

It was even featured in Life magazine in
1955 with the celebratory headline,

Throw Away Living.

Daddy, you forgot.

Every litter bit hurts.

Also in the 1950s, the formation of the
Keep America Beautiful Coalition.

Using public service announcements
starring a Susie Spotless character, the

coalition aimed to get people thinking
about their responsibility to stop

pollution. Please, please, don't be a
leech.

Decades later, in 1971, it was a Keep
America Beautiful ad that shook the

American conscience.

People start pollution.

People can stop it.

The Keep America Beautiful coalition was
founded and funded in large part by the

beverage and packaging industry, the
same companies producing much of

plastic.

Since that campaign, we, the American
people, have been sorting, weeding out,

and sorting some more, all with a
certain sense of responsibility.

Every day, an estimated 750 tons of
material flow through this process.

And every step along the way, just like
this one, is designed to remove one more

material.

For an ultra -durable material like
plastic, the goal of this system was to

us to use less by reusing what we'd
already made.

But that requires people buy into and
participate in the system.

The global recycling rate, we estimate,
is 9%. So it's very, very poor.

And it hasn't even improved all that
much. The current recycling rate in the

is barely 10%. But even in Europe, it's
like 30%. I would say that the way we

recycle plastic at the moment is not
part of the solution.

I would even go as far as saying it's
part of the problem.

Recycling is part of the problem.

Why is that?

So even recycled material, you can't
cycle it forever.

Eventually, you have to dispose of it.
So the only way to reduce disposal is

make less plastic, and that's the only
benefit of recycling.

One reason?

The sheer volume of waste created around
the world.

Americans alone create four and a half
pounds of trash per person per day.

As a country, we generate a third of all
waste in the world.

In a best -case scenario, we'd recycle
as much of that as possible.

My colleague Paul Salmon met a woman in
Massachusetts who is a recycling

superstar.

This is two weeks' worth of trash.

That's two weeks.

And plastic.

These are flower sleeves. I try always
to...

Tell them I don't need a flower sleeve
when you buy flowers, but sometimes I'm

not quick enough.

Like compost tea bags, so this is the
string, and because it has a staple, so

shouldn't go into the compost.

Really? The tea bags. Yes, I'm very anal
about this. So are you kind of a

recycling fanatic?

I wish there was a word like OCD for
recycling.

Not everyone is as vigilant as Meera
Singh.

People today don't understand what
happens to their trash or their

They put it out at the curb, a truck
comes along, throws it in the back, and

disappears. And they don't have to ever
think about it again.

460 tons again today.

Ben Harvey runs a recycling plant just
outside of Boston.

When we collect it, we've got to think
about where are we going to go to

of that material.

Is it going to go to a landfill?

Is it going to go to waste of energy?

The process is more complicated than
simply dropping a bottle into the right

bin.

There are seven types of plastic, and
not every type can be reused.

The plastics that we see come through
here, even though they've got the little

recycling logo on the bottom of it, that
doesn't mean that there's a market for

that material that we can recycle that.

For a long time, Harvey sent Boston's
plastic to China until 2018 it had the

corner on the market.

And that's where many recycling
facilities in the U .S. sent their

Greg Cooper leads recycling efforts for
the state of Massachusetts.

About 20, 30 years ago, when we were
starting to ramp up our recycling

across the country, I think China saw an
opportunity to utilize some of the raw

materials and the commodities that we
were producing through recycling.

But environmental protection and a
reputation makeover put an end to that.

In March of 2018, China stopped buying
plastic recyclables completely in an

operation dubbed National Sword,
refusing to be the world's dumping

Right now, we're not moving any material
to China. Very difficult to move into

China right now.

So all that material started stacking up
in Mark Gillardy's Save That Stuff

warehouse.

Inventory's a little high. It does come
in waves because we do have to sell

multiple loads at a time. So when we get
a shipment, we'll ship out three or

four loads.

So we're trying to do price adjustments,
and that's why it's really hurting our

bottom line.

We can't do the adjustments quick enough
to keep up with the changing market.

With prices for plastic tanking and
global markets shifting, as much as half

America's plastic waste was and is stuck
in the U .S.

Stockpiles and warehouses disposed of in
landfills or incinerated.

And the plastic that was still being
shipped overseas started flowing to new

countries, this time in Southeast Asia.

Malaysia quickly took up the mantle as
the world's leading importer of plastic

scrap.

Here in Ipoh, that meant mountains of
plastic piled up at the edge of the

as plastic waste inundated recycling
plants.

We are standing here next to a pile of
about 1 ,500 tons.

This Malaysian site is run by Pavel Cech
with a government license.

Here, the plastic waste goes into a kiln
to help in the production of cement.

The first waste started coming here mid
last year. And that was the time of the

boom of the imports.

Since then, the piles of plastic waste
have shrunk. But the proportion of

plastic waste coming from Western
nations hasn't. Here you have post

cake or pancake from Germany.

Can you make anything out of that?

Yeah, USDA organic. So here we have some
organic American

vegetable packaging.

Here we have a Pepsi bottle with no
local

printing. Czech sees real value in the
global trade in recyclable commodities,

but not in plastic scrap.

Mixed waste, non -recyclable waste
definitely should not be traded.

It has to be a product. It has to be raw
material.

But it must not be a mixed, non
-recyclable liability of one country to

passed on to another country.

Because then you see the greed.

Then you see that for money people are
ready to do bad things.

Czech site is legal. But illegal sites,
like this one we secretly filmed, have

been popping up all over the country as
the opportunity to turn a profit grows.

One way to get rid of the plastic waste?

Burn it.

That illegal activity spurred citizen
activists to take action. They used

to find the worst offenders, then
lobbied the government for change.

As the influx of plastic waste grew, the
Prime Minister took notice.

We cannot accept that kind of idea that
waste from rich countries should be sent

to poor countries.

We don't need your waste because our own
waste is enough to keep us problem.

Before long, in October of 2018,
Malaysia, like China before it, banned

imports of plastic waste.

Malaysian officials turned away arriving
shipping containers filled with plastic

from Western nations that were being
smuggled in, destined for illegal sites.

In front of a crowd of media, the
Malaysian environment minister showed

was inside.

Whoever sends their waste to Malaysia,
whether it's e -waste, whether it's

plastic waste or whatever waste, we will
send it back. And we will fight back.

Even though we are a small country, we
cannot be bullied by developed

The crackdown had the unintended effect
of pushing illegal sites into more

unpopulated areas, away from the eyes of
law enforcement.

And now plastic waste smugglers are
taking their business away from the

and deeper into the jungle.

The burning sends a toxic brew into the
air.

Sunny Neo is an activist working to stop
the illegal activity.

He uses a particle counter to take air
quality readings.

Anything over 35 .4 is considered
unhealthy.

Here, the reading settled at 123.

These people are doing incomplete
defiance of the government.

and polluting the environment, doing
harmful to things that are harmful to

society. We found that harm across the
country.

Outside the northern city of Sungai
Pitani, yellow tape and a government

to shut down.

The facility was still operating five
months later.

Farther south in Port Klang, an illegal
facility now abandoned, but still filled

with foreign waste, including plastic
from America.

plastic has become a hot potato.

In Indonesia, they're shipping
containers full of waste back to

In Thailand, activists are taking to the
streets to protest the trash trade, the

trade that's polluted their once
-pristine beaches, largely with what's

single -use plastic, the stuff that's
used once, then tossed.

40 % of all plastic is that kind of
single -use packaging.

40 % of all plastic. So if we did away
with single -use packaging, I think we

could solve 40 % of the problem.

That would make a huge difference. That
would make a huge difference, and I

think it's really doable.

So bans on single -use plastic are
popping up around the globe.

From the tiny island of Dominica in the
Caribbean, where they've banned all

single -use plastic containers,
including styrofoam, to Scotland, where

the targets is the cotton swab, to
Rwanda, where one of the world's first

plastic bag bans has transformed the
landscape.

That willingness to crack down on
plastic use is not as widespread in the

States. A PBS NewsHour Marist poll found
that only 25 % of Americans would fully

support a ban on single -use plastics,
and 19 % somewhat support the idea.

In some places, the backlash on bans has
been loud.

The pressure from public outcry has led
some cities and states to reverse course

and ban any bans on bags and straws. In
Oklahoma, the state government passed

legislation preventing local governments
from banning or taxing plastic bags.

The targeting of the tiny straw even
drew the attention of President Trump.

So you have a little straw.

But what about the plates, the wrappers
and everything else that are much bigger

and they're made of the same material?

So the straws are interesting.

Everybody focuses on the straws. There's
a lot of other things to focus.

In all, more than a dozen states have
implemented these preemption laws to

local leaders from passing any bans on
plastic.

Already hundreds of states, counties,
and cities have some kind of plastic ban

or tax in place.

Seattle is one of those cities.

It set its sights on single -use
utensils, bags, and straws in July of

becoming the first major American city
to implement an outright ban.

Why straws?

As Becca Fong of Seattle Public
Utilities explains, even the best

system... isn't perfect.

It's geared to capture certain types of
plastics of certain sizes.

And if it doesn't fit into those
categories, it's not really recoverable.

Speaking of certain sizes, something
like this, a tiny little plastic straw.

Where does something like that straw
fit?

The fact that it made it here is pretty
impressive, but the vast majority of

small items are going to fall through
the machinery and not be able to be

recovered to be recycled.

More important than the ban itself is
the way in which it makes people think

about the way they use plastic.

It is that piece of material that is so
small and so nuanced and actually kind

of an extra for a lot of people that it
actually makes people stop and think, do

I really need to have this straw? And
that's probably the bigger impact.

A straw that I use today in Seattle can
end up in the Pacific Ocean and last

there for thousands of years. Or it can
return back to your plate in 10 years as

microplastics embedded in some fish.

Mami Hara runs Seattle Public Utilities.
Before her team could implement and

enforce the ban, they had to get local
businesses on board.

For a lot of businesses, it hasn't been
a hard sell.

For those who are concerned about the
price point, we try to work with them to

find viable alternatives that don't
impact their purse too much.

We'll buy about a million straws this
year, and the cost of straws has

Bob Donegan is the president of Ivers,
an 80 -year -old Seattle seafood

institution. We don't routinely put a
straw in a drink.

We ask everybody, would you like a
straw?

And they can always have one. And these
are the new compostable straws.

They are made from plants.

But the compostable straws aren't a
perfect solution.

I challenge you to suck a milkshake
through that straw and see if you can

it.

That's not easy. It's pretty hard. Yeah.

So he's spending more money and ordering
bigger straws. Since the ban, costs

have gone up, but Donegan says he's
budgeted around them by buying supplies

early and in bulk. So there's no use, he
says, in complaining.

Put on your big boy pants and get used
to it.

Everything the government does isn't
fair.

But our customers expect it of us, and
we want to do what our customers want.

Not only are we saying that the
environment is important to us, This is

for us to put our money where our mouth
is.

Wes Benson at Taco Time, another area
food chain, is taking Seattle's straw

utensil ban one step further.

Today, nearly every single item they
give customers, from utensils and cups

plates and bowls, is fully compostable,
meaning they're made of natural

materials and can be turned into compost
after being tossed.

One of the nice things about being 100 %
compostable is you can make it a part

of your story.

We're a local company. The environment
is important to us, and we're willing to

pay five times as much for our
packaging.

What's important to remember about
compost, the waste has to actually make

a compost facility in order to break
down into soil.

Most compost facilities in the U .S.
only take yard trimmings. But here in

Seattle, they have a system in place
that includes food waste.

This is where Seattle processes its
compost on an industrial scale.

a family business run by Jason Lenz, an
hour north of the city.

How much of a problem do plastics
present?

You know, it's not insurmountable. At
the same time, it's definitely

a problem.

Even here, bits of plastic need to be
sorted out.

Lenz has been in this business since
2008.

So without the city asking this of you
or showing that there was a demand for

this, you guys likely wouldn't be doing
that.

That's correct.

Seattle is a big butcher of organic
diversions for composting.

And, yeah, so that's what Lenz is doing.

Where are we going next?

Lenz's company now churns out hundreds
of thousands of tons of compost a year.

think there's a spot over here.

This is the final product.

And sells it to everyone, from soil
companies to local governments to home

gardeners.

Seattle's efforts even extend to the
ballpark.

Behind the scenes of Major League
Baseball Seattle Mariners, we got a look

the stacks of compostable items they now
require food vendors to use.

In 2017, the park managed to recycle or
compost 96 % of all waste.

Trevor Gooby runs operations at the
ballpark.

It definitely is more work to sort
through the trash that we have after the

and to do these type of things.

Again, we feel it's really important for
our business and it's important because

our fans are asking us to do it.

So while some cities and businesses in
the U .S. are doing their part to cut

back on plastic, here the entire country
is being asked to pitch in.

Canada, the world's second largest
nation, is trying to put into place the

world's toughest plastic ban.

As early as 2021, Canada will ban
harmful single -use plastics from coast

coast to coast.

It will be up to businesses to take
responsibility for the plastics they're

manufacturing and putting out into the
world.

At Unboxed Market on Toronto's historic
Dundas Street, single -use plastic is

already a thing of the past.

The zero -waste grocery store is the
brainchild of Michelle Gentner and her

partner, Luis Martin.

I'm from rural southern Ontario and he's
from southern Portugal. It was very

much a need to recognize access to food
and quality ingredients and things

that are always fresh and when you grow
up.

Near or on farms, you have constant
contact with those items. So you can

your potatoes, you can touch your corn,
you can see it, you can smell it. And

with everything that's happening in the
environment right now, that excess

packaging and plastics and single -use
wrappers and everything just seemed

daunting. And so we wanted to avoid it
as much as humanly possible.

Shoppers here bring their own containers
to transport everything home.

Somebody in the winter had a glove, and
they put eggs in each of the fingers of

the glove so they wouldn't bang
together.

However you liked. They put eggs into a
glove. Into the glove. Yeah, it was

amazing. So milk. No. I threw so much
milk in my house.

Yeah. How do I get milk here?

Milk is a fun thing for a lot of people.
It's on top as well. So if you didn't

bring a container, you can grab one that
we have. Same process always.

Yep. Any size. Yep. So just open that.

And then...

There's a little spout underneath here,
so just line your jar up. Yep, and then

just pull up slowly on the handle.

Oh, and mashed milk.

All right.

But even here, to help keep some food
fresh, they rely on plastic.

Now, can I ask you about one thing?

Yeah. Obviously, these are made of
plastic.

Yeah. So you've got plastic in the
store, right? We do.

It's deliberately single -use plastics
that we're trying to avoid. These will

used. have been used countless times,
will continue to be used countless

It's not the same as a throwaway wrapper
around a straw or a chip bag or those

individual single -use products. This is
meant to be a sustainable long -term

product.

Unlike in the U .S., people here seem to
be more on board with cutting back on

single -use plastic.

Polling shows 81 % of Canadians support
the idea of a ban, and a majority would

also be willing to pay more to help
reduce waste.

When the scale of the problem is so big,
this is what we hear again and again

from people who are trying to make a
difference.

How do you even think about it, day in
and day out?

It's all I think about. It's all I think
about all day.

I think that there is an overwhelming,
this is a lot, we can't do it. But what

say to customers who come for the first
time and they're trying to think of a

way to transition in their own
environment, don't look at your whole

at one room. Look at one section of your
room.

Broccoli? Yeah, can you help me put in
the fridge, Alex?

Vicky Popa shops at Unbox Market every
week in her quest to banish single -use

plastic. I think we don't have a choice
to not do something.

We know the problem's there, and we may
not be able to reverse what's been done,

but I don't think we can keep on living
and moving forward the way that we have.

Do I think we're making a difference?

In some ways, yes, as a family, we are
making a difference.

I think the biggest impact we could have
is to pass it on to our kids.

Six -year -old Bella has been paying
attention.

Is plastic a big problem in the ocean?

Yes. Why is it a problem?

Because the animals eat it, and then
they get sick.

Do you think that most people know about
this?

No. No? Why don't they know about it?
Because they don't really think about

planet.

Why should we think about the planet?

So it could stay healthy, and then all
the animals could be healthy,

and then all the animals could be in the
ocean.

Canadians might support a plastic ban,
but what about companies? Under the

government's proposal, companies would
be responsible for the plastic long

they make it and sell it.

Unilever is a global company with dozens
of recognizable household brands.

Dove shampoo, Lipton tea, Vaseline, and
many are packaged and sold in some form

of plastic.

Unilever not only signed the New
Plastics Economy Global Commitment, an

initiative from the Ellen MacArthur
Foundation targeting plastic pollution

its source, it also just pledged to cut
in half the amount of non -recycled

plastic it uses by 2025.

Its annual plastic packaging output is
nearly 700 ,000 metric tons.

We are not going to do away with
plastic.

It is in too much of too many things
that we have in this world, well beyond

packaging that I put in the marketplace.

John Coyne works on sustainability
issues at Unilever Canada.

What I think we need to try to do is try
to apply ourselves to the waste issue.

How do we take recycling rates from 11 %
to a much higher number?

By saying it's more of a plastic waste
problem instead of a plastic problem,

aren't you really just shifting a lot of
the burden more to the people who are

using the plastic instead of the people
like Unilever who are making it? No, I

don't think so. And some people have
made the argument that somehow consumers

are responsible for this. No, I don't
accept that.

If we have ownership over that material
that we can recover, we are in a better

position as businesses to reutilize that
material.

Recovering and reusing the plastic is
more important, Coyne says, than efforts

to ban it.

The volume of material that we are
recovering from the marketplace is still

low that I don't know whether or not a
ban on any single -use plastics is going

to have a material impact on that.

How would it not? Doesn't that mean that
a significant amount isn't going out

into the environment in the first place?
I don't know what proportion of the

overall plastic that is.

Well, it's about 40 % by global
estimates.

I don't think it's that high at all.

I don't think, it depends how you, well,
it depends how you define single -use

plastics. How do you define single -use
plastics? Single -use plastics are

things like plastic bags and straws,
which are the two most common examples,

which are only available for use one
time.

But there are those who will argue that
a plastic bag is not a single -use

product. Yes, you bring it home from the
grocery store, but you may use it three

or four times in the home.

But industrial ecologist Roland Geyer
says reusing and recycling won't fix the

problem, especially when 91 % of the
world's plastic currently goes

The only plastic that does not need to
be disposed of is plastic that was never

made. That fact poses a big problem for
the world's biggest plastic producers.

One of those is Coca -Cola.

Since the very first Coke was poured 133
years ago, the iconic global brand has

used lots of different kinds of
packaging, everything from glass and

aluminum and plastic.

Inside Coca -Cola's archives in Atlanta
are shelves and shelves of its historic

designs. PET plastic bottles didn't
arrive on the scene until 1978.

Today, the Coca -Cola company sells over
120 billion plastic bottles a year.

Laid out end -to -end, those bottles
could wrap around the circumference of

Earth 700 times.

It's a very big problem that has to be
solved. This cannot be done alone.

Bea Perez is Coca -Cola's senior vice
president for sustainability.

If the planet is not stable, if
communities aren't thriving, then no

to win and business is not going to be
successful.

Like Unilever, Coca -Cola signed on to
the New Plastics Economy global

commitment and disclosed its plastic
production.

3 million metric tons a year.

How did that number resonate? Did you
think, okay, this is way more than we

thought, or how do we bring this down?

Well, we want to continue to be more
efficient, so how do you bring it down?

how do you make sure that you're
actually reusing it so you're not

So part of this is to help to eliminate
virgin plastics.

You're not creating new materials you're
putting into the marketplace. You're

using the ones that are out there again
and again and again and giving that

value to the material.

A lot of people will look at that and
say 3 million tons is quite a lot. Do

have a target in mind for where you want
that number to be by 2030?

That's not part of the target. The
target is about the collection.

So we want to make sure that whatever's
put out there, we're collecting back and

reusing. To help do that, Coca -Cola
launched their World Without Waste

The goal is to collect and recycle the
equivalent of every bottle or can it

sells globally by 2030.

We don't fundamentally see our packaging
as waste.

That's a value that we're not realizing,
and we want to see that package come

back so that we can turn it into a new
package.

Ben Jordan heads up Coca -Cola's
environmental policy.

Two billion times a day, consumers enjoy
our product around the world, usually

out of a package.

And when they're finished with their
product, they have a choice to make.

are they going to do with that package?

Many developing countries around the
world you see informal scavenging

where waste pickers will find that
package. Even if it's littered by a

they'll find it and get it back into
recycling because it's worth their time,

that inherent value in that material is
worth their time.

There are places in the world where
there's not that inherent value in the

material and you need a little bit more.
Now, is that a formal waste management

system?

a curbside recycling program like we
have in the U .S. or other parts of the

developing world. Or maybe there's
something even on top of that that needs

be put in place to motivate consumers to
do the right thing with their

packaging.

Changing the packaging itself to make it
more recyclable is another goal of the

company. By 2025, Coca -Cola wants all
its packaging to be 100 % recyclable.

And by 2030, the company wants 50 % of
new packaging to use recycled material.

In 2018, that number was at 30%. Some
will say it's easy to make it an

priority when the bottom line isn't too
badly affected.

Can you commit that even if those things
weren't there, that even if the bottom

lines shift, that the numbers don't
quite add up, does this still remain a

priority for Coke?

Yes, this is a priority for Coke,
absolutely. And so you either pay today

pay tomorrow.

You're going to pay by either losing
your consumers who give up in your

because they say, because we know if you
look at all of the data coming with

this next generation, millennials
started it, I'd say this next generation

there in terms of purchase
consideration.

They're saying, I'm not going to
purchase brands that do not leave a

impact impact or legacy in society.

I don't want to feel badly about the
products I'm consuming, so help me

understand what you're doing to solve
these problems.

We know we're going to lose consumers if
we don't do this. We're going to pay

one way or another, so it's better to
invest today, do the right things, and

ensure that we also have a strong
business because we're doing the right

While Coke is making inroads with its
plastic recycling, One British company

making actual roads using, what else,
recycled plastic.

It's an innovative way to reuse plastic
that already exists.

Toby McCartney is the man behind
McCreeber, a startup that mixes recycled

plastic pellets into asphalt to make
longer -lasting and cheaper roads.

The downside to waste plastic is it
lasts so long. A bottle will last maybe

years. What we're using is the ability
of those plastics because they last so

long, but in our roads, we want our
roads to last so long before they need

maintenance.

MacGreeber is paving the way toward
better plastic use, but its efforts are

a drop in the bucket. Don't forget, 9
billion metric tons of plastic have been

manufactured over the last 70 years.
There's just too much out there to reuse

all. So, what else can be done?

Right now, the only option for large
-scale total disposal we have is

incineration, literally burning the
plastic.

But that solution can create another
problem, releasing toxic chemicals into

air. What is in here?

So these are bags of dirt that I
collected from various sites around the

area. To bypass incineration, Morgan
Vague had a hunch when she was a student

Reed College in Oregon.

If plastic really is everywhere, maybe,
in heavily polluted areas, bacteria have

evolved to eat it. And maybe those
bacteria could take a bite out of our

problem. So she collected samples from
some of the dirtiest places around her

hometown of Houston, Texas, like sites
of past oil spills and sites deemed

contaminated by the EPA, and brought
them back to the lab.

You identify the bacteria you want to
take a closer look at, and then you put

them in these test tubes. Yes. And the
only food you give them, basically, is a

piece of plastic.

Exactly. And we were fortunate to find
some that did a pretty good job.

What would you name it? Have you thought
about that?

Pseudomonas morganensis is the tentative
name.

I like that you've already thought of
that. Oh, yeah.

But name or no name, her plastic -eating
bacteria is promising, even if it has a

ways to go.

They have this ability, but it's
incredibly slow, too slow to be useful

So what can we do really to make the
plastic a little more appetizing to

little bugs?

Pre -treatment, kind of like marinade on
the steak, right? What can we do to

make these a little more palatable?

Make it so bacteria say, oh, hey, that
looks good. I really want to eat on that

and eat it up quickly.

It is just one study in very early
stages, but she's excited for where it

lead. I think we need more of these kind
of grassroots efforts and kind of

thinking outside the box or outside the
plastic bottle and kind of seeing what

sort of solutions we can find.

An inspiration for solutions to the
plastic problem can come in many shapes

sizes.

This is a seabin, essentially a garbage
filter that goes into the water.

This one is part of a pilot project at
Toronto's Outer Harbour Marina, but more

seabins are working hard all over the
world.

People see the garbage floating, but
they don't realize that that water

that they used, they may have put it in
the recycling bin, but somehow it

accidentally ended up in the water.

How does it work?

The cylinder sucks in all the junk. A
containment bag catches it.

And inside this sludge is a lot of
plastic.

A coffee cup lid, a candy wrapper.

Every day, the seabin can trap up to
nine pounds of floating trash.

This is the one you can eat.

Lori Goff says the inspiration for her
invention to tackle the plastic problem

came from a cartoon, Captain Planet.

The power is yours.

Part of what Captain Planet says is take
pollution down to zero and the power is

yours. And this stuck with me.

It's still here with me now.

So there's just this little Captain
Planet flying around telling me that I'm

responsible to...

help make the world better, that I can't
be waiting for someone else to do this.

So Goff, an American living in the
Netherlands, came up with an idea she

Unplastic, an alternative wrapper that
uses leftover wastewater from brewing

beer. It's a super highly functional
material that's transparent, it's

compostable, it's edible, it's totally
non -toxic, and it's completely plastic

-free. Brewery waste was just thrown
away, and now it...

We can take it and make it into
something that's extremely functional

totally helpful for us. It can protect
our food. It can package things. And at

the end of the day, it will just go back
to the earth.

Innovation and inventions aside,
everyday citizens are asking what they

to make a dent in the plastic problem.

Experts say start small and scale up.
Vicky Popa started with a cup of coffee.

The all -reusable cup. All -reusable
cup. It's lost.

Coffee filter? Yes. And we get our
coffees in a jar. Reusable snack bag.

We've got silicators. And what do you
replace this with? We are replacing it

with these wax wraps to cover the food
so that it doesn't dry out.

How on earth do you get rid of plastic
in your bathroom?

Yeah, and we're using a toothpaste in a
jar. And it's a glass jar, right? And

it's a glass jar. You can wash it out,
reuse it. We've got hand soap.

So now, instead of the plastic pumps,
we've got a glass jar.

So you've made little changes everywhere
you can. Little changes, yeah.

How hard is it to make those changes?

I need... I put my own grocery list to
the test and did a shopping run at Unbox

Market. Okay.

Roll, milk. We are shopping. Cereal,
eggs, peppers, peas, pasta, lettuce,

popcorn, dish soap, blueberries, and
chocolate -covered almonds.

At the checkout counter, the only piece
of plastic, the reusable soap bottle.

Compare that to this.

Buying the same items from a national
grocery chain meant also buying all this

plastic. Nearly every single item came
in some form of packaging, and only some

of it was recyclable.

Efforts to educate people about plastic
are growing.

Every single filter that's in here is
made of a plastic fiber you probably

that. Here in Tybee Island, Georgia,
high schoolers from nearby Savannah came

find out why plastic is such a problem
and what they can do to help.

After a brief lesson in how to clean a
beach, they picked up their gear and

headed out to hunt for cigarette butts
and other small pieces of plastic.

Thousands of miles away on Easter
Island, residents have found another way

educating young people.

Mahani Tayabi grew up on the island
before leaving to build her career as an

international pianist.

Now back home, she's running a music
school built from garbage.

2 ,500 tires are in the walls, 40 ,000
glass bottles.

Glass and plastic bottles are in the
walls. We have the solar panels, which

provide the electricity.

Now the school trains more than 100
students in both classical and

music, passed down from Rapa Nui
ancestors.

This garbage, in a way, has become like,
if you see the windows, like the little

bottles have become like little jewels.

And in a way, you just feel good about
that. You say, okay, I'm doing my little

grain of sand to help this place become,
this planet become a little bit better

than the way we found it.

From Easter Island to Tybee Island, one
thing is clear.

Everyone we spoke to over the last year
agreed. The willingness to find

solutions exists.

When we asked if the plastic problem can
be solved, this is what we heard.

This is not some rarefied scientific
principle that people are going to

with to try to understand. This is a
nuts and bolts infrastructure, jobs,

investment, markets, regulatory
challenge that can be solved.

I think it needs to be.

fundamental change across the board
that's going to be hard. And I think it

to include reducing the amount that
we're producing, or at least the amount

waste, having better waste management
that builds more into a circular

and cleanup. And I think we need people
at every level of government, the

citizens, and the industry all working
together in order to do it.

If we can solve the plastic problem, I
think that's going to make an enormous

difference, not just to turtles, but to
the entire marine ecosystem.

And at the end of the day, we rely on
the sea so much that if we damage the

to the point where we kill the sea,
we're not going to survive either. I

we have a chance, in a way, on this
island that has the same environmental

problems as the rest of the world.

If we can find solutions here, there's a
hope for the rest of the world. I feel

that lots of people are at a point where
they don't like what they see.

There is real willingness to change
behavior, to do things differently, and

think there are many, many ways we can
do it that still allow us to have the

good life.

Do you think we can fix it?

Yes.

Experts say it will take everyone at
every level.

governments, businesses, and individual
citizens working together to make a

difference. But the question remains,
will we take those big steps to bring

about big change and ultimately fix the
plastic problem?