Stop choking the planet with plastic

Glimpsed along the roadside between the Baltimore Highlands Light Rail station and my home: five plastic water bottles with and without tops, four plasticized soda cups with plastic tops and straws, three plastic foam takeout containers, one used diaper with plastic lining.

Glimpsed on my lawn: a Baltimore Sun in a plastic film bag, a plastic bag for a size “M” Hanes undershirt, a cut-up (plastic) credit card, a plastic wrap from a cigarette pack.

In The Baltimore Sun (the one on my phone, not the one in the plastic film bag), I read about “Mr. Trash Wheel,” more precisely known as the Inner Harbor Water Wheel. Since May 9, 2014, the carbon-neutral wheel has collected 1.5 million pounds of trash, including 638,262 plastic bottles, 737,025 polystyrene containers, 522,603 grocery bags and 728,411 chip bags washed down the Jones Falls Watershed. All plastic. The Waterfront Partnership of Baltimore is doing a great thing, no doubt about it. But all of this plastic goes into a dumpster barge. Where does the dumpster go? It doesn’t just disappear.

Plastic is forever. It seems we can’t live without it. And our silence about this cheap and convenient modern invention has been deafening — until now.

In a paper — now gone viral — in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States, Jennifer Lavers and Alexander Bond estimate that 38 tons of (mostly) plastic garbage litters the beaches of one of the most remote places in the world, 14.4square-mile Henderson Island in the South Pacific (no, I’d never heard of it, either). No longer can Wikipedia refer to this UNESCO World Heritage Site as “one of the world’s last two raised coral atolls whose ecosystems remain relatively unaffected by human contact.” Ms. Lavers and Mr. Bond politely term the piles of plastic on Henderson “anthropogenic waste.” That means we made it and we threw it away.

National Geographic has made “Planet or Plastic?” a multi-year theme. In their publications and on their websites, you can read about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch and the astonishing prediction that by 2050, Earth’s oceans will be filled with

But it’s the pictures that speak loudest.

In “We Made Plastic. We Depend on It. Now We’re Drowning in It,” Laura Parker and Randy Olson depict garbage pickers sorting through plastics leaching toxic chemicals into landfills and rivers in Bangladesh. And if animals are your thing, check out the seahorse whose tail curls around a plastic ear swab. Justin Hoffman said of his award-winning photo, “I wish this didn’t exist.” On the Weather Channel the other day, I saw a clip of a small, but very dead, whale who had ingested no fewer than 80 plastic bags. The reporter suggested that it had mistaken the bags for octopuses, its favorite food.

Even celebrities are now speaking out. “Entourage” star Adrian Grenier is “working on” a plastic-free house. I’ll bet he’s got his own entourage of assistants coming up with ways to ditch furniture, clothes, bottles, bags, wrap and wrappers, combs, toothbrushes and microplastics in his hygiene products. I, on the other hand, don’t. Neither does my niece, who while raising a 7-year-old and a toddler would love to save the planet, simply doesn’t have the time or money to search out plastic-free clothing, diapers, wet wipes, ear swabs and laundry detergent (yes, those “pods” are made of polyvinyl film — a.k.a. plastic). So let’s keep it simple. Here’s stuff

can do: Apple juice in glass or plastic? No-brainer. Glass can be recycled over and over again. Water in plastic bottles? Never. Instead, buy a refillable, recyclable container to save money the planet. Body wash and hand soap? Whatever happened to bar soap wrapped in paper? Plastic wrap? Aluminum foil works just as well, and it’s recyclable. Single-serving packets? Whether chips, crackers, cookies or raisins, buy in bulk and repackage (if necessary) at home. When choosing bulk products from bins, use paper (recyclable), not plastic (rarely recyclable) bags. And what about those “convenient” plastic bags offered to keep “dewy” produce from soaking you and the rest of your groceries? Ask for paper towels (compostable) instead.

In 2014, California became the first state to ban single-use plastic bags. The port city of San Francisco made them illegal in 2007. It’s estimated that by 2020 the San Fran law alone will have saved 14 million trees, 12 million barrels of oil and 100,000 marine mammals. Why? Plastic bags are almost never recyclable, contrary to what you might think when you congratulate yourself on stuffing your “used bags” into the receptacle at WalMart. Let’s be honest. How hard is it to stash bags in our cars or backpacks? Not hard at all. And don’t just use them at the supermarket. Surprise the checkout folks at Kohl’s, Macy’s and (gasp) Walmart as well. Machine wash the bags and use them until they wear out.

Only 10 percent of plastic we use in the U.S. gets recycled.

Baltimore City and surrounding counties make it easy. Solid waste one day, recycling another. they accept many plastics, especially No. 1 and No. 2 (there are seven kinds, but at least you’re making a dent).

Sure, you don’t to recycle plastic, but If recycling in Maryland seems like a hardship, consider Fresno County (California again!), where residents are fined for placing recyclables, including plastics, in solid waste bins (I know because I once received a warning). When Maryland runs out of landfill space — and it will, and we can only export so much plastic to China — we’ll recycle. So why not jump on the (nearly 40-year-old) bandwagon (The city and surrounding counties can up their game as well.)

And for those of us who want to (and can) go the extra mile: Don’t buy it, period. Chewing gum? Almost every brand contains polyethylene (plastic No. 4) and/or polyisobutyelene. Yuck. Nevermore. Tea bags? Most are sealed with polyethylene. Try loose leaf and a tea ball instead. “Disposable” coffee cups? Most are unrecycled paper + polyethylene. Take your own (metal, reusable) cup to Starbucks. Melamine dinnerware? It’s durable and shatter-proof, but as plastic No. 7, it’s rarely recyclable. Exfoliating facial scrub? If the hard bits aren’t shredded almond pits, those “beads” are plastic. Personal and household cleaning wipes? Polypropylene (plastic No. 5), standard, which leaches into the environment and creates “fatbergs” in sewage systems. Greeting cards with glitter? Yep. My son works at Hallmark Cards in the “glitter room.” Getting rid of one of the worst forms of microplastics on his skin means not one but several showers, and guess where that waste water goes?

It’s time to speak out about plastic. But even more, it’s time to make those words actionable.