What is the effect of the plastic limit order for 10 years？ Media： mass production and waste
What is the effect of the "plastic limit order" for ten years?
The real answer may only be known by landfills. Documentary director Wang Jiuliang aimed at the plastic products with an average service life of 25 minutes, but it took at least 200 years to degrade.
But before it became a garbage mountain, it was a plastic bag with a daily consumption of 3 billion. It is a courier bag with a daily flow of hundreds of millions and travels all over the country; It is a takeaway box that can be built into hundreds of peaks a day and indirectly feed more than 20 million mouths; It is also a "white ocean" in rural areas.
Plastic is constantly changing its shape at high temperature, covering every individual in the consumer society. In the past 10 years, when the "Plastic Restriction Order" pushed the concept of "environmental protection is valuable" to the public, science and technology also constantly pursued the environmental protection needs of consumers. Various "environmental protection plastic bags" were put on the shelves, and the methods of screening the specific gravity of plastics and the chemical means of degradation and regeneration became hot environmental protection topics.
Few people know whether these projects have really landed and where those "environmentally friendly plastic bags" have gone after being discarded.
Ten years have passed, and the plastic wrapped in layers of veil has never been absent. At the beginning of this year, the National Development and Reform Commission invited people from all walks of life to make suggestions on the prevention and control of plastic waste pollution in official website.
Efforts to limit plastics are still going on.
Environmental protection or business opportunities?
In Wang Jiuliang’s shot, the plastic bag is the absolute protagonist of the landfill.
On the garbage mountain more than 50 meters high, all valuable things were taken away, only inferior plastic products were left unattended, including an uncountable number of "environmental protection plastic bags".
Liu Jianguo, a professor at the Institute of Solid Waste Control and Recycling of Tsinghua University Institute of Environment, is not surprised by the fate of these "environmentally friendly plastic bags". "Environmental plastic bags need strict conditions to degrade, such as temperature, moisture content, specific reactors, etc., which are difficult to degrade in the natural environment." He noticed that the whereabouts of these "environmentally friendly plastic bags" are still mixed with all kinds of garbage, then compressed and weighed, and finally sent to landfills or incinerators.
The only difference from ordinary plastic bags is that consumers "spend more money to meet their environmental protection needs".
His investigation found that a large number of plastic bags marked with "degradable" signs are actually the products of mixed degradable materials and non-degradable materials. After leaving the factory, it turned into an "environmentally friendly plastic bag" at a higher price, which is a huge business opportunity.
"If a degradable plastic bag is stained with oil, it needs to be cleaned with chemical reagents before entering the degradation process. How much does this process cost?" He said.
Wang Jiuliang is well aware that the current pace of scientific and technological progress is not unpleasant. Italy develops new technology — — Screening plastics in a pile of garbage by crushing and specific gravity. However, the implementation of these means in China is very difficult.
"Our garbage is not classified. What kind of substances are there in those garbage wastewater, how many processes have to go through and how much does it cost?" He said.
Wang Jiuliang feels that there are more urgent things to do than pinning his hopes on science and technology — — For example, rationally examine the extent to which plastics have affected the world around them. As far as you can see, there are inferior plastic products that have been reused everywhere, such as the pier supporting the sunshade in the coffee shop, the small pillars used for traffic isolation on the road, and the plastic trash cans that can be seen everywhere.
When he returned to his hometown, he found a countryside almost surrounded by plastic. The plastic film that I haven’t heard of since I was a child has now become the "owner" of farmland.
"Abandoned mulch films can be found everywhere in fields, ditches, roads, streets and farmers’ courtyards. The old mulch film was not finished, and the new one was laid. " Jiang Gaoming, a researcher at the Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, knows very well that the mulch film with a thickness of only 0.004 mm is difficult to completely peel off from the soil. Because it is covered with soil ash and light in weight, the value of mulch film recycling is low, and there is no other way but to burn and put it on hold.
Walking on the farmland, if you turn over the soil, it is easy for the naked eye to see the white plastic film broken into pieces intertwined with the clods, like crops growing in the field.
He found that the countryside is an almost "unmanaged plastic world". Some environmentalists went to the countryside and ate at their fellow villagers’ homes. Disposable plastic tableware was put on the table. After use, the fellow villagers threw it into the stove, and the speed of plastic bowls and cups disappeared, and then it became an invisible carcinogen dioxin, which was discharged into the air and then circulated to farmland and rivers with precipitation.
These inferior plastic products, which were eliminated by cities, flooded into the countryside with the tide of consumption. Because some villages do not have special sanitation personnel and garbage collection systems, plastic products enter rivers or ditches with the help of wind and rain, leaving them in rivers, lakes, seas and farmland mountains.
Negative value-added industries
Wang Jiuliang’s lens once aimed at a company that recycled mineral water bottles in Japan. This enterprise has a spacious workshop of several hundred square meters with advanced intelligent and numerical control equipment. On the production line, plastic bottles are crushed, cleaned and recycled in turn. In the workshop, Wang Jiuliang couldn’t find sewage or smell the pungent smell.
To his surprise, the person in charge of such a "model" enterprise is often troubled by recycling plastic bottles. Japan’s requirements for sewage discharge are too high, and they need to spend a lot of money to meet the standards. "Without government subsidies, we would lose money." The person in charge told Wang Jiuliang that for every ton of waste mineral water bottles purchased by enterprises, the government would subsidize them by 20,000 yen.
Even so, they are unable to recycle more kinds of plastic products, "the cost of environmental protection is too high."
The camera is aimed at the China garbage disposal plant, but it is a sad picture for Wang Jiuliang. He once spent three years filming a documentary called Plastic Kingdom. The documentary tells about the industrial chain of "foreign garbage" in China — — Some people buy garbage from all over the world from ocean-going cargo ships, sort out recyclable plastics, then rinse and crush them, then heat and melt them, and then cut them into plastic particles for manufacturing.
"Japan has to build a factory to deal with a single pollutant, but a small workshop in China can handle all kinds of plastic waste all over the world." He said, "China has the best garbage sorting people in the world. They have no protective measures and advanced technology." During the filming, those dark faces taught Wang Jiuliang the way to distinguish plastic waste all over the world — — Feel, listen to the noise, and then look at the smoke and smell the fire.
"They are a group of farmers." He said.
A mill the size of a table and two granulators the length of a table can form a small workshop. With the roar of the machine, plastic chips were flying in the air. From Wang Jiuliang’s lens, plastic debris can be seen in every corner of the screen. Turn the camera again, and the sewage may purr into the river without treatment.
The only difference between workshops is the size. "You have 10 such machines, and I may only have one."
Beyond the lens, more and more plastic wastes that are more difficult to handle are exported to China. In the past 10 years, China’s import of foreign garbage has experienced explosive growth, decline and complete ban this year.
"The reason why imports are still profitable is it really beneficial?" Wang Jiuliang couldn’t help but ask, "What is the cost of the environment?"
During the three-year shooting time, the camera recorded those visible "costs", and the water in the village was floating with garbage and foam; The sewage after cleaning the plastic flowed into the forest; An old lady accidentally touched corrosive products when sorting, and her whole finger joint was carbonized; The boss of a small workshop felt that there was a tumor on his waist but he didn’t want to see a doctor anyway. "What should I do if I check out the disease?" Life is not over yet? A batch of particles, half a year’s tuition. "
The filming of the documentary made Wang Jiuliang realize the truth that "garbage recycling based on environmental friendliness is a negative value-added industry." He made an analogy. If recycling 1 ton of waste living plastics in an environmentally friendly way can generate economic benefits in 100 yuan, the cost to be paid will be at least 101 yuan. "Otherwise, it can’t explain why Japan, which is recognized by the world as the best in garbage sorting and recycling, should provide government subsidies for enterprises to recycle garbage, and it can’t explain why Japanese garbage will still appear in foreign garbage coming to China in Plastic Kingdom."
Some environmentalists said, "Landfills and incinerators earn money to consume and treat garbage, not the secondary benefits generated by recycling plastic garbage."
In fact, the power generation efficiency of these dry-wet mixed garbage is not high after incineration, and it is possible to discharge toxic substances and produce fly ash and waste residue under the condition of insufficient combustion. But correspondingly, "the cost of recycling plastic products from massive garbage is even greater and more exaggerated."
"Environmental protection is often a matter of taking a few evils lightly." Liu Jianguo said that there is a voice in the current society, expecting scientists to find something that can completely replace plastic bags. But in fact, from the whole life cycle calculation, the pollution caused by the resources consumed by both canvas bags and paper bags will not be less.
For example, he said that if paper bags are made, they need to go through the process of planting trees, cutting trees, making pulp and making paper, and the cotton planting involved in canvas shopping bags is an industry with high water consumption and high energy consumption. Not only the amount of pesticides and fertilizers used, but also the cost of land resources occupation, transportation, printing and dyeing, circulation, landfill and incineration after abandonment should be considered. "You have only seen it used many times, but you have never thought that once it is handled, the weight of the cloth bag is dozens of times that of the plastic bag, and the space occupied and the handling difficulty are not small."
This scholar who studies solid waste has done experiments, and the impact of canvas bags on the environment can be better than that of plastic bags once every 200 times.
"The fundamental problem is not to find a substitute for plastic bags. What we really need to do is to examine our consumption behavior." Jiang Gaoming said.
Mass production, mass consumption and mass waste.
Large areas of plastic greenhouses and plastic films have occupied farmland. According to the data of China Academy of Agricultural Sciences, in just 30 years, the use of plastic films has increased by more than 200 times. Jiang Gaoming, who has been studying white pollution in rural areas for more than ten years, found that the butterfly effect caused the appearance of farmland to change greatly, which had a lot to do with the dining table of city people.
He said that in order to produce out-of-season vegetables and fruits, a large number of plastic greenhouses were built in rural areas. The purpose of "white ocean" plastic film on cultivated land is to improve soil temperature and humidity, so as to prolong the production season of crops with high economic value and ultimately increase their output.
After the plastic film was laid, the yield really increased. But at the same time, the plastic film is difficult to peel off from the soil after use. They stay in the soil for a long time, destroying the soil structure, losing the living space, leaving the nematodes and earthworms one by one, and finally hardening the land.
Jiang Gaoming noticed that in order to solve this problem, many people even adopted the method of "membrane in membrane", covering the greenhouse with a membrane and spreading another layer on the ground, in order to prevent water loss, but such a sealed environment would suffocate the microorganisms in the soil alive and eventually evolve into a fragile ecosystem.
He saw one sad face after another. Some farmers suffered from crop rot, diseases and other problems. Some cattle and sheep ate peanut seedlings covered with plastic film and were suffocated alive. Jiang Gaoming asked people to turn over the land and clearly saw that the plastic film was wrapped around the seedlings of peanuts, as if it were parasitic on the seedlings. They took the soil back to the laboratory for inspection, and even found the residual plastic film 30 years ago. "It has become a tiny, invisible plastic piece, but it has not disappeared."
Most of the plastic films that were too late to be treated were burned, so harmful substances such as hexachlorobenzene, dioxins and polychlorinated biphenyls entered the air.
And where did the crops that were infected and used excessive fertilizers and pesticides go? Jiang Gaoming said, "In the end, they all went to the table of the city people."
He thinks all this is ironic. Endless consumer demand controls the flow and changes of the market, but it is finally eaten by it. He once discussed with farmers that he simply removed the reflective film spread all over the orchard and used it less to reduce pollution and waste. But the other party rejected this proposal for a simple reason — — Without reflective film, apples are unevenly colored and sell poorly, so no one will buy them.
"Apples are for eating, not for seeing." Jiang Gaoming said.
The scholar couldn’t help thinking, "Do we really have such a big consumer demand?" He dislikes the packaging mode of a piece of candy and a piece of plastic paper, publicly criticizes the publishing industry’s behavior of pasting plastic films on books, and also opposes the hotel’s provision of disposable plastic toiletries. "How much waste will this cause?"
Liu Jianguo summed up 12 words: "mass production, mass consumption and mass waste".
Looking out from the office building of Tsinghua University Institute of Environment, the dense housing and office buildings are constantly compressing the space of the city. Plastic bags, construction waste, electronic waste, scrap steel, tires, glass, and even bike-sharing … … Liu Jianguo felt that the economic growth was too fast, the pace of life was accelerated, people’s consumption patterns changed, demand was stimulated, and a fast market was born. One or two years ago, bike-sharing was the "angel" who solved the last mile problem. In a blink of an eye, it became a garbage mountain in residential areas and parking lots.
"Many people don’t think about it, but think that plastic bags are a big problem, so while eating take-out packaged in plastic boxes, they lambaste the evil of plastic. If you really think about it, you will find problems everywhere. " The scholar sighed.
The abandoned construction waste landfill site after the demolition and construction was once the object of Wang Jiuliang’s lens capture. He saw many people in a landfill nearly two kilometers wide. During the rush hour, more than 2,000 people shuttled through all kinds of waste pipes, wires, plastics, steel bars and bricks, holding things and running to the shack on the edge of the landfill. That is their temporary residence, and it is also the temporary residence of waste materials. Cranes and trucks will soon take these materials away and send them to the next construction site or factory.
In the hot atmosphere, Wang Jiuliang stood in the distance with mixed feelings.
When filming Plastic Kingdom, the young documentary director noticed a set of data. From the large-scale import of foreign garbage in 1995 to around 2008, the whole foreign garbage recycling industry reflected a perfect upward curve in economic value. A ton of US$ 9 garbage from the United States can be sold to small workshops at a price of more than 1,000 yuan after crossing the ocean to China. After treatment, the price of a ton of plastic particles even reaches five figures, and the price is "almost catching up with raw materials".
"I thought people could be as low as dust, but I didn’t expect to be as low as garbage." At a screening event, a university teacher cried after watching the film.
Let enterprises feel pain, and let people feel pain.
Many times, Wang Jiuliang felt that he was also caught by the wave of consumerism. He poked his hand at the plastic cup in his hand and asked, "If you don’t provide plastic cups, can’t you drink?"
Wang Jiuliang said, how much plastic is produced, how much plastic waste will eventually appear, and the process of continuous reuse will only make the performance of plastic decrease, and eventually it will become truly non-recyclable plastic waste. The only way to avoid the environmental pollution of plastic waste is to reduce the use.
In his view, the current scope of the "plastic restriction order" is too narrow, "it should cover more industries." The means need to be adjusted by the government. "Enterprises that produce mineral water bottles have gained benefits. Should they bear the cost of environmental protection? Should people pay for the convenience of plastic bottles? Should the packaging industry be reformed? Do you have to pay taxes when selling plastic bags in supermarkets? "
"To make enterprises feel pain, let people feel pain." He said.
Liu Jianguo believes that in the past 10 years, the greatest value of the "Plastic Restriction Order" lies not in how many ultra-thin plastic bags are produced, but in the fact that it sends a signal to the society that "resources are valuable and resources need to be used at a cost" by charging for plastic bags.
Just, "If one day the price of plastic lunch boxes really rises from 50 cents to 5 yuan, are consumers willing to pay? One day, a recyclable lunch box is really made from recycled waste. Are people willing to use it? " He said that it is impossible to change the situation at once because of rising costs and market volatility.
The scholar believes that it is necessary to correct the name of plastics at present. "Materials don’t fall from the sky, plastics are not evil, they are made by human beings."
"Plastics should not be demonized, and the evil of plastics should not be confused with the problem of poor management." He said, "Can we keep plastic out of water? Keep it out of the farmland? Poor management of any material will become a problem, not just plastics. "
"It can really be done to improve the technology and management level of the whole recycling system and promote garbage sorting." The breakthrough in Liu Jianguo’s eyes is the countryside. "To make something out of nothing, establish a basic recycling system as soon as possible, even a simple landfill."
If we can sort the garbage well to reduce the difficulty of treatment, then it is possible to establish a derivative plastic sorting transit center, "at least it will be more valuable than burning a fire directly."
But in Jiang Gaoming’s view, there is more to try now.
He once heard that in Gansu, which is short of water, an agronomist helped local farmers to develop a double-layer mulch film and spread it on the land, in order to help the arid land lock in water so as to plant more corn. This project won the project, and finally "all parties are satisfied" and "everyone is happy".
Jiang Gaoming is not happy at all. "There is something wrong with technology. What you want is to develop another technology to solve it. In fact, it is against the laws of nature to artificially create an environment with the best temperature and humidity to grow corn. " He said, "The source is wrong."
Earlier, a Spanish scientist found that 100 wax moths degraded 92 mg of polyethylene within 12 hours. After being compiled by the media, this insect became a "salvation insect" with the ability to digest plastics. As soon as the news came out, Jiang Gaoming was in distress situation. Humans produce hundreds of thousands of tons of polyethylene every day, and let insects eat it. I didn’t know it would take years to eat it. More importantly, the idea of letting insects eat things that are not in nature is still "off the mark".
He is always thinking, maybe the natural conditions in some parts of Gansu are not suitable for planting corn, can Chinese herbal medicines be developed and planted? Can we find ways to promote eco-agriculture?
Jiang Gaoming knows very well that it is consumers who can really make all this change happen. "The banknotes in the hands of urban consumers are the best votes. Wherever you invest, there will be an industry." He said.
What should we do? Be optimistic!
Before filming Plastic Kingdom and Garbage Besieged City, Wang Jiuliang was a regular student at Communication University of China. At that time, some "stream of consciousness" wanted to make an exhibition called "Supermarket". "A conceptual thing, the shelves are not filled with new products, but with empty boxes filled with finished milk and plastic buckets filled with ice cream."
After the idea came up, he began to carry the machine to the big and small garbage dumps. But there, he found something more important than art The seriousness of the problem of plastic waste is far beyond the young man’s imagination. "There are more urgent things for you to solve."
In the face of reality, the metaphysical concept art landed and eventually became a documentary project. He also abandoned the implicit point of view and chose to point to the problem.
In the post-production process of Plastic Kingdom, he has been thinking: on the surface, these industries may be the pillars in the local area, supporting countless rural families. However, when the acquisition of individual interests is based on harming the interests of others, it has become a question of right and wrong. "It is necessary to cut down this industry. It is necessary to see more affected people. Who will protect their interests and who will speak out?"
He never forgot an old man he met during filming. Because of the treatment of "foreign garbage", the water source of the photographed village was polluted, and the nearby villagers had to go a long way to buy water. One day, Wang Jiuliang met an old lady with rickets at the place where she bought water. The vendor told the old man that a bucket of water was 4 yuan. The old lady was embarrassed to say, "4 yuan, can I owe it first?"
Since January this year, the state has completely banned the import of 24 kinds of "foreign garbage" from abroad, cutting down this industry that has been lingering for more than 20 years. Wang Jiuliang saw hope in it. He thought that if the garbage tax is really levied and the reform is promoted from top to bottom, maybe hope lies ahead.
Jiang Gaoming thought it was not difficult. He remembers that in the past, the rectification of waste oil and flour brightener at the national level was a cake that moved many people, but it was finally implemented.
This time, the gnawing bones became plastic products.
"The Queen of England can introspect and ask the royal family to ban the use of plastic straws and plastic bottles. Why can’t we?" He said.
At the beginning of this year, Britain promised the public that the British government would implement a 25-year plan to eliminate all avoidable plastic waste pollution by 2042. However, this voice failed to get more support from ordinary people. Many people posted messages on social platforms, "The government has set the time too late, and 2042 is too late. It should take immediate action now."
The plastic problem has become a world-class problem. Bangladesh suffered a catastrophic flood, and people were surprised to find that plastic bags turned out to be the primary cause of drainage system blockage. Countless blue-footed boobies are also losing their homes, and plastic garbage has become the new owner of the beach in Roberto Terra, Peru. Statistics show that these plastic wastes cause the death of hundreds of thousands of marine animals every year.
British Prime Minister Theresa May said, "One out of every three fish caught in the English Channel contains plastic fragments." At the beginning of this year, scientists found that plastic particles invisible to the naked eye appeared in the surface seawater of Antarctica, and the content was even higher than the average level in the ocean.
Bangladesh became the first country in the world to ban plastic bags in 2002. According to the law, those who import or sell plastic bags can be sentenced to up to 10 years in prison, while those who distribute plastic bags can be sentenced to 6 months in prison. Nowadays, only cloth bags and paper bags are sold in supermarkets in this country.
Wang Jiuliang toured the world with films, and many young viewers could not help asking Wang Jiuliang, "What should we do?"
He is not going to answer these questions. Wang Jiuliang hopes that these young people who care about environmental protection will find the answers themselves.
Some young people also asked him if he would be particularly pessimistic if he photographed garbage for so long. Wang Jiuliang smiled, "when you still insist on doing it, it means that the heart that wants to change has not changed. Be optimistic, even if we can’t, there are children. "
In recent years, to his surprise, there have been many groups concerned about garbage recycling in the private sector, appearing like dots on the map, looking for the possibility of solving problems.
In Wuxi, a group of doctors and college students are concerned about the recycling of medical waste such as used syringes. They visited all the major hospitals in Wuxi and persuaded each other to accept their proposal — — Distribute special sharp weapon boxes to every patient who needs to use syringes at home. This box is specially used for placing used syringes, and patients can return them to the recycling station set up by the hospital after use, thus avoiding the syringes from being directly thrown into the trash can. Later, they ran to hospitals in Suzhou and Shanghai.
This undertaking is still in progress.
The person in charge of the green packaging project of Jingdong Logistics is also frank. The amount of plastic express bags is huge, and disposable packaging has great advantages in cost. At present, it still occupies the mainstream in the express delivery industry. "It is difficult to implement recycling express packaging at the end of the community. The packaging recycling system and social infrastructure are not perfect, and there is also a lack of laws and regulations to support recycling enterprises to recycle."
At present, Jingdong Logistics is promoting the use of circulating express boxes — — The green box is made of PP material, which can be recycled for many times. After being damaged, it can be rebuilt into a new box, which does no harm to the environment and can replace disposable cartons. They hope to "cooperate with all social resources to form a relatively complete industrial chain and fully implement green recycling packaging."
Liu Jianguo said that many problems in China, including the problem of plastic bags, focus on the ultra-high-speed economic development. Many developed countries have taken hundreds of years to solve these problems step by step, while China needs to solve them in 20 years or even less. He hopes that the people can give more support and understanding, and at the same time, they can look at their consumption behavior more comprehensively and rationally and reflect on their consumption needs from their own perspective.
"In fact, human beings have taken a detour." Jiang Gaoming said that the problems in the development process are not terrible, and it is good to correct them in time. He even hopes that the use, abuse, restriction, reflection and future of plastic bags can be recorded, written into textbooks and become a mirror in history forever.