Climate Canons

Plastic recycling program

On Wednesday 14 August the Climate Canons launched their plastic recycling program. PET 1 plastic bottles will be collected around the school in small red bins and will be sorted for collection by Greenbatch Foundation who will repurpose the plastic. By recycling through Greenbatch, we can save plastic from entering landfills, oceans and waste incinerators.

The explosion of plastic products in the last several decades has been extraordinary. Quite simply, humans are addicted to this nearly indestructible material. We are producing over 300 million tons of plastic every year, 50 per cent  which is for single-use purposes – utilised for just a few moments, but on the planet for at least several hundred years.

Since the 1950s, around 8.3 billion tons of plastic have been produced worldwide, that’s equivalent to the weight of more than 800,000 Eiffel Towers. And only 9% of it has been recycled. In some parts of the world, using plastic is already illegal. Kenya introduced one of the world’s toughest laws against plastic bags in 2017. Now, Kenyans who are caught producing, selling, or even using plastic bags will risk imprisonment of up to four years or fines of US$40,000.

A report by the Guardian found that 1 million plastic bottles are bought around the world every minute, and this number is set to increase by another 20 per cent by 2021 if we don’t act. The same report said more than 480 billion plastic drinking bottles were purchased in 2016 across the world — up from 300 billion a decade ago. Additionally, less than half of the bottles purchased in 2016 were recycled — with just 7 per cent of those collected turned into new bottles, and the rest ending up in landfill sites or the ocean.

Worldwide, about 2 million plastic bags are used every minute. This might seem like an unbelievable number, but according to Ecowatch, between 500 billion and 1 trillion plastic bags are used worldwide annually. Plastic is killing more than 1.1 million seabirds and animals every year. A study conducted by the University of Queensland in Australia, based on data collected since the late 1980s, found that Green sea turtles now ingest twice the plastic they did 25 years ago. According to the United Nations, ingestion of plastic kills an estimated 1 million marine birds and 100,000 marine animals each year.

So, what can we do to change this? Here at the College, starting this week, the Climate Canons are introducing a plastic recycling program. In each of the quads around campus you will find a red bin for collecting only PET 1 plastic which includes your water bottles and juice bottles. Please only place this type of waste in these red bins.

We need everyone on board to do their small part to ensure we all can be proud of a future we leave for generations to come. Please assist the Climate Canons by using these red bins properly. Thank you to the Parent Committee for their assistance with purchasing the bins.

If you have any questions or would like to join the Climate Canons you can email Miss Pisconeri. The Climate Canons look forward to the College’s ongoing support of this project.

Miss D Pisconeri (Humanities and Social Sciences (Geography)

and Science Teacher)