Do you know the carbon footprint of your plastic bottles & bags used daily?
The carbon footprint of plastics, such as LDPE or PET, polyethylene, etc. is about 6 kg of CO2 released by per kg of plastic produced! In other words, if you know the weight of your plastic bottles or bags, you can multiply it with the number of plastic bags or bottles you are using per year. Then you can easily calculate the carbon dioxide emitted by your own usage of plastic bottles or bags
A “daily plastic footprint” is actually the quantity of plastic, an individual, business, workforce or family uses and disposes on a daily basis. As per the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) report for the year, 2017-18, India generates an estimated amount of 9.4 million tonnes of plastic waste per year which accounts to about 26,000 tonnes of plastic waste per day, and this is the approximate daily plastic footprint of the country! Unbelievable and disastrous, isn’t it?
Also, out of the above-mentioned 9.4 million tonnes of plastic waste generated annually, only around 5.6 million tonnes is recycled per year, and the rest is dumped as waste forming the landfill, polluting our land and choking our water bodies, such as rivers, lakes, seas and oceans, leading to severe plastic pollution. Hence, its high time we switched to the usage of sustainable products like glass and steel to minimize plastic waste generation as much as possible and to reduce our plastic footprint, as plastics take hundreds of years to degrade and decompose, so that we can ensure a safer and sustainable future.
Are you aware of the fact that your day begins with plastics?
Well, we may not realize the fact but our day starts with plastics! The plastic packaging of our toothpaste, the plastic bristles of our toothbrush, the plastic bottled water which we drink, the plastic bags that we use, the plastic lunchbox as well as the plaster water bottles, cans , etc., all contribute to the increasing plastic pollution degrading our environment and threatening the entire ecological balance of our ecosystem!
Thus, to replace plastics for good and offer complete sustainable solutions, Original Equipment Manufacturing Companies (OEMs) like WAE have developed unique and innovative machines like the glass bottling plants to mechanically rinse, clean, fill and cap the recyclable glass bottles with pure drinking water. Only these bottles have to be placed on the machine manually in an inverted position for cleaning and rinsing purposes with hot water or detergents, and this process is customizable. Then these inverted and cleaned glass bottles pass through a conveyor belt to get dried by air. It is after the execution of all these processes that the bottles pass through the LED chamber for further cleaning and sterilization, and are capped properly to avoid any water spillage, after a manual inspection round, to ensure clean and safe water in hygienic glass bottles, instead of plastic bottles.
Hazardous health impacts of sipping water from plastic bottles!
When we drink water or juices from plastic bottles or jars, we unknowingly, ingest microplastics or minute, microscopic plastic particles, less than 5mm in size and toxic chemicals leaching from the plastic containers, causing serious health disorders and diseases, such as weight gain, insulin resistance, endocrine disruption, lowered reproductive health and even cancers!
Disastrous environmental consequences of single-use plastics
Landfills, where single-use plastics are sent, account for more than 15 per cent of methane gas emissions, polluting and poisoning the atmosphere continuously, and the overuse of plastics as well as the alarming disposal of more plastics in landfills is leading to an enhanced landfill size with an increase in these gas emissions. In fact, Plastic Pollution, whether it’s Marine or Land, is responsible for the irreparable loss and damage to the entire ecosystem disturbing the ecological balance completely!
So, What’s the Solution? We can follow a few steps mentioned below to Reduce our Plastic Footprint:
- Use reusable glass water bottles, coffee cups and cloth bags for shopping.
- Buy in Bulk: Purchasing items in bulk can help reduce the amount of plastic packaging you bring into your home.
- Choose Glass or Steel: Opt for steel or products packaged in glass or other metals, rather than plastic.
- Recycle Properly: Make sure that all your plastic items are recycled properly and support initiatives that promote recycling.
To sum up, reducing our reliance on plastics isn’t just an option today, but has become a dire necessity, and each step that we take towards it will alone bring us closer to a more safer, healthier and sustainable future for us as well as our future generations.