Thanks to my friend, Dennis Ledden, who passed this along to me today. This is a chart showing categories/lists of how and where we’re affected by plastics. Here’s the link: FACTS
Author: Brian Berardo
Check out bberardo.com for details.
Some potentially GREAT news about a bacteria that eats plastic!!
Funny how I didn’t see this on any of the major news networks. Here’s the link to the story found on the goodnewsnetwork.org: https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/scientists-engineered-a-bacteria-to-eat-plastic-bottles-and-transforming-them-into-useful-liquids/. We can only hope and pray that this research continues and can be made scalable. While we still think that reducing our production of plastics needs to happen, this brings new hope to an otherwise troubling future with plastics.
Report from BeyondPlastics.org on the folly of the plastics industry and their “Chemical Recycling”.
I’m sharing this email from a friend of mine that came out yesterday (Halloween) and confirms what was already feared WRT (With Respect To) this heinous farce. The report itself is 159 pages, but the Fact Sheet paints a clear picture and is only 6 pages on the report link. Your may need to go to beyondplastics.org to access their links. They also have a link to take action and urge Congress to reject this dangerous “Chemical Recycling” fantasy.
“Ghosts and skeletons may be roaming the streets today but you know what really scares me? Chemical recycling, a set of dirty, polluting, climate change speeding technological processes the plastics and petrochemical industry is touting as the solution to the global plastic pollution crisis it created. Unfortunately, nothing could be further from the truth…
To shine a light on the truth of this polluting set of supremely expensive stalling tactics, I am proud to share our new report, “Chemical Recycling: A Dangerous Deception” with you today.
We wrote this report with our good friends at IPEN (the International Pollutants Elimination Network) who contributed incredibly valuable expertise and a remarkable volume of research hours.
Among the report’s major findings are the following:
- Chemical recycling is a false solution to the plastic pollution crisis;
- Chemical recycling is inefficient, energy-intensive, and speeds climate change;
- Chemical recycling creates large amounts of toxic waste;
- Chemical recycling is dangerous and dirty and threatens environmental justice communities across the country;
- Plastics recycling moves poisons around our economy and environment;
- Eliminating or relaxing existing regulations puts our health at risk; and more.
The report also includes a detailed investigation of the United States’ 11 existing chemical recycling facilities. Click here to download your free copy of the report now.>>
We know firsthand how complicated the topic of chemical recycling is and want to answer any questions that may arise for you as you read the report. Please join us for a free webinar on Tuesday, November 28 at 7:00 PM ET US.
Together with my colleague and report contributor, Jennifer Congdon and report author, Lee Bell of IPEN, we’ll dive into the findings. Register now for the free educational webinar. >>
We’d appreciate any help you can offer to get this new report out into the world and in front of more people’s eyeballs 
. Please send this report to your members of Congress and state legislators. The chemical industry is pushing hard to promote this risky technology and we need to educate as many elected officials as possible.
Click here for a sharing toolkit you can use or feel free to just use the links below to share it on social media. 
You can also simply forward this email to your friends and family
- Share on Twitter/X
- Share on Facebook
- Share on Instagram
- Share on Threads
- Share on LinkedIn
- Share on BlueSky
Thank you for helping to raise awareness of the threat chemical recycling poses to our climate, our health, our environment, and environmental justice communities across the country while failing to address our mounting plastic pollution crisis.
I hope to see you at the webinar on Tuesday, November 28 and look forward to hearing your feedback on the report then.
Wishing you and yours a happy Halloween today.
Sincerely,
Judith Enck
President, Beyond Plastics
Former US EPA Regional Administrator”
Bernie has the right idea – lobby to have the DOJ go after the oil companies
An article appeared today (8/6/2023) on MSNBC’s website entitled “The world is burning. Here’s how we stop it.“: ttps://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/bernie-sanders-climate-change-justice-department-lawsuit-rcna97622 . This is an excerpt from that article:
“..Earlier this week, I sent a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland urging him to bring lawsuits against the fossil fuel industry in relation to its longstanding and carefully coordinated campaign to mislead consumers and discredit climate science in pursuit of massive profits. The letter was co-signed by Sens. Jeff Merkley, Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey.
Like the tobacco industry before them, the fossil fuel companies’ actions represent a clear violation of federal racketeering laws, truth in advertising laws, consumer protection laws, and potentially other laws. The Justice Department must hold them accountable.”
Thank you, Bernie, and may the Gods bless you!!!
A Short & Concise Article from Earthday.org
This brief article manages to get to the heart of the problem with plastics and it’s entitled “Oil-Rich Countries Hinder the Global Plastics Treaty”. Here’s the link: https://www.earthday.org/oil-rich-countries-hinder-the-global-plastics-treaty/ . Bottom line, we can’t recycle our way out of the mess we’ve created for ourselves and the planet. As the article states, “Limiting, and eventually ending, plastic production is the only way toward a future free from the chokehold of plastic pollution.”. The article closes by urging you to add your voice to the Global Plastics Treaty petition. You CAN make a difference! Thank you Earthday.org!
Tell the EPA: plastic waste is NOT a renewable fuel
A friend of mine recently forwarded to me an article from BeyondPlastics.org. Check it out:
“Taking a page from George Orwell, the U.S. EPA is actually encouraging big companies to turn waste plastics into fossil fuels to be burned through it’s Renewable Fuel Standard program. But there’s absolutely nothing “renewable” about using plastics as fuel.
Please click here now to add your name to Beyond Plastics’ petition calling on the EPA to stop supporting “chemical recycling” and other false solutions to our plastic pollution crisis.
“Chemical recycling” is a polluting false solution to our plastic pollution crisis that’s being aggressively promoted by Big Plastic to enable the industry to continue to produce massive amounts of plastics (and profits).
“Chemical recycling” (also called “advanced recycling”, “molecular recycling”, “waste to fuel”, gasification, or pyrolysis) refers to a suite of processes that use high heat, chemicals or pressure to turn plastic waste into fossil fuels and other feedstocks that are most often burned.
It’s got a lot of names but no matter what you call it, making fuel from plastic is worse in many ways for the climate, our environment, and human health than simply burning fossil fuels.
If you’d like to learn more about this troubling trend at the EPA, I highly recommend reading this eye-opening ProPublica expose on the health and environmental hazards of so-called “chemical recycling”.
So-called “chemical recycling” is highly problematic because it creates toxic emissions and end products, typically uses more energy and emits more greenhouse gases than conventional recycling or even virgin plastic production, it requires huge investments of money and has not yet been proven viable at scale, and it relies on non-existent clean streams of used plastic to work even though the lack of clean used plastics is already a major stumbling block to conventional plastics recycling.
In addition to all of these critical issues, “chemical recycling” does nothing to turn off the plastic tap and would not reduce the demand for virgin plastics. We can’t afford to waste time and money investing in this false solution at the expense of enacting effective, true solutions to the plastic pollution crisis.
I hope you will join us in urging the EPA to stop supporting “chemical recycling” projects through its Renewable Fuel Standard Program and urge the agency to support solutions to our plastic pollution crisis that actually work and are readily available right now, such as eliminating plastic packaging and advancing reuse and refill systems.
Please add your name here then forward this email to your family and friends and urge them to join you in calling on the EPA to change course.
If you are active on social media, you can also like and share this action there using the links below:
Thank you so much for your help.
Cheers,
Judith Enck
President, Beyond Plastics
Former U.S. EPA Regional Administrator”
Good News!
It can sometimes be a struggle to hear and see all the violent images and bad news in today’s world. In fact, one of the topics in our men’s group meetings was “How do you cope with the constant barrage of depressing and deeply disturbing information routinely disseminated in almost every newscast or news article.” One answer was to limit your exposure to such news/broadcasts, be they TV, radio, phone applications, etc. Unplugging ourselves periodically from our electronic and media saturated world is now considered a VERY healthy practice. Happily, there are alternative news sources that can uplift us instead of dragging us down and depressing us. These are two of my favorites:
It’s like a tonic or an ice-cold drink on a hot day. Your psyche and soul will thank you for bringing a bit of joy and optimism to your day. There IS good happening out there – it’s just not as dramatic and, for many, as alluring as the bad news. Some might argue that bad news sells copy more than good news but how can we know that since the ratio of bad to good news is nothing short of staggering?
Goodnews (the application)
This wonderful journalistic collection is available on Android (what I use) and I suspect is also available on iPhones as well. The application comes to us from Germany but is available in English. I did a search just now on Microsoft Store for Goodnews and I didn’t see this application there. If you know of others, please pass them along. I suspect we can always use a bit more joy in our lives.
A Meditation Plug
There are so many worthy traditions that practice meditation. They have a lot in common like ditching the past and future and living in the present moment – now. Among my favorites are Pema Chödrön’s “How to Meditate”, Deepak Chopra’s “Total Meditation”, Eknath Easwaran’s “Conquest of Mind”, and Eckhart Tolle’s “The Power of Now”. I am so thankful to have enjoyed each of these tomes. Each brings a different yet shared beauty and joy to the reader. For me, some of the chapters are better than others in each of these books, but these resonate deeply and help guide me on my path.
Consumer Alert!
This is being repeated because it’s too important not to do so. My wife and I do a lot of our shopping at our local Safeway grocery stores. They’ve been working hard, as do many grocers these days, in trying to provide products that are sustainable and organic. That said, they recently took a WRONG TURN in the plastic packaging of many of their O Organics product line and it’s up to us to remind them.
Please note the following statement from O Organics, one of Safeway’s premier product lines:
“Why O Organics® ?
With O Organics®, you know that what you feed your family is actually good for them. Because all O Organics® products are USDA Certified Organic. They are made responsibly, sustainably and safely (my highlighting). They are always non-GMO, and grown without synthetic pesticides.
Dear fellow consumers: feeding your family microplastics is NOT good for them and pumping MORE plastics into our environment is NOT helpful. https://www.safeway.com/shop/lp/o-organics-organic.html is the home of O Organics. Please write to them and express your disdain for switching from paper containers to PLASTIC containers in many of their dairy products, e.g. Half and Half, Heavy Whipping Cream, etc. This switch happened recently in 2021! They also have countless other products that are being sold in plastic that could be packaged in a more sustainable manner. We, as consumers, need to fight back or we will truly be even more awash in plastic.
Safeway is trying to do the right thing by going to a product line like O Organics. We LAUD their efforts to bring us higher quality products. Unfortunately, they’ve become distracted from their mission and it’s up to us to remind them that we DO care about our environment and the products we consume. Please go to https://www.safeway.com/shop/lp/o-organics-organic.html and at the bottom of the page, under Quick Links, click on “Contact Us”. Scroll down to the lower part of the next screen to the header ‘Contact Us’ and the right most of three boxes is a box “Other Ways To Contact Us“. Click on “Comments and Questions” and explain to them that their sustainable practices are going BACKWARDS instead of forwards in their packaging. This page also has addresses for Customer Support Center and Media Inquiries. ANYTHING you can do to help mitigate this senseless INCREASE in plastics will help. Your planet and your body THANK YOU!!!
DARIGOLD switching from paper packaging to PLASTIC!
I wrote to Darigold.com this morning: they’ve switched from paper packaging for decades of their Half & Half dairy product to PLASTIC! (Barcode is 264002760) I sent the following to their contact URL:
“Good day!! Your website talks about Sustainability & Stewardship, the Environment, and then you switch from paper packaging to PLASTIC for your dairy products, e.g., Half & Half? Are you kidding me? For your reference that’s Barcode 2640022760. I am OUTRAGED!! Talk about hypocritical! You have such a wonderful product and then you put it in PLASTIC? WAKE UP!!!! Not only will I not buy your product now, but I’ll do everything in my power to spread the word of your hypocrisy, including reporting you to Green Peace, Ocean Conservancy, Oceana.org, 5gyres.org, my own church, and worthyvisions.com.”
I urge you to PLEASE go to darigold.com and click on the Contact button and beg them to stop adding PLASTIC to our environment. Thank you!
worthyvisions.com 