Plastic pollution is one of the most serious environmental crises facing the world today. Between 1950 and 2015, over 90% of plastics were landfilled, incinerated, or leaked into the environment. Plastic waste is ubiquitous—from our rivers, lakes, and oceans to roadways and coastlines. It is in “the air we breathe, the food we eat, and the water we drink.”2 One study estimates that humans ingest up to five grams or the equivalent of one credit card worth of plastic per week.3 Some of the largest oil and gas companies are among the 20 petrochemical companies responsible for more than half of all single-use plastics generated globally.4 ExxonMobil, for example, is the world’s top producer of single-use plastic polymers.
Underpinning this plastic waste crisis is a decades-long campaign of fraud and deception about the recyclability of plastics. Despite their long-standing knowledge that recycling plastic is neither technically nor economically viable, petrochemical companies—independently and through their industry trade associations and front groups—have engaged in fraudulent marketing and public education campaigns designed to mislead the public about the viability of plastic recycling as a solution to plastic waste. These efforts have effectively protected and expanded plastic markets, while stalling legislative or regulatory action that would meaningfully address plastic waste and pollution. Fossil fuel and other petrochemical companies have used the false promise of plastic recycling to exponentially increase virgin plastic production over the last six decades, creating and perpetuating the global plastic waste crisis and imposing significant costs on communities that are left to pay for the consequences.
— source climateintegrity.org | Feb 2024