Pervasive Pollution Problems Caused by Plastics and its Degradation

• Main Authors: Sidra Hassan, Ihsan ul Haq
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: International Association of Online Engineering (IAOE) 2019-06-01
• Series: International Journal of Online and Biomedical Engineering
• Subjects: Plastic Pollution; Biodegradation; Wildlife; Contamination
• Online Access: https://online-journals.org/index.php/i-joe/article/view/10873

We are living in a period of time where gaining access to clean water, food and even air is almost impossible. Everything on the planet Earth is contaminated in one form or another. Not only humans but all the creatures of the planet are under constant threat from at least one of the forms of pollution. Like other forms of pollution, plastic pollution is also a huge and mounting problem and it demands a similarly ambitious and influential solution. As ‘human-caused climate change’ received so much attention, this issue also needs the same consideration and it should be approached in the same way. Plastic pollution is killing our planet! It’s choking our oceans by making plastic gyres, entangling marine animals, poisoning our food and water supply, and ultimately inflicting havoc on the health and well-being of humans and wildlife globally. With the exception of a small amount that has been incinerating, virtually every piece of plastic that was ever made in the past still exists in one form or another.  And since most of the plastics don’t biodegrade in any meaningful sense, all that plastic waste could exist for hundreds or even thousands of years. If plastic production isn’t circumscribed, plastic pollution will be disastrous and will eventually outweigh fish in oceans. It’s time to think about the plastics, banning the single-use plastics, thinking about the recycling and going towards the zero-waste concept. This paper covers the reviews about current research on the plastic disasters by plastic industry and biodegradation of the conventional synthetic plastics by different microorganisms and major concerns related to ocean plastic pollution