Despite our efforts to sort and recycle, less than 9% of plastic gets recycled in the U.S., and most ends up in landfill or the environment.
Despite our efforts to sort and recycle, less than 9% of plastic gets recycled in the U.S., and most ends up in landfill or the environment.
Biodegradable plastic bags and containers could help, but if they’re not properly sorted, they can contaminate otherwise recyclable #1 and #2 plastics. What’s worse, most biodegradable plastics take months to break down, and when they finally do, they form microplastics – tiny bits of plastic that can end up in oceans and animals’ bodies – including our own.
Now, as reported today in the journal Nature, scientists at the Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and UC Berkeley have designed an enzyme-activated compostable plastic that could diminish microplastics pollution, and holds great promise for plastics upcycling. The material can be broken down to its building blocks – small individual molecules called monomers – and then reformed into a new compostable plastic product.
Read More: DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
A modified plastic (left) breaks down after just three days (right) in standard compost and entirely after two weeks. (Photo Credit: UC Berkeley photo by Ting Xu)
