Not long ago, I listened to a certain “Living on Earth” radio broadcast with amazement. A woman was explaining how she made up her mind to live without plastics. She did not make the effort sound easy, but she did make me think of ways I might cut back.
The “Living on Earth” account begins,”We live in a plastic-filled world. It’s used in almost everything, from cars to chewing gum to prescription drug bottles. Five years ago, Beth Terry decided to stop consuming plastic and she’s survived to tell the tale. Host Bruce Gellerman talks with Terry about her new book, ‘Plastic Free: How I Kicked the Plastic Habit and How You Can Too.’ ”
Terry tells the host, “Five years ago, almost to the day, I stumbled across an article about the plastic pollution problem in the ocean. And what completely blew my mind, and broke my heart, was this photo I saw of a dead albatross chick on Midway Island, thousands of miles from civilization — halfway between the United States and Japan. And it was just the carcass; it was full of plastic pieces. Like the plastic that I used on an everyday basis — things like bottle caps, things that didn’t come from the middle of the Pacific Ocean — they came from us. I just had to change. …
“I didn’t commit to stop using the plastic I already had, first of all, and I don’t recommend that anybody go through their house and purge the plastic and throw it away, because that’s just so wasteful, I think. But when my computer broke and it couldn’t be fixed — my first step is always to try and fix things and make them last as long as possible — but, when it couldn’t be fixed, I looked on Craig’s List and I found a secondhand computer.”
My own worry about plastics is how unstable the components are and how chemicals may escape into the air we breathe and the water we drink. When plastics are heated, as in a microwave, they can be dangerous. Please use ceramic containers for warming food in your — er — plastic microwave.
Read more of Terry’s alternatives to buying new plastics at “Living on Earth.”
Photograph: Beth Terry, with the plastic she collected in the first half of 2007.
Suzanne's Mom's Blog 
Interesting that you would write about Beth Terry today. I met her over the weekend at the 2012 BlogHer conference in NYC. She had a book signing at the Moms Clean Air Force table, where I was hanging out (I also blog for them). I’ve just started reading her book. Proud to live in Concord, a pioneer in banning the sale of plastic single serve water bottles
What a coincidence, Judith! I hope you will write more about the conference.
I remember doing research on ocean detritus, and learning about nurdles–the little tiny ball-bearing-like plastic balls that are a preproduction form of plastic. They’re poetically called “mermaids’ tears,” but they’re not good for the environment.
And then there’s the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, where, due to ocean currents, lots of debris congregates. If you go to the wikipedia page on it, you can see perhaps the very same albatross picture that galvanized Beth Terry.
Plastics are hugely useful because they’re lightweight and strong–and they have the possibility of being recycled, if only people and communities would put in the effort to establish recycling centers and use them (but, too, companies would have to commit to using recycled plastic, and so on). But yeah, things like single-use water bottles–a terrible idea for so many reasons.
Thank you for this thoughtful comment. I am a bit overwhelmed by the challenge but do small things like recycling and avoiding plastic bottles. The more we are conscious of the problem, the more we can think up our own approaches in our daily lives.
A world without plastics would be a wonderful world…
Not easy. Being conscious of unnecessary use of plastics seems like a good step, though.