Environmental Impact

Abstract

The society concern for the environmental compatibility of man-made products has been growing in the past few decades and evolved in many directions, with an evident predominance of emotion on technical rationality. These last aspects are clearly justified in the main part of population under the pressure of overwhelming information by mass media without the possibility of a critical evaluation because of the lack of appropriate basic knowledge. Also, the political and commercial completion among various approaches to avoid the possible environmental deficiency of some useful products adds a significant element of uncertainty, which does not help towards an appropriate approach. In this situation, it is useful to examine from a purely scientific point of view, the real environmental problems which arise from the use of plastic materials and evidence the differences in this connection of fossil and nature-originated products. The disposal and degradability problems are certainly the main aspects, but many others are now considered significant, such as renewability of resources, healthy use, energy saving, general cost, all presently condensed in the more general term: sustainability. Of course, these considerations must be compatible with the rapid increase of population on the planet and the many sophisticated requests of welfare going to be extended to all world population. While on one side, this needs an improved education of humans in the use of resources and limitation, until to zero, of waste production, science and technology must consider available alternative ways to the most used materials for which up to now, mineral oil (petrol) is acting as the largest primary feedstock. The correct approach to protect the environment against the improper use of plastic materials should first eliminate the simple disposal and the use of those plastic materials , which for the production process and some product features have been associated with harmful health effects. These last should then be promptly replaced by moving towards reusable products to minimize waste and disposal needs. The situation is also dependent on the evaluation of duration of use life in order to select non-biodegradable materials for applications requiring long-term life and the biodegradable in case of expected short-term applications. The production of items that are disposable with a programmed, short life span from biodegradable to long living and recyclable would certainly help to realize a more sustainable use of thermoplastic materials. In this way, the quality of life of current and future generations will be not compromised as far as the progress of technology and healthy environment is concerned.