Oil, gas, and coal are the fossil-fuel building blocks of plastics. Studies show that fossil fuel air pollution causes almost 1 in 5 deaths globally each year.
Thousands of seabirds and sea turtles, seals, and other marine mammals are killed each year after inadvertently eating plastic or getting caught in it. Endangered wildlife like Hawaiian monk seals and Pacific loggerhead sea turtles are among nearly 700 species that eat and get caught in plastic waste.
It's estimated that over 90% of plastic waste isn't recycled. If present trends continue, by 2050, there will be 12 billion metric tons of plastic in landfills. That amount is 35,000 times as heavy as the Empire State Building!
Fortunately, we can do something to avoid this. Studies show reducing plastic production and consumption can affect this the most and would lessen plastic waste generation by 30%.
Using single-use plastic products ends up costing more over time than using, well-made reusable products. Not only that, reuse beats single-use on every environmental metric, such as greenhouse gas emissions, water consumption, resource extraction, and plastic pollution.