循环经济转型
2016年,艾伦·麦克阿瑟基金会发布了第一份《新塑料经济》报告,在该报告中,一份令人震惊且广为流传的统计数据显示,如果我们不改变生产和使用塑料制品的方式,到2050年,海洋中塑料的重量可能会超过鱼类。 去年,BBC系列纪录片《蓝色星球2》将这种担忧直观地呈现在观众眼前,再度引发公众对塑料问题的高度关注。
《新塑料经济》系列报告呼吁,要根据循环经济的原则来重新设计塑料体系,而这种转变需要人们改变原有的思维方式。
因为,尽管我们做出了极大的努力,但作为一个社会,我们在“塑料问题”上并未取得重大进展。回收标志已推出40余年,但实际上,仅有14%的塑料包装得到回收,且其中只有2%得到有效回收。其余部分要么在回收过程中损耗,要么用于价值较低的商品。尽管出发点极其美好,但回收的酸奶罐不太可能再做酸奶罐。
因此,艾伦·麦克阿瑟基金会将目标重新调整为“建立一个新塑料经济,将塑料制品永远不会成为废弃物或流入海洋摆在第一位”。
In 2016, the Ellen MacArthur Foundation released the first New Plastics Economy report, which provided the alarming and widely shared statistic that if we don’t change how we make and use plastic, by 2050 the oceans could contain more plastics than fish, by weight. Viewers of the BBC series Blue Planet 2 saw this concern brought to life last year, resulting in another spike in public attention.
The New Plastics Economy reports have called for a redesign of the plastics system in line with the principles of a circular economy, a shift that will require a change in mindset.
Because try as we might, as a society we haven’t made much progress on the ‘plastics problem’. The recycling symbol has been around for over 40 years, but just 14% of plastic packaging is actually collected, and of that only 2% is properly recycled. The rest is lost during the recycling process, or goes to lower value goods. Despite best intentions, that yoghurt pot you recycled probably won’t be reborn as another yoghurt pot.
So the new goal, according to the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, is “a New Plastics Economy, in which plastics will never become waste or enter the ocean in the first place.”