Single-use plastic products (SUPs)

Single-use plastics, sometimes abbreviated as SUPs, are plastic products that consumers use only once or a few times before discarding them. Since the turn of the twenty-first century, single-use plastics have come under increasing scrutiny from regulators and policymakers due to their negative environmental impacts. Single-use plastics are a major source of both maritime and terrestrial pollution, and plastic products are made using processes heavily reliant on the fossil fuels that are driving global warming and climate change.

In 2019, one hundred and seventy countries joined an international pledge to phase out or otherwise drastically reduce their consumption of single-use plastic products. Multiple countries, including Canada, China, India, the United Kingdom, the United States, and member states of the European Union (EU) have also introduced bans targeting specific single-use plastic products such as grocery bags, takeout food containers, cups, straws, and cutlery. Many companies have produced products such as biodegradable disposable cutlery and beeswax food wrap as alternatives to synthetic plastics.

Background

Plastics are synthetic materials containing polymers, which are substances made of large molecules (macromolecules) built from smaller units known as monomers. As an industrial material, plastic is defined by its ability to be formed or molded into virtually any shape under heat and/or pressure. This characteristic, known as plasticity, has led to plastic becoming one of the most widely used industrial materials on Earth. It is highly practical and versatile because it is durable, transparent, and lightweight.

Modern plastics can be biobased or synthetic. Biobased plastics (bioplastics) are created using organic substances such as vegetable oils, starches, carbohydrates, and bacteria. Synthetic plastics are made from fossil fuel sources, including coal, crude oil, and natural gas. A large majority of the industrial plastics used in consumer products is synthetic, because synthetic plastics offer efficient, cost-effective production methods while bioplastics are more difficult and costly to produce.

Synthetic plastics are made using a multistep, resource-intensive production method that carries further environmental tolls. The process includes extracting fossil fuels in their raw forms, processing raw materials in furnaces and distillation units, forcing the chemical bonds that create polymers, and combining processed materials into their final forms and shapes. Each of these steps requires significant energy inputs, which are mainly generated from fossil fuel combustion. Expert estimates suggest that in the EU, approximately 4 to 6 percent of all oil and gas reserves are used to produce plastics for industrial purposes.

Some synthetic plastics and bioplastics are biodegradable, meaning that they will naturally break down and decompose under normal conditions. Most consumer plastics will not biodegrade and must instead be recycled to avoid creating solid waste. However, the plastic recycling process itself is fraught with problems. Waste management experts note that plastics are costly to collect and difficult to sort. Consumer plastics consist of many hundreds of different products, all of which must be melted for recycling separately. Plastics also begin to break down when they are recycled and reused, increasing their toxicity and reducing their practicality.

Because of obstacles to recycling plastics, the vast majority of manufactured plastics end their periods of active usage as waste, either in landfills or as litter. Plastic litter frequently collects in municipal drainage systems, where it is deposited into waterways. Much of this plastic finds its way to marine environments, where it poses threats to aquatic wildlife and their natural habitats. According to a 2022 report published by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), only about 9 percent of all plastic waste generated globally is recycled, while 22 percent is uncollected or mismanaged. The OECD also notes that global consumers doubled their plastic usage rates during the two decades preceding the report, creating an untenable situation that a growing number of countries are choosing to address through legislation.

Overview

Single-use plastics include many common plastic-based consumer products that are designed and intended to be used over the short term—once or a very limited number of times—before being discarded as waste. Examples include plastic shopping bags, product packets and wrappers, beverage containers and cups, take-out food containers, plastic cutlery and straws, and the sticks used to make many cotton swabs. Additional single-use plastics include balloons and balloon sticks, cigarette butts, and many sanitary items for infants, children, and adults. Some single-use items made from plastics and plastic derivatives, such as surgical gloves, cannot be safely reused and are generally exempted from efforts to reduce plastic consumption.

Plastic was first invented in the nineteenth century, but it did not become widely used in consumer products until the second half of the twentieth century. Novel production methods made durable, inexpensive plastics more appealing to manufacturers than traditional materials such as wood and glass, leading plastic to replace many of these materials. Approximately 9.149 billion imperial tons (8.3 billion metric tonnes) of industrial plastics have been produced since 1970, with the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) estimating that about half of that production took place during the 2005 to 2020 period. In a 2024 report, the NRDC estimated that 8 million metric tons of plastic make their way into waterways each year

Single-use plastics account for a large majority of all manufactured plastics circulating in consumer markets. In addition to the terrestrial and marine pollution they produce and the atmospheric pollution to which they indirectly contribute via fossil fuel consumption, single-use plastics are also associated with other harms. As they break down, plastics degrade into smaller and smaller forms known as microplastics. Because plastic is so widely used, microplastics have extensively contaminated natural environments, water supplies, and food chains. Researchers have linked microplastics to numerous serious health risks: plastics and their chemical constituents are known to disrupt the body’s endocrine system, implicating them as a potential source of hormone imbalances. Exposure to microplastics in excessive amounts has also been linked to fertility problems and certain forms of cancer.

Addressing the Issue

Government leaders, policymakers, and ecology advocates around the world broadly agree that the ubiquity of single-use plastics must be addressed as part of any comprehensive environmental remediation plan. Efforts in the twenty-first century focus on reducing the rates at which single-use plastics are consumed, improving recycling rates, and introducing policies that restrict or ban unnecessary single-use plastics or otherwise phase them out of widespread use.

Consumption reduction strategies include public awareness campaigns designed to educate consumers on the negative impacts of single-use plastics and encourage them to source alternatives whenever possible. Many jurisdictions around the world have also introduced new design standards intended to improve product efficiency or reusability and reduce waste. Additional approaches include product labeling requirements that compel manufacturers to indicate how much plastic a particular product or package contains, how to safely dispose of it, and how to avoid causing accidental harm or pollution after discarding the product. Some jurisdictions, such as the EU, have also introduced requirements that assign increased cleanup and environmental mitigation responsibility to plastic producers and manufacturers that choose to package their products in plastic when other alternatives are available.

In 2019, one hundred and seventy countries joined a United Nations (UN) pledge to “significantly reduce” plastic consumption rates by 2030. The non-binding resolution mainly targets single-use plastic items including shopping bags, cutlery, cups, and straws. While stakeholders and observers recognized the agreement as an important form of progress, many also felt it did not go far enough in addressing the environmental threat posed by plastics in general and single-use plastics in particular. The agreement was reached after five days of negotiations involving more than 4,700 delegates and was a compromise after a more aggressive target that would have phased out single-use plastics worldwide by 2025 failed to attract adequate support.

As of early 2024, the United States did not have a ban on single-use plastics. However, in July 2024, the Biden administration announced plans to phase out their use by 2035. The first goal of the plan was to end the federal procurement of single-use plastics from food service events and operations by 2027. Individual states have also taken action to limit or ban their use. California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, New York, Oregon, and Vermont have passed laws restricting or banning the use of plastic bags at supermarkets and retail stores. A 2019 study found that California experienced a 70 percent reduction in plastic bag usage after the ban went into effect in 2014. Despite the progress, some states have laws that could be used to partially or fully block any legislative effort to ban plastic shopping bags.

Internationally, many countries and jurisdictions including Canada, China, the EU, India, Kenya, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Zimbabwe have laws that partially or fully restrict the use of certain classes of single-use plastics. Canada’s ban, which was introduced in 2020 and took effect in 2022, targets plastic bags, straws, cutlery, take-out food containers, beverage stir sticks, and six-pack can rings. However, this ban was overturned in 2023 when a judge declared it to be unreasonable and unconstitutional. The federal government planned to take the case to Canada's Supreme Court.

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