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Here another listening you can try to do about the impact of plastic...

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Here another listening you can try to do about the impact of plastic...

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The UK government has recently introduced a small charge of 5p on plastic bags in English supermarkets to try to stop people using them. Neil and Alice take a look at the environmental impact of mass-produced plastic bags and plastic in general. They also teach some related vocabulary.

This week's question

How many tonnes of plastic rubbish from the UK is being sent to China each year for recycling? Is it:

a) 20,000?

b) 200,000?

or c) 2,000,000?

You can hear the right answer at the end of the programme.

Vocabulary

Transcript

Note: This is not a word-for-word transcript

Don't you follow the news, Neil? It's a recent government initiative - which means a new plan for dealing with something - in this case, to cut the number of thin plastic bags being given away in shops. And the environmental impact of plastic is the subject of today's show.

Good. Now let me ask you today's quiz question, Neil: How many tonnes of plastic rubbish from the UK is being sent to China each year for recycling? Is it:
or c) 2,000,000?

No. They take hundreds of years to decompose - or break down by natural chemical processes. And also people don't dispose of them properly. They litter our streets. They clog - or block - drains and sewers. They spoil the countryside and damage wildlife.

At this company laboratory in North London they're testing how bags made with a special additive break down when exposed to sunlight, oxygen and heat... The technology was discovered by a British scientist in the 1970s and is now sold to around half the world's countries. In some, biodegradable bags are backed by law.

So adding small amounts of a chemical to the plastic - a special additive - allows the plastic to break down in the open air. But if the technology was discovered back in the 1970s, why aren't these biodegradable bags being used in every country by now?

Biologist Dr Pennie Lindeque from Plymouth Marine Laboratory
We're already finding that there's a lot of microplastics in the sea and that some of these microplastics are actually being ingested by the zooplankton that live there. We're also concerned this could end up being passed up through the food chain to food which is destined for human consumption so it could end up on your or my plate.

Indeed. OK. Remember my question from earlier? I asked: How many tonnes of plastic rubbish from the UK is being sent to China each year for recycling? Is it...
or c) 2,000,000?

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BBC Learning English - 6 Minute English / The impact of plastic

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The UK government has recently introduced a small charge of 5p on plastic bags in English supermarkets to try to stop people using them. Neil and Alice take a look at the environmental impact of mass-produced plastic bags and plastic in general. They also teach some related vocabulary.

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Here a piece of news about the subject...

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Here a piece of news about the subject...

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I talk a lot about reduction. Reducing the number of toys you have, the quantity of cleaning supplies you buy, even the amount of meat you eat. My constant focus on reduction over recycling, upcycling or disposing of waste responsibly is a deliberate one. Put simply, recycling isn't enough.

Recycling is good, and I'm not here to contradict that. When the options are to either toss a plastic bottle into the recycling bin or into the trash can, you'll see me shaking my pom-poms for the blue bin. But I'm afraid the black-and-white thinking ends there. Recycling is a complicated business, and not always a pleasant one to boot.

First of all, recycling doesn't wipe the slate clean. It requires an enormous expenditure of energy and resources, including the monitoring of collection sites, the transportation of recyclables, and the recycling manufacturing process itself.

Plastic, my nemesis, is especially problematic in that it can rarely be used for primary reprocessing - the process of breaking down a product and manufacturing it back into that same product. Plastic's sensitivity to heat and light mean that its long, flexible molecules (the same ones that give it its unique malleability) degrade and break down when exposed to repeated thermal and mechanical processing. In plain terms, plastic has a sort of "heat history", degrading more and more each time it's processed. This process is irreversible.

For this reason, plastic is typically used for secondary reprocessing, which takes recovered plastic and uses it to create items which are not typically recyclable themselves: bumper stickers, textiles, and plastic lumber.

These uses are certainly preferable to its not being reused at all, but it's important to understand that recycling a plastic bottle doesn't mean closing the loop. That bottle will not embark on some celestial journey, reincarnated a thousand times. Recycling absolutely has a waste footprint, and it's not an insignificant one.

Furthermore, recycling only works when there's someone on the other side of the equation, someone who wants to buythe recycled material. And although some organizations operate with earth-friendly practices, many do not.

With falling commodity prices, recycled glass, aluminum, plastic and cardboard are being sold for less and less while the cost to the processor to process these materials stays the same. It's come to the point where many cities are operating recycling programs at a significant and consistent cash loss - admirable, perhaps, but not sustainable.

So why is there always that undercurrent of resistance when we talk about consuming less? Certainly some of it is simple habit: it's not yet common practice for many of us to carry a reusable water bottle instead of buying one. We're more used to buying new rather than sourcing secondhand. We lack the time to take a few extra minutes to placate a crying toddler instead of simply handing them the toy they're screaming for.

But I have a hunch that, as with recycling, the story is a bit more complicated. Viktor Frankl, in his book Man's Search for Meaning, wrote the following about what a person goes through when possessed by a feeling he refers to as an existential vacuum: "No instinct tells him what he has to do and no tradition tells him what he ought to do; sometimes he does not even know what he wishes to do. There are various guises under which the existential vacuum appears. Sometimes the frustrated will to meaning is vicariously compensated for by a will to power ... the will to money ... [or] the will to pleasure."

With apologies to Frankl, I'd like to add another to the list. I think, faced by this sort of nameless listlessness, many of us fill the void by shopping.

Unless we address the underlying reasons we buy so much, we will never truly feel that we have enough. Unless we understand why stuff keeps coming through the door, it matters less and less how we organize it, curate it, or dispose of it when we're done.

We're not buying things because we have money to burn - this generation is crushed under its debt. We aren't doing it because we've got space to fill - our houses are packed to overflowing. And finally, we're certainly not doing it because it makes us happy. Studies repeatedly hammer home one simple truth: it's the experiences and the people in our lives that bring the most happiness.

Not the stuff. Never the stuff. That's the real secret.

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Yes, you recycle. But until you start reducing, you're still killing the planet

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The blue bin may be preferable to the trash can, but a better goal is simply to have less stuff

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Here a listening exercise for you to do, if you want to learn more about the recycling system...

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Here a listening exercise for you to do, if you want to learn more about the recycling system...

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With countries shutting their doors to foreign recyclable waste and a lack of processing capacity in Western countries, is the recycling system broken? Neil and Georgina talk about the excessive reliance on recycling rather than reducing the use of plastics and they teach you related vocabulary along the way.

This week's question

On average, how many kilograms of household waste were generated per person in the UK last year? Was it:

a) 280 kg

b) 480 kg

c) 680 kg

Listen to the programme to find out the answer.

Vocabulary

scrap
unwanted waste material; rubbish

public at large
most people (in the world), rather than just some of them

raise consciousness
develop awareness of an unfair situation, with the aim of making people want to help in changing it

virgin plastic
original, unused plastic containers before anything else is done to it- made directly from crude oil or natural gas

slogan
short, easily remembered phrase, often used to advertise an idea or product

emphasised
highlighted as being especially important; drawn attention to

Transcript

Note: This is not a word-for-word transcript

Georgina
And I'm Georgina.

NeilAnd the problem isn't going away. In fact we are creating more household waste than ever. So here's my quiz question. On average, how many kilograms of household waste were generated per person in the UK last year? Was it:
a) 280 kg
b) 480 kg
c) 680 kg

Neil
OK. We'll find out later if you were right. Although nowadays people are recycling more, the use of plastic isn't decreasing at the same rate. The BBC World Service's programme The Inquiry spoke to Roland Geyer, a professor at the University of California about the current situation.

Professor Roland GeyerThere's been a real raise in consciousness which is fantastic and I'm really glad that now it seems the public at large is really interested in this issue and appalled and wants to do something about it, wants to change it. But at the same time I don't see yet any real action that would make things better because while all of this is happening the virgin plastic industry is actually increasing its production capacity.

Neil
Another expert, Professor Monic Sun, believes that focusing only on recycling may not be the best idea. She conducted psychological experiments to find out more about peoples' attitudes to recycling...

Professor Monic Sun
We have the slogan of 'Reduce, Reuse and Recycle' and the priority should be exactly that - reduce and reuse is better than recycling. And the cost of recycling is often not emphasised enough. People perceive recycling to be great but there's actually significant labour and material costs associated with recycling.

Today we've been talking about the problems associated with recycling scrap - another word for rubbish.

GeorginaWestern countries used to send their rubbish to China for recycling but this caused issues for the local environment. Some groups raised consciousness about the problem - made people aware of the situation to encourage them to help change it.

NeilThe public at large - most people in the world - are now aware of the need to 'Reduce, Reuse and Recycle', the slogan - or short, memorable phrase - used by environmentalists to spread their message.

GeorginaA related problem is the increase of virgin plastic - original, unused plastic made from fossil fuels. Recycling is unable to keep pace with virgin plastic production, so instead reducing and reusing plastic should be emphasised - highlighted as being especially important.

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BBC Learning English - 6 Minute English / Is the recycling system broken?

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With countries shutting their doors to foreign recyclable waste and a lack of processing capacity in Western countries, is the recycling system broken? Neil and Georgina talk about the excessive reliance on recycling rather than reducing the use of plastics and they teach you related vocabulary along the way.