The US is waking up to the plastic pollution crisis, but is it too little too late?   

Looking back on the UN General Assembly, a standout moment was when California Gov. Gavin Newsom told the Climate Ambition Summit, “The climate crisis is a fossil fuel crisis. It’s not complicated.” 

Fossil fuels lie at the heart of so many of our biggest climate challenges, and plastic pollution is no exception.  

Fossil fuels are the basis for 99 per cent of all plastics. The petrochemicals used to produce completely new plastic feedstocks, also known as virgin plastics, account for 8 percent and 14 percent of total primary demand for gas and oil, respectively, and will soon become the world’s biggest driver of oil demand, ahead of trucks, aviation and shipping. So it’s unsurprising that measures to address plastic pollution put forward by actors with large fossil fuel industries rarely seek to address the real drivers of this environmental crisis: rampant overproduction of virgin plastics and their toxic legacy.  

During the UNGA and the flurry of political activity surrounding it, discussions about fossil fuels and plastic pollution rose in prominence. We saw some positive moves from the Biden administration, such as the Environmental Protection Agency’s commitment to invest $100 million in recycling infrastructure. While this investment is welcome, it is clear that recycling alone cannot solve the plastic pollution crisis. Such investment is critical, but it will only scratch the surface if policy fails to tackle the fundamentals of reduction, reuse and restoration. 

Virgin plastics are the fastest-growing source of industrial greenhouse gases in the world. In that context, downstream measures such as recycling must be coupled with efforts to tackle the root causes of plastic pollution. The U.S. is the world’s largest producer of plastic waste, yet its waste management system is unable to keep pace with plastic production; an estimated 2.2 million tons of plastic leaks into the environment each year in the U.S., and in 2016 alone roughly half of all plastic waste intended for recycling was exported — often to be landfilled, dumped or burnt, releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. 

This investment in recycling does at least represent an attempt to adopt an holistic approach, addressing the unequal distribution of the impacts of pollution, as 40 percent of the funding committed will be used to protect marginalized communities. However, this too could become a hollow nod to environmental justice if progress doesn’t address the fundamental causes of plastic pollution.

For example, large build-outs of petrochemical facilities, such as those planned in Louisiana, Texas and throughout the Ohio River Valley, risk further poisoning the water and air of marginalized communities living nearby, threatening livelihoods and adding to an already untenable impact on those bearing the brunt of this toxic industry.  

There is some hope the launch of the End Plastic Pollution International Collaborative could enable meaningful change, but for this to be truly effective, it cannot be a substitute for supporting globally binding controls on production. The public-private partnership is spearheaded by the U.S., with an initial $15 million funding injection, and is aimed at improving plastic waste management at the local level and helping develop national plastic inventories. While laudable, these interventions must be complemented by efforts to plug the global policy gaps and drive change throughout the supply chain.  

There are, however, some signs of hope at a national and state levels where individual politicians are taking a stand against plastic pollution. We must embolden them to keep pushing for stronger measures. Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr has released a compelling 10-point plan to end plastic pollution, not least, calling for higher ambition in the Global Plastics Treaty negotiations so that is not watered down ”at the behest of lobbyists for the oil and petrochemical industries”. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse and Congressman Lloyd Doggett also re-introduced the REDUCE Act, which would impose a 20 cent per pound fee on the sale of virgin plastics for manufacturing single-use plastics. There are plenty of ideas and ambition, but the Biden Administration must be willing to listen to the voices calling for stronger action.  

This is not just an opportunity for the U.S. to be a global leader: if ignored, plastic pollution could become a legal headache hovering over this administration. The State of California is suing five major oil companies for a “decades long campaign of deception” about climate change. Plastics are listed as one of the components of fossil-fuel related activity about which the companies have deceived the public. This is just the latest in a mounting series of climate litigation cases, including the first-ever U.S. constitutional climate case to go to trial, demonstrating the increasingly morally and legally shaky ground upon which continued fossil fuel extraction is based.  

The planet has just experienced its hottest summer since records began, but if the plastics industry has its way, production will triple by 2050, leading to even more plastic waste and associated emissions at every stage. If the Biden Administration is serious about protecting the health of Americans and our planet, the U.S. must join global efforts to tackle the entire lifecycle of plastic, from production to least-harmful end-of-life treatment.  

The upcoming third round of negotiations for the Global Plastics Treaty and major climate milestones such as CoP28 offer the opportunity to do just this. In an interview during the UN General Assembly, UN Environment Chief Inger Andersen made the important point that when it comes to plastics “the status quo is just not an option.”

The U.S. must heed the call and use the negotiations to address these issues head-on and adopt an ambitious, global and legally binding framework that can help solve the plastic pollution crisis at its source, rather than resorting to merely cleaning up the mess.  

Tim Grabiel is senior lawyer and policy advisor at the Environmental Investigation Agency.