Plastic pollution in the North-East: How it stacks up

From 2017 to 2018, the UK produced 25m tonnes of waste and about 11m tonnes was recycled – but only 4.3 per cent of this was plastic.

Plastic was first invented in 1869, when a New York firm offered a reward to anyone who could provide an alternative to ivory.

The creation of this first plastic was hailed as revolutionary, and it was claimed this new substance meant that animals and the environment would be protected, while people’s needs could still be met.

Modern-day plastic is just as revolutionary – it is cheap, easy to produce, easy to manipulate and does not decompose. However, the demand for plastic has become so large that most plastic is now produced to be thrown away within minutes of its first use.

A recent Sustainable Seas Report stated that, of the nine billion tonnes that has ever been made, only nine per cent of plastic has been successfully recycled and, because it does not decompose, all of it is still on the earth in some shape or form.

If it is not recycled, plastic can make its way into oceans where it is ingested by marine life, damaging the environment and becoming part of the food chain.

In the North-East, at least 3,917kg of plastic was removed from beaches in 2018, according to environmental charity Surfers Against Sewage. UK-wide, results from last year’s annual Great British Beach Clean, run by the Marine Conservation Society, found that on average, 182.6 pieces of plastic were picked up for every 100 metres of coastline.

Ben Hewitt, from Surfers Against Sewage, said: “Plastic in our ocean is due to treble in the next ten years unless urgent action is taken.

“We are campaigning and supporting communities to tackle the scourge of avoidable single-use plastic from the beach, all the way back to the brands and businesses who create it.”

Campaigners, environmentalists and local authorities are encouraging people to think about how they consume plastic and also how they dispose of it.

A report from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) showed that the North-East had a recycling rate of 34 per cent.

This figure is the second-lowest rate in the country above London, which recycles just 33 per cent of its waste.

The report also showed that, within the North-East, Darlington had the highest recycling rate of 41 per cent while Stockton was the lowest at 25 per cent.

Darlington councillor Gerald Lee said these figures should be used as a starting point for the region.

He said: “Well done to Darlington for the 41 per cent but now, the question is, what about the remaining 59 per cent which isn’t recyclable?

“How do we increase that?

“I think there is some confusion with how we should be recycling.

“If we don’t know we just shove it all in but that means we’re contaminating the plastic with materials that cannot be recycled.

“We need more education about what plastics people can recycle in their own home and this message wants to be spread in central government down to local authorities, schools and everywhere – until properly disposing of plastic can become the norm.”

In Durham, the county council and partners such as Durham University, Beamish Museum, and the Environment Agency have signed a pledge to eradicate single-use plastics in the area.

Oliver Harmar, area director for Environment Agency North East, said: “Plastic waste is one of the most important issues facing our planet today and we need to take action now to significantly reduce plastic pollution and the impact it has on our environment.

“As an organisation, the Environment Agency has already taken great strides to reduce the amount of single use plastics waste we produce. However there is still much more that we can all do to reduce this further.”

Across the region, local people are banding together to spread the message of reducing our plastic waste.

Here are just some of the stories in which people are trying to combat plastic pollution in the North-East.

Creating art with discarded plastic

DIANE WATSON is an environmental artist living in Hartlepool who turns the plastic she finds on her local beach into art.

Ms Watson collects the plastic while walking her dog and has been documenting it over the course of a year to create an exhibition.

The exhibition, which was displayed in Redcar from January 12 to February 9, and will be shown again at Hartlepool Art Gallery from March 23 to 25, features 12 wallpaper prints to represent each month of the year.

Ms Watson said the aim of her exhibition was to demonstrate that plastic pollution is a local issue.

She said: “You would be surprised what you find a lot of.

“The thing I find the most is bottle lids. I find a lot of cigarette lighters, not just a few but probably about 400. I also found shotgun cartridges, tampon applicators – all by the hundreds.

“Then I would find a lot of old things. I have found Fairy Liquid bottles that were the 1970s style of bottle and it makes you think ‘how long has that been in the sea?’”

Ms Watson works for Plastic-Free Hartlepool by giving talks to schools and groups in her area about how people as consumers can reduce their plastic waste.

She said: “I try and encourage people to think about their plastic usage and what we can do to eliminate some of the plastics in our lives, like the single-use plastics that we don’t really need to be using.

“It’s about getting people to think about not only what they’re buying but how they are disposing of it. If you desperately want coke out of a plastic bottle then think about how you are disposing of that bottle, or whether you need to buy it at all.

“The sea is such a massive entity that we have been treating it like a bin.”

For her next project, Ms Watson wants to take her message further by collecting plastic across the UK, from remote beaches in Scotland to tourist spots such as Blackpool, and documenting how much plastic is dumped on the coastline.

Finding ways to reduce plastic packaging

LAURA and Anthony Phoenix have opened their own zero-waste shop to help people reduce their plastic waste.

The couple, who are expecting their first child, have this week opened Mutiny Zero Waste Deli on Skinnergate, Darlington.

Zero-waste shops have grown in popularity across the UK in a bid to reduce as much throw-away plastic packaging as possible.

The idea of a zero-waste shop is for customers to bring in their own containers and purchase in bulk items ranging from rice, flour, beans and pasta to other goods such as washing-up liquid and shampoo.

Mr and Mrs Phoenix took on the idea after travelling across South-East Asia.

The pair said they were shocked at the amount of plastic that had washed up on every beach they visited and wanted to take matters into their own hands.

Mrs Phoenix said: “If you were to take everything single thing that you threw away and put it in your garden, you wouldn’t be able to cope with it all.

“It’s kind of a relief that more people know about plastic pollution now. We wanted to create somewhere that was quite on trend that people can use.”

Teaching future generations about consuming plastic

A PRIMARY school has been teaching children how best to deal with plastic during a week-long special event.

Gurney Pease Academy, in Darlington, has been holding a science week to get its pupils more involved with the world around them.

Teacher and science leader, David Ferrari, has been using the week to talk to pupils about plastic pollution and the ways in which people can reduce their own plastic consumption.

He said: “I quickly realised that at this school we have no recycling at all. So we started recycling in my class but as it got towards science week we really wanted to roll it out across the whole school.

“The focus is now much less on recycling but on a bigger thing, which is how we can become responsible consumers.

“On Monday, we gathered all the school’s rubbish and tipped it onto a tarpaulin. The children sorted through the rubbish and we found that lots of it was paper but lots of stuff, particularly from the staff room, was single-use plastic covered in food that can’t be recycled.

“We’re trying to change the behaviour of the children so they are aware that all these little plastic objects matter, and the choices that they make with these objects are very important choices.

“Do they throw it away? Do they try and use them again? Or, most importantly, do they decide at the first point to buy them or not?”

For science week, the school held a competition to see which class could bring in the most plastic bottle tops.

The bottle tops are now being used by pupils to create a mural highlighting the issue of plastic pollution.

The mural will feature the phrase “keep our sea plastic free” and the bottle tops will be used to create pictures of marine animals which are affected by plastic.

Mr Ferrari said: “The children are responding really positively and they’re really interested in the topic. Some of the classes have brought in hundreds of bottle tops.

“But also, involving parents means children are having these discussions within the family, as well as at school, and the message of responsible plastic use can become a normal thing in their home.”