WASTE IN ALL KINDS !

SPRING CLEANING

Spring has arrived and everywhere in France, municipalities or associations organize with their technical services or roads but especially with volunteers, who arouse admiration, cleaning, become traditional, spring, our environment.

Our admiration! First of all because the work is ungrateful and sometimes not very "ragouting" ; but also because it is discouraging, because year after year, they are the same or almost the same waste that we find on roadsides or highways, in ditches, along beaches, in footpaths etc. . always the same bottles of Coca Cola, always the same cans of beer, always the same bags of garbage that we got rid of not paying or paying less tax garbage collection, always the same reliefs of meal etc ..

When is not worse, because we often find large appliances, old mattresses, old furniture, computer waste, site rubble or more ...?

All developed countries are affected by this phenomenon, but thanks to these activists for the protection of our environment, near or farther, and cleaning operations that are renewed year after year, our environment has managed globally to maintain a similar appearance. clean.
In any case, the first criticisms relate to our way of life and our consumption patterns: too much packaging, too much planned obsolescence, too many paper ads that cause massive deforestation that we know, too much waste of all kinds ...

Certainly an awareness is taking place .... In the richest countries in particular but for the poorest, it is still something else. But!

These types of pollution have recently raised more serious questions in the wake of particularly disturbing situations that have just emerged; we will mention two.

1. The existence of the plastic continent adrift in the Pacific. This "continent" was first identified by IFRIS researchers in an expedition led by Baptiste Monsaingeaon, a postdoctoral researcher and member of the Scientific Council of the "Garbage Lives" exhibition at Mucem in Marseille.

This continent is as big as 6 times the size of France. The boats that approach it, to study it, are forced to rush on like ice-breakers, so thick is it in the center. At first he was preoccupied by his proven or possible danger because he has been drifting for a long time in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. It is growing by 8 million tons of waste every year.

This clump of plastic waste, essentially, should be cleaned up according to the obligations in force in some specific environmental treaties, but this remains insufficient because many obligations are still to be defined, to write, to vote, to act in these treaties or in new treaties.

Outside the Annual General Meeting of the United Nations that took place from 19 to 25 September 2017 (that is to say unofficially), the actors in the fight against this ecological disaster have called for the recognition of this island trash that could become ... the 196 ^th country member of the UN ... with his flag (?) his passport for all his citizens, namely the 118,000 people who signed the petition handed over to Antonio Guerres, Secretary General of the UN, all for a look and funding is finally granted to it.

Beyond this, several initiatives have emerged to organize the collection of this waste, in particular that of P.Pod of the "Abondant Seas" Foundation or Océan Clean-up who propose a concept using marine currents to bring waste to recovery platforms.

A San Francisco-based company, "Méthod Products" has also organized the recovery of waste on this continent, waste that once collected are recycled plastic packaging for liquid soap.

It remains and will remain however to treat the microparticles of plastic, which absorbed by the body, are mutagenic and factor of cancers. The problem will remain on this point, more difficult to solve.

1. Second worrying question, too. China has recently closed its "trash" . The decision has created panic in rich countries. The situation is similar to a disaster scenario for the environment of countries that used to export their waste to Cathay (former name given to China). China's decision took effect on January 1, 2018. It was announced about six months ago.

China was indeed until now the first destination for the recycling of waste and of course its decision has just created a wave of shock within the European Union (EU) which exported (although already summarily sorted) near 85% of its waste (especially plastic) to the Asian continent.

It is therefore urgent to find alternative or alternative solutions to other countries; we are already talking about India (Emmanuel Macron did he talk about the French garbage cans, at the foot of the Taj Mahal, during his visit from March 9 to 12 to the Indian president, Ram Nath Kovid, or did he remain that to more noble subjects (?): defense, security, space, energies ... for a deep cooperation.We also talk about Pakistan?

While waiting for future agreements, some companies already store their waste of recovery ... on parking lots ??

The EU unveiled in January 2018 that, as far as it is concerned, its recycling strategy for all packaging was the subject of a study within a horizon of ... 2030 for its operationality ?? It was time!

But by then?

Certainly the decision of China had a merit: to force everyone to question themselves and to invent new solutions to recycle waste or even to manufacture less. But it will take more personal discipline for everyone.

Because, HOMO DETRITUS only became aware of the situation very late.

Also, given the amount of waste that is collected each year on beaches, along roads and highways, in woods or isolated places, we can only congratulate (and welcome) the existence of these cleansing commandos who each year devote a minimum day to picking up the trash of everyday life that some of our fellow citizens, without education, and unscrupulous cast daily (the night most often for discretion and because at night all cats are gray). Ashamed !