The petroleum industry is playing a huge part in an ecological disaster which is taking place among some of the most beautiful scenery in the United Kingdom. After decades of marketing the recycling symbol on plastic bottles, and publicity for their recyclable PET material, statistics show that plastic food and drinks containers are ruining beaches and killing wildlife on a staggering scale.
According to a survey carried out by the Marine Conservation Society, Welsh beaches are the dirtiest in the United Kingdom when it comes to plastic waste, litter left behind by sea anglers as well as rubbish which is dumped by shipping and washed ashore with the tides.
The Beachwatch survey has been undertaken annually since 1994 and the figures throw up some disturbing trends which suggest the issue of plastic rubbish and debris is showing as increasing year on year.
Keep Wales Tidy said 44 beaches and five marinas flew the flag during the summer.
Visitors to Welsh beaches, historically some of the cleanest in the UK, are responsible for a lot of this waste material and as a result, 5 Welsh beaches which proudly flew the prestigious "Blue Flag", awarded for cleanliness, in 2007, will not be eligible to do so from 2009.
Criccieth and Aberdyfi in Gwynedd, Llangrannog and Aberporth in Ceredigion and Amroth in Pembrokeshire all failed tests during the high season.
Chief executive Tegryn Jones said tests were carried out regularly during the bathing season and beaches could lose their flag at any time.
He added: "Twenty samples might be taken from each beach during the bathing season and if it fails a number of samples then the flag is removed. From this point forth the region involved can expect to lose upto 50% of its tourism and leisure visitors as they seek cleaner bathing conditions for their annual holidays.
'Natural plastics'
Plastics can also be manufactured from hemp, which creates are far more environmentally friendly product which will bio-degrade over time.
The current methods for manufacturing plastics creates a product with a half-life, (the amount of time it naturally takes to break-down) measured in centuries.
Scientists have experimented with plastics based on natural polymers for centuries. In the nineteenth century a plastic material based on chemically modified natural polymers was discovered: Famously, Charles Goodyear discovered vulcanization of rubber (1839) and Alexander Parkes, English inventor (1813—1890) created the earliest form of plastic in 1855. He mixed pyroxylin, a partially nitrated form of cellulose (cellulose is the major component of plant cell walls), with alcohol and camphor. This produced a hard but flexible transparent material, which he called "Parkesine."
But around the turn of the 20th century the burgoining petroleum industry, headed up by the DuPont Oil Company in America, devised a method in which it could produce plastic products from its large scale oil drilling operations and not long afterwards, the only viable alternative to petroleum based plastics - hemp - was outlawed, along with cannabis.
The first plastic based on a synthetic polymer was made from the lethal chemicals phenol and formaldehyde, with the first viable and cheap synthesis methods invented by Leo Hendrik Baekeland in 1909, the product being known as Bakelite.
Subsequently poly (vinyl chloride), polystyrene, polyethylene (polyethene), polypropylene (polypropene), polyamides (nylons), polyesters, acrylics, silicones, polyurethanes were amongst the many varieties of plastics developed and all have experienced great commercial success. But at what cost to the environment?
Only now, after over a century of plastic manufacturing, is the cost in real terms being exposed to public scrutiny.
Why is this environmental disaster being allowed to happen?
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Contributor's Note
Welsh Beaches lose coveted "Blue Flag" award, costing the country millions of pounds in lost tourism revenue.
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