Thoughts on Richard Brubaker’s Talk
Richard Brubaker’s talk offered new perspectives on sustainability that I had never considered before. I thought it was very interesting how he looked at waste from a business standpoint, making the point that waste is an economic failure as much as it is a moral failure. Waste is in fact a material that has not been properly allocated or used, but also offers an opportunity for people to jump in and profit off of this misallocation. Instead of a somewhat doomed and gloomy message many other environmental media promote, Brubaker’s talk was refreshingly inspirational and shed light onto the creative ways individuals and companies are re-allocating waste back into a valuable material.
Thoughts on the Readings
Both of the readings shed light on problems with consumerism. In “The Concepts of Sustainability,” William Rees mentions how “there cannot be sustainability as long as economic growth is defined in a way that is based on consumption.” This consumption is very evident in Gay Hawkin’s chapter in terms of how we use PET plastic. Hawkins brings up an interesting point in that PET bottles are made specifically for disposal. This supports the first reading in problems with consumption and consumerism – if constantly producing disposable plastics is what the current economy needs to survive and grow, then that is not sustainable.
One of the strains of thoughts in sustainability that was brought up in “The Concepts of Sustainability” was the critique of technology strain of thought, stating that technology has harmed the environment more than it has benefitted it. This in combination with the reading focused on PET plastic reminded me all too well of the constant plastic waste we see in Shanghai that have direct links to new technologies we implement in our daily lives. For example, new algorithms that make food delivery services like Eleme or Meituan more efficient has also meant that more and more single-use plastic disposable items are used to meet the demand of consumers.
Plastic Pollution Discoveries
I started off by searching “plastic pollution” which led me to read some generic facts about how much plastic is generated per year and how most of it ends up in our oceans. Then, I stumbled across something that equally fascinated and horrified me: garbage patches. Garbage patches are giant patches of trash that just accumulate in the ocean, the most well known being the Great North Pacific Garbage Patch, which has a whopping surface area size of 1.6 million square kilometers. Basically, when waste accumulates in the ocean, some of it eventually finds its way to these garbage patches because of gyres and convergence zones. Gyres move in a circular motion around a central vortex, which essentially traps the debris. The Great North Pacific Garbage Patch in particular is bounded by the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre. Most of the debris that make up garbage patches are microplastics, which give the water a cloudy look. In addition to the microplastics, larger waste items such as fishing nets are present.
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