You might have heard about Scotland’s ‘black bag’ waste ban. The ban is set to cover all biodegradable municipal waste (BMW), in both the domestic and commercial sectors. BMW encompasses the significant portion of municipal waste that breaks down naturally, e.g. food waste, garden waste, paper, cardboard, and natural fibres. But you may question: isn’t waste breaking down naturally a good thing? After all, isn't biodegradable waste preferable to plastics and metals that persi

The global trade in plastic waste reveals stark inequalities. For decades, high-income countries like the UK, US, Germany and Japan exported much of their plastic waste to lower-income nationals, often with weak waste infrastructures (OECD 2022, Plastics Treaty Briefing 2023). This practice, often referred to as “waste colonialism,” offloads the environmental burden of consumption onto those least able to manage it. As recently as 2018, Asia imported 70-80% of the world’s tr

Danone is a French food and drink giant and a major plastic polluter. In September 2022, a coalition of anti-plastic NGOs, including ClientEarth, Surfrider Foundation Europe, and Zero Waste France, issued a legal warning to Danone, in an effort to get the mega corporation to publish statistics about its global plastic pollution. However, this warning was ignored. In January of 2023, the coalition filed a lawsuit against Danone over its failure to comply with French due dilige

Millions of new clothes are produced every year for the $2.5 trillion global fashion industry. Many of these items are inexpensive fast-fashion pieces made of plastic fabrics derived from petrochemicals, such as polyester, acrylic, and nylon. Buying clothing made of plastic fabrics may seem like an affordable and harmless way to keep up with the latest trends. However, these clothes can have a major impact on your health. Every time you wash a polyester shirt or jacket, the p

The UK’s recycling rates are around 70% lower than in leading Deposit Return Scheme (DRS) countries with return rates exceeding 90% such as Germany, Finland and Norway. Financially incentivising recycling and reducing waste is important, but our end goal must be a reuse, not throwaway, economy. A DRS that includes glass is key. Glass is infinitely recyclable (although currently energy intensive). Inclusion of glass, as seen in Wales’ proposed model, helps improve resource re

The idea that plastic will outweigh fish in the ocean by 2050 has become one of the most widely-quoted statistics in environmental discussions. But this disguises the real nature of the problem. Fish make up around 29% of animal biomass on this planet (Ritchie 2024) but calculating their mass in oceans is very difficult. We can estimate algae concentrations from satellite imagery - a proxy for fish food - but actual marine biomass remains uncertain and rather variable. Est

Founded in 1919, the French company Danone includes brands Evian, Activia, Actimel, Volvic, Alpro, and more. In 2020, it sold products in 120 countries with global sales reaching 23.6 billion euros, making it one of the world’s top ten largest plastic packaging producers. Danone claims to be committed to producing products that preserve the planet’s resources whilst also growing its business. This article will examine how committed Danone really is to reducing its plastic foo

Paper-based packaging. Following the recognition of the harmful environmental and social impact of plastics, paper packaging has been adopted as a sustainable and ‘eco-friendly’ alternative. Paper-based packaging has become the largest source of packaging waste in the European Union, accounting for 41.1% of packaging waste – more than plastic and glass combined. While paper packaging may seem like a sustainable solution, research has highlighted the sustainability challenges

The Deposit Return Scheme (DRS) is an environmental policy that will tackle litter and pollution, reducing the environmental impacts of plastics and leading us towards a circular economy. Whilst the UK’s plans are still faltering, other countries are showing us how it’s done. Germany has an impressive 98% return rate for drinks containers! Consumers can return a wide range of containers, including plastic bottles, cans and glass bottles for financial reward. Norway’s DRS was

Ocean plastic is often misunderstood - and misrepresented. Media images of massive garbage patches floating in the Pacific suggest the ocean is blanketed in rubbish. The reality is more complicated - and arguably more concerning. Of the 460 million tonnes of plastic produced annually around the globe (OECD 2022), 353 million tonnes go to waste and only about 9% is recycled in any meaningful way. Approximately 82 millions tonnes of this waste (of the 9%) is mismanaged - eith

The ‘Global Plastic Laws’ database. The Plastic Pollution Coalition (PPC) is a non-profit communications and advocacy organisation focused on the impacts of plastic on the environment, wildlife, the climate, human health, and social justice. Recognising the global scale of the plastic problem, the PPC launched the Global Plastic Laws database, which provides extensive information about local, national, and international legislation. While policies are debated and determined

For years, companies making misleading environmental claims faced little more than bad press. A campaign group would raise the alarm, a brand would issue a careful non-apology, and the cycle would begin again. In 2025, that changed. The Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 came fully into force on 6 April 2025, giving the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) the power to impose fines of up to 10% of a company's global annual turnover for misleading environme

If there’s one thing to take away from the United Nations Ocean Conference (UNOC 2025) and the ocean plastics crisis, it’s that solutions do exist, but that they’re not scaling, not enforced and not shared equally. Cleanup technology may help in pollution hotspot areas, but they treat symptoms, not causes and are cost intensive. Recycling has a role, but its effectiveness is vastly overstated and most plastics are actually not recyclable to date. Individual actions - whilst

October 2025 saw the 13th annual Great Global Nurdle Hunt, a citizen science project with over 1,500 volunteers in 25 countries searching their shorelines for nurdles. Nurdles are the pre-production building blocks of most plastic products. They’re lentil-shaped microplastic pellets, ~2-3mm in diameter, which are melted down in plastic production. Unfortunately, nurdles have found their way into every corner of the world, with this year's hunt reporting that 92% of participat

The Deposit Return Scheme (DRS) is an important step towards reducing litter and waste, but real progress means moving away from single-use packaging entirely. There are different types of DRS, some focusing on recycling single-use items, whilst others, particularly for glass, promote reuse. The idea behind DRS in the UK is to incentivise consumers to recycle drinks containers, but focusing on a reuse system is a better option. Recycling plastic doesn’t always work. When it