by Did you feel disgusting when you took a walk along the river or plunge into the sea to escape the summer heat just to spy on a used wet wiping along the surface? Or a shock when he found out that animals died and died of plastic products or that the seafood we eat can be contaminated with microfiber?
These pollutants are often present in our waterways, since the wastewater mismanagement and inappropriate disposal, the hygiene products and microfibs in rivers and oceans, is common. In the UK alone, more than 11 billion wet towels are thrown away annually. Wet wiping waste was found on 72% of the British beaches in 2023.
They consist because they are made of plastic, a permanent material that is not slightly worsened. Plastic can take decades to hundreds of years. For this reason, governments and manufacturers promote the use of non-plastic as a “more sustainable” alternative, with the British plastic prohibiting plastic in wet towels in 2024.
These textiles can be made from plant or animal fibers such as cotton and wool, or they can be changed chemically and physically, such as rayon or viscose. They are often referred to as “biodegradable” for product packaging, which indicates that they are environmentally friendly, collapse quickly and are a safe alternative to plastics. But is that really the case?
In the UK alone, more than 11 billion wet towels are thrown away annually (Alamy/Pa)
My research focuses on investigating the environmental impact of these non -plastic textiles and their persistence in the waterways. My colleagues and I have found that some non-plastic microfibs can be just as problematic or even more harmful than plastic.
While not plastic textiles are not as durable as plastics, they can compost many composting within weeks to months, but they can last long enough to damage plants, animals and humans. Studies by scientists from the University of Stirling show that biodegradable wipes can take up to 15 weeks on beaches, where they can act as reservoirs for faeces and E. coli. Other studies have not highlighted plastic textiles that last two months or more in rivers and oceans, where they deal in hundreds of thousands of microfiber.
These microfibs are so widespread in the waterways that they are contaminated via the food chain, from filter feeding mussels and oysters to top predators such as sharks and the seafood that we eat.
They also come in remote places to the Arctic sea floor and the deep sea, thousands of miles from civilization. These discoveries underline that the non-plastic lasts longer than we think.
The dangers of non-plastic
As soon as plastic microfibers are not exposed to water life, they can be easily absorbed or inhaled where they are caught in the body and cause damage. During their production, textile fibers can be modified with various chemical additives to improve their function, e.g.
For this purpose, several toxic synthetic chemicals, including the plastic additive bisphenol A (BPA), are used for this purpose. These additives can be carcinogenic that cause neurotoxic effects or damage hormone and reproductive health.
A wet wiping on a beach in Cornwall (Marine Conservation Society)
Researchers like me have just started to research the dangers of non-plastic. Some have shown that plastic microfibers and their additives do not damage the digestive system, cause stress, hinder the development and change the immune responses in animals such as shrimp, mussels and oysters. However, other studies have hardly or no effect from non -plastic microfibers on animals that are exposed to them.
We still don’t know how much these materials are threatened for the environment. Only the manufacturers know exactly what in the textiles we use. This makes it difficult to understand what threats we are really exposed to. Nevertheless, assumptions that non-plastic are environmentally friendly and a simple alternative to plastic materials are challenged and covered.
To do this, we have to push for greater transparency in the content of our everyday objects and test them to ensure that they are really sustainable and don’t harm the world around us. The next time you browse in the supermarket courses and come across a pack of “biodegradable” or “environmentally friendly” wet wipes, just ask yourself whether it really is?
Daniel James Jolly is a doctoral student at the University of East Anglia.
This article will be released from the conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read that Original article.
