Plastic Waste Management Rules and Regulations

Plastic waste management rules and regulations are very important in the industry, and they are laws that help keep plastic products safe for everyone. There are different types of plastics; each has its own rules, and plastics can be made from many other materials. 

Plastic waste management rules and regulations also help protect animals from getting sick or injured by eating or stepping on plastic bags or other pieces of plastic trash. The plastic waste management rules were issued to facilitate the implementation of plastic waste management rules in 2011. In this article, you will learn about recycling plastic waste and the responsibility for plastic waste management.

Plastic Waste Management Issue

The management of plastic waste is a critical environmental issue. Plastic production has increased in the last 60 years, from 15 million tons of plastic produced in 1950 to 311 million tons in 2015. The contribution of plastics to global solid waste generation has increased from about 10% in 1960 to about 50% today. Plastic is a material made from organic polymers, particularly high molecular weight polyethene. Plastic can be used to make bottles, packaging, bags, containers, film and many other things. The advantages of using plastic are that it can be formed into any shape desired, and it is lightweight due to its relatively low density. However, it does not biodegrade easily and can persist in landfills or the natural environment for hundreds of years.

Plastic wastes are generated at various stages of the plastic lifecycle, such as during production, use and disposal. These wastes may be hazardous as they contain toxic chemicals such as dioxins and heavy metals like cadmium and mercury. They also have non-biodegradable components that persist for thousands of years, posing serious human health and environmental threats. Therefore, these wastes must be managed properly by following strict rules and regulations defined by government agencies at national, state/provincial/territorial and local levels depending on where the waste is generated or disposed of (e.g., residential areas).

Plastic Waste Management Rules

The plastic waste management rules 2011 were formulated to efficiently manage plastic waste generated in major towns and cities. The main objectives of these rules were:

• The main rule for plastic waste management is never to throw away your plastic products in the garbage can outside your house or apartment building. This is not allowed because there could be children playing outside who could accidentally get injured by a piece of sharp plastic sticking out of the garbage bin.
• Ensure the proper collection, storage, transportation, processing, and disposal of plastic waste environmentally soundly.
• To set up infrastructure for setting up plastic recycling units in every State/UT and Union Territory where there is no such unit or in any other place where such a unit has not been set up within two years from the date when these rules come into force in that State/UT or Union Territory.

How to Manage Plastic Waste?

Plastic waste management is a growing challenge that has recently been given much attention. The production and use of plastic materials have increased dramatically over the last decades, with plastics now dominating many product categories.

Plastics are used for many purposes, most commonly as food and other construction goods containers. In 2016 alone, approximately 300 million tons of plastic were produced globally. Plastic waste management is an important aspect of plastic recycling, and it is the process of managing the collection, segregation, processing, reuse and disposal of plastic waste.

1. First, separate your household waste into dry and wet categories. The dry category includes paper, cardboard, glass, and metal, while the wet category includes food scraps, diapers, and sanitary napkins.
2. Use fewer plastics in your daily routine by using reusable bags instead of single-use shopping bags or glassware instead of plastic ones.
3. Recycling plastic waste is one way to reduce the negative impacts of plastic waste. However, even if all plastic collected for recycling were reused or recycled into new products (with no loss), more than half of all plastics would still go to landfills because there is not enough end-user capacity (and demand) for this material in the final products such as packaging and building materials. You should take responsibility for plastic waste management. 

Conclusion

Plastic is one of the most versatile materials ever created by humans. It’s used in everything from water bottles to clothing fibres – even our car tires are made with plastic. Plastic is everywhere because it’s cheap, versatile and easily moulded into any shape desired. The plastic recycling rate for plastics in the US is only about 9 %, far below other countries like Germany (38 %) or China (72 %). Globally, only about 14 % of all plastics are recycled each year – mainly due to cost factors and lack of infrastructure in developing countries where much of the waste ends up being dumped into landfills or burned as fuel without adequate air pollution controls in place. In this article, you learned about recycling plastic waste and the responsibility for plastic waste management.