Plastics are made of oil or fracked ethane.

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Plastics are made of oil or fracked ethane. The #FossilFuel industry is looking to plastics as their future income stream. Not surprisingly:

At negotiations to end #PlasticPollution, delays "manufactured" by oil-rich countries "left little time to discuss the actual ins and outs of the future #plastics treaty — including whether to reduce plastic production, how to fund the implementation of the treaty, and whether to ban certain single-use plastic products."

Global plastic treaty talks limp on despite blockade by oil-rich countries

Officials and NGOs accused a coalition of countries including Saudi Arabia and Brazil of stalling negotiations.

POLITICO (www.politico.eu)

Frontline communities urgently need an end to #PlasticPollution .

"Communities on the frontlines of any part of the #plastic lifecycle, from oil extraction to trash dumps and everywhere in between, are hit with a trifecta of injustice: plastic pollution, social #injustice, and the #climate crisis. The plastic deluge that is left after every climate-crisis-fuelled storm only reinforces this point."

Frontline Communities Need an Ambitious Global Plastics Treaty | Common Dreams

An effective treaty must reduce plastic production and prioritize protecting biodiversity, safeguarding the climate and ensuring a just transition to a low-carbon, reuse-based economy.

Common Dreams (www.commondreams.org)

"The world will be “unable to cope” with the sheer volume of plastic waste a decade from now unless countries agree to curbs on production, the co-chair of a coalition of key countries has warned ahead of crunch talks on curbing global #PlasticPollution.

Progress has stalled over a row about the need for cuts to the $712bn plastics industry.
The final round of talks, which starts on Monday and is due to end on 1 December, is critical."

World will be ‘unable to cope’ with volume of plastic waste in 10 years, warns expert

Countries must curb production now and tackle plastic’s full life cycle, says Norwegian minister Anne Beathe Tvinnereim ahead of key UN talks this week

the Guardian (www.theguardian.com)

"The Alliance to End Plastic Waste (including ExxonMobil, Dow, Shell, TotalEnergies and ChevronPhillips, promised to divert 15m tonnes of plastic waste in five years to the end of 2023, by recycling, and creating a circular economy.

The data reveals the five companies alone produced 132m tonnes of polyethylene (PE) and PP (polypropylene) in five years – more than 1,000 times the weight of the 118,500 tonnes of waste plastic the alliance has actually removed."

Five firms in plastic pollution alliance ‘made 1,000 times more plastic than they cleaned up’

Five oil and chemical companies which promised to divert plastic from environment accused of producing 132m tonnes of it

the Guardian (www.theguardian.com)

"The new data was revealed as delegates prepared to meet in Busan, South Korea, to hammer out the world’s first treaty to cut plastic pollution: a legally binding global agreement to tackle plastic pollution across the entire plastics life cycle.

But the talks, which have been subject to heavy lobbying by the alliance and fossil fuel companies, are on a knife-edge in a row over whether caps to global plastic production will be included in the final treaty."

Five firms in plastic pollution alliance ‘made 1,000 times more plastic than they cleaned up’

Five oil and chemical companies which promised to divert plastic from environment accused of producing 132m tonnes of it

the Guardian (www.theguardian.com)

"Carbon Brief analysis shows that without any agreement to cut plastic production, emissions from plastics could consume half of the remaining carbon budget for limiting warming to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels."

Five charts: Why a UN plastics treaty matters for climate change - Carbon Brief

A global treaty on plastics, touted as the most important environmental treaty since the Paris Agreement, will be negotiated in South Korea.

Carbon Brief (www.carbonbrief.org)

Plastics currently cause triple the emissions of aviation.

If, for climate reasons, you're not hot on flying: I'm with you!
Let's also work on plastics.

Plastics are everywhere, so you can tackle it everywhere.

Five charts: Why a UN plastics treaty matters for climate change - Carbon Brief

A global treaty on plastics, touted as the most important environmental treaty since the Paris Agreement, will be negotiated in South Korea.

Carbon Brief (www.carbonbrief.org)

#PFAS and #microplastics become more toxic when combined, research shows

"Study detects synergistic effect making substances more dangerous, raising alarm since humans are exposed to both"

PFAS and microplastics become more toxic when combined, research shows

Study detects synergistic effect making substances more dangerous, raising alarm since humans are exposed to both

the Guardian (www.theguardian.com)

Global plastic talks collapse as oil states rebel

"Although many issues are being discussed the key split is around Article 6 - whether there should be a commitment to cutting how much #plastic is produced, or just try and reduce plastic waste by increasing efforts to recycle."efforts to cut production levels."

Global plastic talks collapse as oil states rebel

Two years of negotiations to reduce global plastic production have collapsed amid a split between countries.

(www.bbc.com)

Who is surprised?
Oil and gas companies (including petrostates) are *counting* on plastics for their growth for the next decade. Cutting production? Forget it.

Oh, and:

"InfluenceMap, a think tank, found that the petrochemical industry intervened dozens of times on the treaty via company statements, social media and consultation responses, and 93% of those were unsupportive of efforts to cut production levels."

Global plastic talks collapse as oil states rebel

Two years of negotiations to reduce global plastic production have collapsed amid a split between countries.

(www.bbc.com)

"Malaysia will ban plastic waste imports from the U.S. starting Tuesday because of America’s failure to abide by the Basel Convention treaty on international waste transfers, in a move that could have significant consequences for California.

The U.S. is one of just a handful of countries, including Fiji and Haiti, that hasn’t signed the pact.

Malaysia emerged as a major destination for U.S. waste after China banned American waste imports in 2018."

Malaysia no longer takes U.S. plastic waste, creating a dilemma for California

Malaysia emerged as a major destination for U.S. waste after China banned U.S. waste imports in 2018.

Los Angeles Times (www.latimes.com)

"Negotiations for a historic global treaty to end plastic pollution reconvene in August, three years after they began. The goal is ambitious: to set new, legally binding and equitable global agreements that change how plastics are produced and consumed.

Fossil fuels and subsidies are at the core of the plastic crisis."

Just a moment...

(odi.org)

"Plastics are a “grave, growing and under-recognised danger” to human and planetary health, a new expert review has warned. The world is in a “plastics crisis”, it concluded, which is causing disease and death from infancy to old age and is responsible for at least $1.5tn (£1.1tn) a year in health-related damages."

World in $1.5tn ‘plastics crisis’ hitting health from infancy to old age, report warns

Plastic production has increased more than 200 times since 1950 and hits health at every stage from extraction to disposal, says review in the Lancet

the Guardian (www.theguardian.com)

"The driver of the crisis is a huge acceleration of plastic production, which has increased by more than 200 times since 1950 and is set to almost triple again to more than a billion tonnes a year by 2060. While plastic has many important uses, the most rapid increase has been in the production of single-use plastics, such as drinks bottles and fast-food containers."

More than 98% of plastics are made from fossil oil, gas and coal.

World in $1.5tn ‘plastics crisis’ hitting health from infancy to old age, report warns

Plastic production has increased more than 200 times since 1950 and hits health at every stage from extraction to disposal, says review in the Lancet

the Guardian (www.theguardian.com)

Add the $1.5tn health costs of plastics to the $ 7tn annual cost of burning fossil fuels (subsidies, health costs, etc, but not counting climate costs), and the case for stopping the subsidies to the fossil fuel industry becomes that much stronger.

What if we redirected this at least $ 8.5 tn A YEAR to the global climate fund?

"Fossil fuel and chemical industry lobbyists outnumber the combined diplomatic delegations of all 27 European Union nations and the EU combined (233). Major fossil fuel and chemical companies and their lobbyists are particularly well represented.

Nineteen fossil fuel and chemical lobbyists have secured places in the national delegations of Egypt (6), Kazakhstan (4), China (3), Iran (3), Chile (2), and the Dominican Republic (1)."

Fossil Fuel and Petrochemical Lobbyists Overrun Plastics Treaty Negotiations INC-5.2 | Break Free From Plastic

GENEVA, Switzerland, August 7, 2025 — At least 234 fossil fuel and chemical industry lobbyists — a new high compared to the 221 identified by CIEL at INC-5 —

Break Free From Plastic (www.breakfreefromplastic.org)

Chemical pollution:
Many of these chemicals are derived from fossil fuels.

"When these chemicals contaminate our bodies, the results can be disastrous. The report found there were correlational or causal data linking widely used chemicals with threats to human reproductive, immune, neurological, cardiovascular, respiratory, liver, kidney and metabolic systems.

“One of the main things that came out strongly was links between pesticide exposure and reproductive issues."

Chemical pollution a threat comparable to climate change, scientists warn

More than 100 million ‘novel entity’ chemicals are in circulation, with health impact not widely recognised

the Guardian (www.theguardian.com)

"A new document reveals that one of the world’s largest plastic producers, DuPont, acknowledged as early as 1974 that recycling its plastic products was not possible.

This new discovery also comes against the backdrop of two pending lawsuits alleging that U.S. plastic producers have deceived the public about the feasibility of recycling since the 1980s."

‘Maddening’ Proof Plastics Industry Knew Recycling Was False Solution in 1974, New Document Shows

Exclusive finding by DeSmog shows high-level industry awareness that recycling plastic ‘not feasible’ as companies face lawsuits over alleged public deception campaign.

DeSmog (www.desmog.com)

Thanks to @benjamingeer for the link.