Dear Readers,
In this newsletter, we again have some interesting study results that we have researched on the topic of plastics in the environment. Researchers from the Thünen Institute have certainly caused a bit of a surprise. As part of the project "Plastic waste in marine animals", they found in the evaluation of their experiments that, contrary to their own expectations, microplastics apparently do not harm the health of fish. They conclude from this that there can also be no health risk to humans from eating fish. We asked the polar and deep-sea researcher Melanie Bergmann from the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI), for her appraisal of the results. In its own studies, the AWI had found effects on marine animals that Ms. Bergmann had described as "worrying." You can read in the interview in this newsletter what she now says about the Thünen Institute's latest results.
The BKV can report on a recent study with brand new figures on the recycling of plastics and the use of plastic recyclate in plastics processing. This "material flow analysis", commissioned by the BKV every two years with the support of numerous plastics associations and institutions, is not directly related to the topic of "Plastics in the Environment", but it is the definitive set of figures in Germany on the "career" of plastics produced, consumed, processed and properly collected and recycled in Germany. With this study and the reports "Plastics in the Environment" and "From Land to Sea", including the special reports on individual aspects, the BKV can draw a complete overall picture of the life cycle of plastics and/or the products made from them.
A research group from the Dutch non-profit organisation "The Ocean Cleanup" has been investigating where the plastic litter in the so-called Great Pacific Garbage Patch actually comes from. It published its findings in September. We report on the results and also on the results of a series of experiments with "superworms" which, according to a research team from the Australian University of Queensland, can digest polystyrene. In addition, under the heading "Politics and Industry", we report on the progress of a project initiated by the Schwarz Group in Indonesia and what the EU Commission has prepared legislatively to restrict the use of microplastics.
We wish you an informative read.
Kind regards,
BKV GmbH
FCIO (Austrian Chemical Industry Association)
IK Industrievereinigung Kunststoffverpackungen e.V. (German Plastics Packaging Industry Association)
PlasticsEurope Deutschland e.V.
VDMA Association Plastics and Rubber Machinery
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