Sustainability Assessment of a Single-Use Plastics Ban
| dc.contributor.author | Herberz, Timo | |
| dc.contributor.author | Barlow, Claire Y. | |
| dc.contributor.author | Finkbeiner, Matthias | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2020-11-18T13:39:22Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2020-11-18T13:39:22Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2020-05-05 | |
| dc.date.updated | 2020-06-10T02:45:24Z | |
| dc.description.abstract | Governments around the world are introducing single-use plastics bans to alleviate plastic marine pollution. This paper investigates whether banning single-use plastic items is an appropriate strategy to protect the environment. Product life cycle assessment was conducted for single-use plastic and single-use non-plastic alternatives. The life cycle impacts of the two product categories were compared and scaled according to EU consumption of 2016. The results show that a single-use plastics ban would decrease plastic marine pollution in the EU by 5.5% which equates to a 0.06% decrease globally. However, such a ban would increase emissions contributing to marine aquatic toxicity in the EU by 1.4%. This paper concludes that single-use items are harmful to the environment regardless of their material. Therefore, banning or imposing a premium price on single-use items in general and not only single-use plastic items is a more effective method of reducing consumption and thereby pollution. The plastics ban only leads to a small reduction of global plastic marine pollution and thus provides only a partial solution to the problem it intends to solve. | en |
| dc.identifier.eissn | 2071-1050 | |
| dc.identifier.uri | https://depositonce.tu-berlin.de/handle/11303/11997 | |
| dc.identifier.uri | http://dx.doi.org/10.14279/depositonce-10877 | |
| dc.language.iso | en | en |
| dc.rights.uri | https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ | en |
| dc.subject.ddc | 333 Boden- und Energiewirtschaft | de |
| dc.subject.other | single-use plastics | en |
| dc.subject.other | plastics ban | en |
| dc.subject.other | plastic marine pollution | en |
| dc.subject.other | LCA | en |
| dc.subject.other | plastics policy | en |
| dc.title | Sustainability Assessment of a Single-Use Plastics Ban | en |
| dc.type | Article | en |
| dc.type.version | publishedVersion | en |
| dcterms.bibliographicCitation.articlenumber | 3746 | en |
| dcterms.bibliographicCitation.doi | 10.3390/su12093746 | en |
| dcterms.bibliographicCitation.issue | 9 | en |
| dcterms.bibliographicCitation.journaltitle | Sustainability | en |
| dcterms.bibliographicCitation.originalpublishername | MDPI | en |
| dcterms.bibliographicCitation.originalpublisherplace | Basel | en |
| dcterms.bibliographicCitation.volume | 12 | en |
| tub.accessrights.dnb | free | en |
| tub.affiliation | Fak. 3 Prozesswissenschaften::Inst. Technischen Umweltschutz::FG Technischer Umweltschutz / Sustainable Engineering | de |
| tub.affiliation.faculty | Fak. 3 Prozesswissenschaften | de |
| tub.affiliation.group | FG Technischer Umweltschutz / Sustainable Engineering | de |
| tub.affiliation.institute | Inst. Technischen Umweltschutz | de |
| tub.publisher.universityorinstitution | Technische Universität Berlin | en |