Why Scotland must turn the tide on plastic waste

The pilot led by Marine Conservation Society (MCS) was inspired by a clean-up in 2017 which saw 1,500 volunteers remove 58,000 pieces of litter from 111 beaches in just four days. That figure was up 6 per cent from 2016.

Head of conservation for Scotland at MCS, Calum Duncan, said the results of the latest annual clean-up carried out last month are due to be released next month and there is likely to be another increase.

He said: “Our data for the last 25 years shows that the trend is for increasing rubbish on beaches we’re surveying. Litter levels have doubled since 1993, on average. There’s the legacy issue of the rubbish that’s been discarded to date – nine of the top 10 items we record every year are plastic and plastic doesn’t disappear.

“And the amount of plastic going into the sea shows no sign of abating, whether it’s discarded on the beach, from the side of boats or through our sewage system.”

Lyndsey Dodds, head of marine policy at WWF, said eight million tonnes of plastic pollution enters our oceans each year, and evidence of this can be seen on Scotland’s shores at an increasing number of coastal sites.

"It’s massive problem,” said Dodds, “and pretty much everywhere we look we see it. It’s in our water, in the fish we’re eating.

“It can affect all marine wildlife. Scotland is home to important seabirds and they ingest plastic, and plastic is found in nests.

“In terms of marine mammals, there’s issues of entanglement there. We have seen pictures of seals with plastic around their necks. Whales have washed up with stomachs full of plastic.”

Dodds said an EU commitment to phase out single-use plastics by 2030 – which was matched by the Scottish Government – is welcome but “that’s not to say there aren’t plenty of things to get on and do now”. She added: “The public appetite for real change is huge, in terms of single use plastics.”

A new plastics processing plant in Perthshire could be part of the solution, according to Iain Gulland, chief executive of Zero Waste Scotland.

The Scottish Government-funded organisation has provided £1.7 million for Project Beacon, a partnership of four private-sector firms tasked with developing state-of-the-art systems.

Gulland said marine waste could be processed at the “game-changing” Perthshire facility when it’s up and running next year.

“In terms of our marine environment, a lot of that stuff could be fed into this facility,” he said. “In terms of household waste, we’re still throwing away about 70,000 tonnes of packaging that could potentially be put through the system. It’s currently costing councils about £11m a year to send it to landfill.”

The system is expected to recycle around 20,000 tonnes of plastic waste a year and Gulland is hopeful that the pilot could eventually be rolled out across Scotland, meaning councils would no longer be forced to send recycling overseas for processing.

Local authorities currently export thousands of tonnes of plastic waste. It is difficult to find out true quantities because contracts with private sector companies are kept confidential as they are considered “commercially sensitive”, according to Gulland.

“New technology will allow us to say to householders you can put all plastics out for collection and we’ll be able to sort and recycle them in Scotland,” he said. “The Perthshire plant is designed in modular system so there is scope for increased capacity. And these types of facilities could be located throughout the country.”

The Scottish Government has already banned plastic microbeads and has pledged to legislate against plastic cotton buds. A fund for companies to trial technologies to recover marine waste was doubled to £1m last month. Also in the planning is a deposit-return scheme for plastic drinks containers, which would see customers pay a surcharge to be refunded when bottles are returned.

Gulland revealed the government received more than 3,000 responses to its consultation, which closed on September 25. The responses will be analysed in the coming weeks and then released.

“There is a full commitment to get the implementation of that scheme up and running,” Gulland added.

Environment Minister Roseanna Cunningham revealed in The Herald in January that she would ensure Scotland matches an EU commitment to phase out throwaway plastics by 2030. She instructed civil servants to look at restricting the sale and manufacture of all non-recyclable plastics “on an item by item basis”.

At the time, director of Friends of the Earth Scotland, Richard Dixon, said the Scottish Government’s commitment was “a strong signal of intent to stop plastic waste at source”.

Speaking to The Herald on Sunday last night, Dixon said 10 months on “not all that much” has been done to meet the pledge.

He said civil servants’ time had been tied up with the bottle deposit-return scheme. Although he welcomed the initiative, Dixon said: “It’s taking up most of the civil servants’ time.”

In May, Cunningham set up an “Expert Panel on Environmental Charging and Other Measures” which will advise ministers “on a set of priority items, starting with disposable cups and plastic straws”, according to its website.

Dixon said: “The expert panel has been asked to come up with recommendations, so the Scottish Government can’t leap forward with interesting and exciting announcements at the moment.”

The panel has met twice and is expected to have an “initial working life” of two years.

Dixon added: “The question is whether the Government leaps into action when they come forward with recommendations. If the response is swift and active that’s fine. If the report sits on a shelf that would be very frustrating. I’m happy to give the Scottish Government the time but I expect them to react.”

Calum Duncan of MCS added: “We’d like to see some plastic items banned and levies introduced on other items such as coffee cup lids. We need action and intervention. I don’t think anybody’s in doubt now that this is a crisis.”

Cunningham was unavailable for interview, but a spokesman provided a prepared statement from the minister which said the manufacture and sale of rinse-off personal care products containing plastic microbeads had been banned, and legislation to ban the manufacture and sale of plastic-stemmed cotton buds has been drafted.

The statement said the expert panel is considering the issues of plastic straws and disposable cups “as a priority area” before looking at other materials and “the evidence for taking action”.

The minister’s statement added: “Our work on deposit return, which will help us in recovering and recycling a commonly used plastic, is proceeding. I was encouraged by the positive engagement we’ve had through the consultation, which will help us shape the system. I look forward to making further announcements on deposit return and the expert panel in due course.”

SKYE: WHERE THE WORLD'S PLASTIC WASTE WASHES UP

Marine conservationist Katie Tunn – who was a participant in Channel 4 reality TV series Eden – said she has collected plastics from all over the world from the shores of Skye, where she now lives.

Tunn organises regular beach clean-ups on the island to remove “huge amounts of marine debris” which washes up every week.

She collects discarded plastic bottles, tampon applicators, shotgun shells, cotton bud sticks, plastic toys, balloons and their ribbons, fishing gear and food wrappers with Spanish, Japanese, Norwegian, Chinese and French writing.

She said: “The plastic problem varies wildly from shore to shore as it's the currents that determine what washes up and what carries on past. The east coast of Skye is relatively clean, there are very few shores with major plastic problems. However, because of the currents that funnel up through the Minch, the west side of Skye is particularly badly hit.

“Score Bay in Duntulm in the north of Skye is one of the areas where I organise beach cleans and we remove huge amounts of marine debris. It's often disconcerting to drive past the next week, especially if there's been winter storms, to see the tell-tale colourful specks amid the seaweed which show that stuff has washed up again.”

Tunn said she gives pep talks to volunteers who become “disheartened” by the insatiable tide of debris.

“I say to volunteers here that it's not about how clean the beach looks, it's how much rubbish has been taken out of the ocean and out of the way of wildlife,” she added. “Every piece of plastic strapping removed is one less danger to seabirds, seals and other marine mammals.”