[Senate Hearing 118-753]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 118-753
HEARING ON PETROCHEMICALS TO WASTE:
EXAMINING THE LIFECYCLE
ENVIRONMENTAL AND
CLIMATE EFFECTS OF PLASTIC
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON CHEMICAL SAFETY,
WASTE MANAGEMENT, ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE,
AND REGULATORY OVERSIGHT
of the
COMMITTEE ON
ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
MARCH 30, 2023
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Environment and Public Works
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.govinfo.gov
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
62-354 WASHINGTON : 2026
COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware, Chairman
SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West Virginia, Ranking Member
BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland KEVIN CRAMER, North Dakota
BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont CYNTHIA M. LUMMIS, Wyoming
SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island MARKWAYNE MULLIN, Oklahoma
JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon PETE RICKETTS, Nebraska
EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas
DEBBIE STABENOW, Michigan ROGER WICKER, Mississippi
MARK KELLY, Arizona DAN SULLIVAN, Alaska
ALEX PADILLA, California LINDSEY O. GRAHAM, South Carolina
JOHN FETTERMAN, Pennsylvania
Courtney Taylor, Democratic Staff Director
Adam Tomlinson, Republican Staff Director
----------
Subcommittee on Chemical Safety, Waste Management,
Environmental Justice, and Regulatory Oversight
JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon, Chairman
MARKWAYNE MULLIN, Oklahoma, Ranking Member
BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas
SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island ROGER WICKER, Mississippi
EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts DAN SULLIVAN, Alaska
JOHN FETTERMAN, Pennsylvania SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West
THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware (ex Virginia (ex officio)
officio)
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
MARCH 30, 2023
OPENING STATEMENTS
Merkley, Hon. Jeff, U.S. Senator from the State of Oregon........ 1
Mullin, Hon. Markwayne, U.S. Senator from the State of Oklahoma.. 3
WITNESSES
Ravikumar, Arvind, Ph.D., Research Associate Professor and Co-
Director, Energy Emissions Modeling and Data Lab, the
University of Texas at Austin.................................. 4
Prepared statement........................................... 7
Rochman, Chelsea M., Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Head of
Operations and Science Programming and Application Lead,
Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of
Toronto........................................................ 11
Prepared statement........................................... 13
Responses to additional questions from Senator Carper........ 19
GangaRao, Hota, Ph.D., Wadsworth Professor and Director of
Constructed Facilities Center, Wadsworth Department of Civil
and Environmental Engineering, West Virginia University........ 22
Prepared statement........................................... 24
Responses to additional questions from Senator Carper........ 40
ADDITIONAL MATERIAL
Articles from:
Annals of Global Health: Philip J. Landrigan, MD, MSc, The
Minderoo-Monaco Commission on Plastics and Human Health.... 45
McKinsey & Company: Stefan, Helmcke, et al., Climate impact
of plastics................................................ 272
Nature Communications: Jeffrey S. Rutherford, et al., Closing
the methane gap in US oil and natural gas production
emissions inventories...................................... 303
Environmental Science & Technology: Hayley K. McIlwraith, et
al., Evidence of Microplastic Translocation in Wild-Caught
Fish and Implications for Microplastic Accumulation
Dynamics in Food Webs...................................... 315
Elsevier: Jakob Skovgaard, et al., Finace for fossils--The
role of public financing in expanding petrochemicals....... 326
OECD: Mathias Cormann, Global Plastics Outlook, Policy
Scenarios to 2060.......................................... 337
ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering: Qining Chen, et al.,
Mapping Greenhouse Gas Emissions of the U.S. Chemical
Manufacturing Industry: The Effect of Feedstock Sourcing
and Upstream Emissions Allocation.......................... 365
Scientific Reports: Katlyn MacKay, et al., Methane emissions
from upstream oil and gas production in Canada are
underestimated............................................. 372
Journal of Integrative Environmental Sciences: Robert W.
Howarth, Methane emissions from fossil fuels: exploring
recent changes in greenhouse-gas reporting requirements for
the State of New York...................................... 380
Conservation Biology: Keenan Munno, et al., Microplastic
contamination in Great Lakes fish.......................... 394
Elsevier: Joachim Peter Tilsted, et al., Energy Research &
Social Science, Petrochemical transition narratives:
Selling fossil fuel solutions in a decarbonizing world..... 405
PNAS: Fanran Meng, et al., Planet-compatible pathways for
transitioning the chemical industry........................ 418
Elsevier: Fredric Bauer, et al., Energy Policy: Plastic
dinosaurs--Digging deep into the accelerating carbon lock-
in of plastics............................................. 428
Plastic Waste Makers Index 2023: Dominio Charles and Laurant
Kimman, Minderoo Foundation................................ 435
One Earth: Frederic Bauer, et al., Plastics and climate
change--Breaking carbon lock-ins through three mitigation
pathways................................................... 499
Plastic & Climate: Lisa Anne Hamilton, et al., The Hidden
Costs of a Plastic Planet.................................. 515
Plastic Pollution: Stephanie B. Borrelle et al., Predicted
growth in plastic waste exceeds efforts to mitigate plastic
pollution.................................................. 621
Microplastics and Nanoplastics: Alvine C. Mehinto, et al.,
Risk-based management framework for microplastics in
aquatic ecosystems......................................... 626
Microplastics and Nanoplastics: Scott Coffin, et al., Risk
characterization of microplastics in San Francisco Bay,
California................................................. 636
Elsevier: Science of the Total Environment: Helen V. Ford, et
al., The fundamental links between climate change and
marine plastic pollution................................... 654
Oceanography: Roger Revelle Commemorative Lecture: Chelsea M.
Richman, et al., The Story of Plastic Pollution............ 665
Ecological Applications: K. Bucci, et al., What is known and
unknown about the effect of plastic pollution: A meta-
analysis and systematic review............................. 676
Environmental Science & Technology: Michael P. Drewniok, et
al., What to do about Plastics? Lessons from a Study of
United Kingdom Plastics Flows.............................. 692
Science: Ecotoxicology: Zhenyu Tian, et al., A ubiquitous
tire rubber-derived chemical induces acute mortality in
coho salmon................................................ 706
HEARING ON PETROCHEMICALS TO WASTE:
EXAMINING THE LIFECYCLE
ENVIRONMENTAL AND
CLIMATE EFFECTS OF PLASTIC
----------
THURSDAY, MARCH 30, 2023
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Environment and Public Works,
Subcommittee on Chemical Safety, Waste Management,
Environmental Justice, and Regulatory Oversight,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m. in room
406, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Jeff Merkley
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Present: Senators Merkley, Mullin, Carper, Whitehouse,
Markey, Capito, Sullivan.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JEFF MERKLEY,
U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF OREGON
Senator Merkley. Welcome to the first hearing of the year
of the Subcommittee on Chemical Safety, Waste Management,
Environmental Justice and Regulatory Oversight. The particular
emphasis in this subcommittee hearing is on the challenges we
face in regard to plastics.
A special welcome to our Ranking Member, Senator Markwayne
Mullin of Oklahoma. Thank you for your preparation for the work
of this subcommittee.
Mass production of plastic began in earnest during the days
of World War II. It continued to boom in the decades that
followed, heralded by many as an all-new frontier in material
abundance thanks to its versatility, its durability, and its
inexpensive cost of production.
There is a scene from the movie The Graduate where one
character speaking to another says, ``There is a great future
in plastics. Think about it.''
Decades after filming The Graduate we have had a chance to
think about it, not only to think about it but to experience
it, to live it and to know that with this particular material
comes not just variety of potential uses but a significant
number of problems and challenges. It is our responsibility to
understand these problems and seek a way to address them.
We know that one of our problems is the massive amount of
greenhouse gases emitted throughout the entire life cycle of
plastics, from its extraction and transportation of the raw
material of methane gas to the greenhouse gases produced in the
process of refining and manufacturing to the management of
plastic waste through incineration.
Many folks do not connect that plastics are closely tied to
the petrochemical industry. Fossil fuels are a part of nearly
every stage of plastics production. It takes the raw feedstock
and chemically refines them, and turns them into polymers which
become the building blocks of plastic manufacturing.
Right from the start the very first step in creating new
plastic is pulling fossil gas out of the ground. It contributes
to an increase in methane being released into the atmosphere
through that massive network of pipes. Over a 25-year period,
methane is 80 times more efficient in trapping heat than carbon
dioxide ounce per ounce.
There is another challenge, the unthinkable amounts of
waste. It is estimated that at least three-quarters of the
plastic ever produced has ended up as waste. Now the ratio has
grown to something close to 90 percent of the plastic produced
ending up as waste.
We always hear the mantra of the three RRRs, reduce, reuse,
and recycle, but less than 10 percent of our plastic is
actually recycled. That is despite the Blue Bin Program. Most
of the plastic you put in that blue bin is referred to as wish
cycling. You put it in wishing that it is going to be recycled
but the reality is, in most cases, it is not.
Instead of the reality of the three Rs, the true case is
the three Bs. Plastic is burned, buried, and borne out to sea.
In the process, it creates public health and ecological
challenges.
Each year thousands of sea birds, sea turtles, seals, and
other marine mammals die from ingesting plastic or getting
entangled in plastic. Fish in the Pacific Northwest ingest an
estimated 12,000 to 24,000 tons of plastic annually.
Plastic pollution often comes in the form of lumps but also
comes in the form of microplastics. Microplastics have now
penetrated every system on earth, the water, the soil, the air,
our food systems, and even our human body. They have made their
way into our lungs, the breastmilk we feed our babies, our
bloodstreams and that produces a lot of public health concerns.
Plastics have more than 10,000 chemicals associated with
them. Over a quarter of them have potential health risks,
including chemicals that mimic, block or alter the actions of
hormones, reduce fertility and damage the nervous system.
It is estimated that each of us consumes about a credit
card worth of plastic every week. I do not think there is a
person in America who likes the idea of envisioning their
children eating a credit card worth of plastic each week with
all the chemicals that are in it. It gives us pause.
The fossil fuel industry is envisioning a massive increase
in the production of plastics. That will only amplify the
problems and makes it even more urgent that we address them.
As we work to protect human health and protect the
integrity of our ecosystems, we have to increase our
understanding of the challenges and explore ways to address
those challenges and to solve those challenges.
That is the purpose of these hearings. We will be doing a
series of six hearings. We are fortunate to be joined by
several witnesses who will kick this off.
Dr. Arvind Ravikumar is Co-Director, Energy Emissions
Modeling and Data Lab at the University of Texas at Austin
which seeks to provide reliable, science-based, transparent and
measurement-based greenhouse gas assessments of global energy
supply chains. He is also a member of the Sustainable Energy
Development Lab which focuses on developing technical and
social policy solutions to affected climate action and the
global energy sectors.
With Dr. Ravikumar, we have Dr. Chelsea Rochman, Assistant
Professor at the University of Toronto, St. George, where she
spent the past decade researching the sources and ecological
implications of plastic debris in marine and freshwater
habitats.
Dr. Rochman runs a program researching plastic pollution
with a major focus on the sources and pathways of microplastics
and other contaminants into urban watersheds and arctic
ecosystems, as well as the effects of multiple stressors on
ecosystems across all levels of biological organization and
solutions to reduce plastic pollution.
They are joined by Dr. Hota GangaRao. He will be introduced
in detail by my colleague.
Thank you all for being here this morning. Now, I will turn
it over to Ranking Member Mullin.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. MARKWAYNE MULLIN,
U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA
Senator Mullin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for
reaching out to me. I enjoyed the breakfast we had.
While we have different views on multiple things, including
this, I believe working together with the respect with which we
started, we can possibly come up with some positive outcomes.
I would like to thank our panelists for being here. I know
it is never easy. For you to take time out of your life to come
sit in front of us is important. If we are not hearing from you
then we are just having a bunch of guys up here that think we
know best, making decisions with uninformed information. Every
point of view, I believe, is valuable. Thank you for being
here.
The focus on this hearing is petrochemicals. It is
understood you are giving the Administration views on domestic
fossil energy production.
However, rather than using this opportunity to discuss all
the innovative technologies that are available and upcoming,
Democrats would rather focus on the ending of American energy
production at a key point that many people forget is that the
renewable energy we rely on, on petrochemicals, and the vast
majority of the petrochemicals are derived from oil and natural
gas. EVs, wind turbines, solar panels, batteries, just to name
a few, are all made possible by petrochemicals.
Nearly every component of an EV and the batteries that they
run on require petrochemicals. Wind turbines are not made out
of wind, solar panels are not made out of sun. These are all
possible from petrochemicals. Even better, using petrochemicals
provides the opportunity to extend the life cycle and new end-
of-life uses for renewable energy technologies.
Without petrochemicals, we would not have today's roads and
bridges, current aviation and aerospace technologies and
advanced life-saving medical equipment such as hearing aids and
pacemakers that make lives better and help people live longer.
Some people may not realize it but one of the innovative
technologies made possible by petrochemicals are our iPhones
which some of my colleagues and those who oppose fossil fuels
use every day to push out their message on social media.
Innovation, not over-regulation, is where we need to focus
and we should be. Through innovation we watch private
industries leading the recycling space for technologies that
have been developed or are under development to recycle plastic
waste, one in particular being advanced recycling.
Environmentalists will say advanced recycling burns plastic
to scare you away and advance their anti-plastic agenda. If
advanced recyclers burned their material, they would have
nothing to recycle, meaning they would have nothing to sell to
their customers.
In 2021, Oklahoma passed legislation recognizing the
important role of advanced recycling and 23 other States have
done the same. If our goal is to recycle more material, then
the committee should focus on supporting technologies and
innovations that do just that.
Instead of trying to ban one of the most important
innovations in the last 100 years that we know a modern society
needs, I am hopeful in future hearings this committee can spend
time focused on innovation and how we can legislate as
legislators and support these ideas that continue to advance
society with realistic perspectives.
Mr. GangaRao, I want to thank you and all of our panelists
for taking the opportunity once again for being here.
With that, I yield back.
Senator Merkley. Thank you very much.
We are now going to turn to our witnesses starting with Dr.
Ravikumar.
STATEMENT OF ARVIND RAVIKUMAR, PH.D., RESEARCH ASSOCIATE
PROFESSOR AND CO-DIRECTOR, ENERGY EMISSIONS MODELING AND DATA
LAB, THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN
Mr. Ravikumar. Chairman Merkley, Ranking Member Mullin, and
members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to
testify on the topic of greenhouse gas emissions of plastics
manufacturing.
I am Arvind Ravikumar, Co-Director of the Energy Emissions
Modeling and Data Lab at the University of Texas at Austin.
Over the past decade, I have several large-scale, field
campaigns in the U.S. to measure greenhouse gas emissions from
the oil and gas supply chain.
Throughout my research, I have worked in collaboration with
the oil and gas industry, State and Federal agencies, and non-
governmental organizations.
I want to make three key points in my testimony. First, up
to 50 percent of the lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions impact
of plastics comes from the upstream oil and gas supply chain
that serves as feedstock to chemical manufacturing that become
plastics.
Second, geographic variations in emissions associated with
the feedstock results in significant differences in lifecycle
emissions of plastics.
Third, uncertainty in emissions accounting and allocation
methods is a key driver of uncertainty in lifecycle emissions
of plastics.
Major sources of emissions in the lifecycle of plastics
production are upstream emissions from oil and gas feedstocks,
process and combustion emissions from manufacturing, and
emissions from electricity use. These do not include emissions
associated with end-of-life management such as pyrolysis-based
chemical recycling methods, which can be a significant source
of emissions.
Feedstocks come in the form of petrochemicals and
hydrocarbon liquids that are byproducts of crude refining and
natural gas processing. In the context of plastics, upstream
greenhouse gas emissions associated with feedstocks, primarily
methane, can account for up to 50 percent of total lifecycle
emissions.
As the electricity grid rapidly decarbonizes, the
contribution of upstream methane emissions to total lifecycle
emissions of plastics will only increase. Therefore, addressing
methane emissions associated with the oil and gas supply chain
is key to reducing lifecycle emissions impacts.
U.S. production of natural gas liquids has increased
threefold over the past decade to six million barrels per day.
These liquids are co-produced with oil and gas in different
shale basins. In particular, the Marcellus, Permian and
Haynesville shale basins together account for 60 percent of all
natural gas liquids produced. Methane emissions across these
shale basins vary. Recent field campaigns have shown methane
leakage as low as 1 percent in the Marcellus Shale Basin and as
high as 9 percent in the Permian Basin.
Furthermore, official estimates such as the U.S. greenhouse
gas inventory have been shown to underestimate U.S. methane
emissions from the oil and gas sector by 60 percent. This
impacts the life-cycle emissions of plastics in two critical
ways.
One, estimates of emissions intensity of plastic production
is highly location specific. Two, underestimation of methane
emissions from the oil and gas supply chain risks minimizing
the lifecycle emissions impacts of plastics.
A key driver of emissions underestimation is the
disproportionate role of methane super-emitters. These super-
emitters are short-duration emission events, often
unpredictable and vary by location. Thus, plastics produced
from feedstock sourced from the Permian Basin will likely have
higher lifecycle emissions compared to that produced from
feedstock sourced from the Marcellus Shale Basin.
Effective and frequent monitoring and mitigation of methane
emissions will be critical in reducing supply chain emissions
of plastic production. In this context, recent innovations in
technology have enabled the oil and gas industry, as well as
the EPA, to address methane emissions cost effectively.
I want to conclude by highlighting two key issues in
effective carbon accounting across plastic supply chains.
First, allocation methods, the process of assigning upstream
emissions to different co-products such as crude oil, natural
gas, and natural gas liquids, can change lifecycle emissions by
a factor of two.
There are several approaches to emissions allocation. One
such approach is to allocate emissions based on the energy
content of products. Thus, co-products with high energy density
will be assigned higher emissions. Energy allocation is
frequently used in a regulatory context such as the California
low carbon fuel standards program. Ensuring a uniform
allocation method for upstream emissions associated is
essential for meaningful comparisons across plastic supply
chains.
Second, transparent carbon accounting is essential to build
accurate estimates of the emissions intensities of different
plastic supply chains. Differences in feedstocks, upstream
methane emissions, and downstream processes can enable
differentiation in the markets that allow for a target-based
approach to reducing lifecycle emissions. However, this
differentiation requires a level of accuracy and trust in
supply chain carbon accounting frameworks that is currently not
available.
Emissions measurements conducted across the supply chain
must be interpreted in a way that is transparent,
scientifically robust, reliable, and timely. The Department of
Energy has a key role to play in supporting public-private
partnerships to collect, interpret, and make public plastic
supply chain emissions information.
In summary, up to 50 percent of the lifecycle greenhouse
gas emissions impact of plastics is associated with the
upstream oil and gas supply chain that serves as a feedstock.
Upstream emissions are dominated by methane, lifecycle
emissions of plastics vary by location and the source of
feedstocks.
Improved monitoring and estimation of supply chain
greenhouse gas emissions is essential to develop target-based
approaches to reduce the emissions intensity of plastics
manufacturing.
Thank you for your time.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Ravikumar follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Senator Merkley. Thank you very much for that summary of
the upstream greenhouse gas emissions. It is appreciated.
Dr. Rochman.
STATEMENT OF CHELSEA M. ROCHMAN, PH.D., ASSISTANT PROFESSOR,
HEAD OF OPERATIONS AND SCIENCE PROGRAMMING AND APPLICATION
LEAD, DEPARTMENT OF ECOLOGY AND EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGY,
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO
Ms. Rochman. Good morning, Chairman Merkley, Ranking Member
Mullin, and members of the subcommittee, and Senator
Whitehouse.
I am grateful for the opportunity to share my expertise
with you on this important issue. For the sake of time, I am
going to summarize our current scientific knowledge about the
effects of plastics pollution, but I note that my written
statement provides additional information.
My name is Dr. Chelsea Rochman. I am an American citizen
working abroad as a professor in Ecology at the University of
Toronto. I have been researching plastic pollution for about 15
years, beginning with the first scientific expedition to what
is often called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, with the
Scripps Institution of Oceanography. I also serve as a Science
Advisor to the Ocean Conservancy and am Head of Operations for
the University of Toronto Trash Team.
Within the scientific community, my laboratory is globally
known for our research on plastic contamination, specifically
microplastics in the environment as well as their effects on
plastic pollution on wildlife. We study plastic debris across
the United States including the San Francisco Bay, right here
in the Chesapeake Bay, and also at home in the Great Lakes. We
also measure microplastic exposure in humans.
As you are all likely aware, plastic pollution has become
ubiquitous. Large plastic litters our environment from the
Poles to the Equator, from the deep sea to the tops of the
mountains. Microplastics cycle in the global dust cycle, the
water cycle, the carbon cycle and food webs.
I would be shocked if any of you have not seen plastic
waste litter in your local parks and waterways. Our eyes are
not deceiving us; scientific papers report plastics of all
sizes across the globe and show that the amount of this litter
is increasing.
To put it bluntly, plastic pollution is everywhere and the
problem is getting worse. I am here to tell you why this
matters. I am going to spend some time telling you what we know
about the effects of this plastic pollution on wildlife.
In order for there to be effects of plastic, the animals
actually need to interact with it and they do. The two main
ways animals interact with plastic are that they get entangled
by it or they ingest it. Scientific studies and monitoring
records demonstrate these interactions in more than 1,000
species.
Entanglement is especially common in sea turtles, sea
birds, and marine mammals, and ingestion occurs across all
levels of the food web from the smallest zooplankton to the
largest sharks and whales. In fact, nearly every scientific
study that has looked for ingested plastic in animals finds it.
In our own work, for example, we find microplastics in the
gut content as well as in the fillets of every species of Great
Lakes fish we have collected. It is not uncommon for these fish
to have more than 100 pieces of plastic in their bodies.
What do these interactions mean for individual organisms,
populations and communities? When it comes to large plastic
debris, there is no doubt that plastic harms wildlife.
Entanglement leads to skin lacerations, drownings and
ultimately mortality. Ingestion of large plastic items, such as
plastic bags or straws can injure internal organs and cause an
animal to feel full and starve.
A recent study modeling the risk of microplastic pollution
suggests we have already crossed the threshold in some
populations where we can expect up to 50 percent mortality in
sea turtles from plastic ingestion. Similar examples of adverse
effects have been reported in many different species of sea
birds, marine mammals, corals, among other species.
Recently, it has also become clear that microplastics lead
to adverse effects. When animals eat microplastics, the
microplastic can displace the food in the gut. This can lead to
delays in development, weight loss, diminished survival and
reproduction. Smaller sized microplastics and their additive
chemicals can migrate out of the gut into other organs, leading
to other mechanisms of toxicity like endocrine disruption,
inflammation and tumor promotion.
I recently co-led an expert working group for the State of
California. We were asked to assess the risk of microplastics.
Our study suggests that where microplastic concentrations are
high, including in the Great Lakes as well as San Francisco
Bay, our wildlife is at risk.
Although we do not yet understand how microplastics affect
us, we do know we are exposed via house dust, drinking water,
seafood and other sources. More explicit research on human
health is necessary.
In summary, there is no doubt that plastic of all shapes
and sizes litter our ecosystem. This debris contaminates more
than 1,000 species, and these include some of our important
seafood resources.
We know plastics harm individual organisms and populations
and these impacts, combined with evidence for accelerating
plastic production and then emissions into the environment,
suggests governments should come together to decide how we are
going to work together to limit plastic pollution. This is
essential before we transform ecosystems irreparably.
I want to thank you again for this opportunity to speak
with you, and I would be happy to answer questions today or if
they come up later in the future.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Rochman follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Senator Merkley. Thank you very much, Dr. Rochman.
Dr. GangaRao.
STATEMENT OF HOTA GANGARAO, PH.D., WADSWORTH PROFESSOR AND
DIRECTOR OF CONSTRUCTED FACILITIES CENTER, WADSWORTH DEPARTMENT
OF CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING, WEST VIRGINIA
UNIVERSITY
Mr. GangaRao. Good morning, Chairman Merkley, Ranking
Member Mullin, and distinguished Member Whitehouse of the
Subcommittee on Chemical Safety, Waste Management and
Environmental Justice.
My name is Hota GangaRao, Professor and Director of the
Constructed Facilities Center in the Department of Civil and
Environmental Engineering at West Virginia University. I
conduct research at the University through the Center for
Innovation and Integration of Composites into Infrastructure
that is being sponsored by the U.S. National Science
Foundation, as well as various Federal and State government
agencies and private industry.
I am pleased to be speaking on behalf of the American
Composites Manufacturers Association, ACMA, today, which
represents the entire spectrum of North American composites
supply chain, including universities such as mine conducting
the research, suppliers, manufacturers, end users and other
businesses involved in the composite sector. The ACMA
represents over 300 corporations established in 49 States.
Thanks for inviting me to speak on this topic of great
importance from the environmental point of view which is of
upmost importance really. With the declining performance of our
in-service infrastructure, how do we ensure that the United
States uses advanced materials that are the best choice for the
environment and the economy while advancing the state-of-the-
art for better quality of life?
I have worked for decades on these composites that consist
of fibers of some kind, I have brought some of them, and
certain resin systems such as the polymers we are talking about
here today. The annual resin production in the United States is
about 120 billion pounds, which is increasing due to the ready
availability of low-cost shale gas, a precursor to make
polymers.
FRP, Fiber-Reinforced Polymer, composites are lighter than
steel by about a factor of four. They are durable by a factor
of two to three. They are nonconductive and many industries,
such as the automotive, aerospace, and infrastructure have been
using composites as pointed out by Senator Mullin, since the
1940's and even before.
Applications that may be of interest for this committee
include the use of composites in infrastructure including
bridge components and rebar. That is my first slide I want to
quickly show. This is of particular interest to me. Rhode
Island, for example, has been using composites for pedestrian
walkways. That is my second slide. There is an interest in
increasing access to the communities.
Similarly, West Virginia has been using composites to
retrofit bridges, as I have shown you there in slide 3. The
U.S. Army Corps has been using all-composite hydraulic
structures developed by West Virginia University. These are
being used in the States of Oregon, Illinois and Washington.
Similarly, FRP composites hybridized with steel substrate
can be used to make rail tank cars with high energy absorption,
which is my next slide, that is a tank car. This is of great
interest today as you know.
FRP composites are important in the energy sector.
Composites are the best choice for windmill turbine blades. The
turbine blade is about 300 feet long. They are enabling
technology to build larger wind turbine blades, obviously
generating clean energy without any greenhouse gases.
Finally, composites are being used as utility poles to
withstand wildfires and hurricanes. In contrast to single use
plastics such as foam cups and straws, there are many durable
plastics and composites that have been in use for 70 to 80
years as has been alluded to here this morning.
The durable reinforced composites with a 100-year service
life use only 20 percent of polymers by weight and they have a
high potential for recycling. Based on some of the estimates we
are receiving from Europe, about 30 percent of the composites
are being recycled. However, the current recycling rate in the
United States is only 5 percent of the annual production. In
coming years, these recycling numbers will improve due to the
intense ongoing research in government labs and also the
private sector.
Another important aspect to highlight here is the near-
future development of the naturally renewable agricultural
resources that is extremely important, because they produce not
only the natural fibers and natural resins, but also they
absorb what we call carbon sequestration in terms of CO2.
I could go on and on but I will not because of the time.
All I want to say therefore, sir, is we urge the U.S. Congress
to kindly direct the R&D agencies to focus on developing and
implementing multifunctional commodity materials that are
durable, that are recyclable, that are biodegradable, and
gradually move away from single-use plastics.
However, as we continue to research and develop alternate
biodegradable sources, completely banning the use of common
plastic is not advisable at this point, because many of those
things that I talked about earlier in terms of the composites
that are being used in those kinds of products I have displayed
here, these are some of the products I developed 30-some years
ago that are in service today.
In short, as you look at how to address plastic, I would
urge the committee to promote growth of composites and other
advanced materials in the United States and then the direction
for faster recovery of alternate materials, sources and systems
and speedier implementation.
Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. GangaRao follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Senator Merkley. Thank you very much.
I will start the questioning. Are we doing 5-minute or 7-
minute rounds? Five minutes. We should have a chance to go
through a couple times, then.
Dr. GangaRao, these advanced composites that you are
referring to, what percent of the total plastic production do
they constitute?
Mr. GangaRao. Approximately 20 to 25 percent of the
polymers being used are going into these advanced composites in
the United States.
Senator Merkley. Thank you.
You mentioned Europe has strategies that have recycling
rates higher than ours. I will certainly ask my team to
followup with you in regard to the differences in those
strategies, and the types of recycling that occur, the costs,
the benefits and disadvantages of each. Thank you.
I am going to turn to Dr. Ravikumar. Just to clarify,
essentially 50 percent of the global warming gases that are
triggered through the production or the life cycle of plastics
are from the upstream production of the methane gas that goes
into it. What percent of the plastics are essentially made
from, if you will, methane gas?
Mr. Ravikumar. I said up to 50 percent, so there are
plastics, if produced from oil and gas basins that have low
methane leakage already, it can be between 10 and 20 percent.
From high leakage basins it could be as high as 50 percent.
Senator Merkley. I was really stuck by, if I understood
your statistics correctly, that the type of leakage that occurs
in the production varies from 1 percent in one basin to 9
percent in, I think you said the Permian Basin. Why that
dramatic difference? Obviously, that is a dramatically
different input in the calculation of the global warming
impact.
Mr. Ravikumar. Differences in methane leakage across basins
have a number of proximate causes. The first one is the
difference in resource. The Marcellus Shale is largely a dry
gas basin with liquid production, so you need less complex
equipment, you can be directly putting all of the products into
pipelines. Whereas the Permian Basin is a much more complex
basin which produces crude oil, natural gas liquids and natural
gas, all of which require much more complex equipment resulting
in higher emissions.
There are also other near-term reasons. For example, lack
of pipeline capacity to take natural gas away in the Permian
Basin results in increased flaring, which does not exist in the
Marcellus Shale Basin, which also increases the differences in
methane emissions.
Senator Merkley. If I recall correctly, the estimate is
that when you have about a 4 percent leakage rate in the
system, that produces a global warming impact roughly
equivalent to coal over the life cycle. Is that in the ballpark
of your understanding?
Mr. Ravikumar. That is correct.
Senator Merkley. Thank you.
Dr. Rochman, you mentioned microfibers. How much of those
fibers that we are concerned about come from, if you will,
washing machines because so much of our clothing is made from
plastics, nylon, Dacron, et cetera? How much of it is kind of
from the erosion of larger pieces of plastic that are tumbling
around in the waterways?
Ms. Rochman. That is a really good question. I can not
speak to the exact numbers but I can tell you that the amount
of microplastics or microfibers that are coming from our
clothing, when we wash our laundry, and then heading out to a
wastewater treatment plant where some will eventually to our
waterways, is significant enough that when we did a small pilot
in the Town of Perry Sound, which is a small community on Lake
Huron, we put washing machine filters in 100 homes. Volunteers
agreed to put these filters in their homes.
We measured the amount of microfibers in the wastewater
treatment plants before this pilot and after this pilot. With
the filters in place, we saw actually a significant reduction
in microfibers going into Lake Huron.
The implementation of filters on washing machines is pretty
simple. It is an innovation that can help reduce the problem.
We actually see that it makes a difference.
Senator Merkley. Significant like 5 percent?
Ms. Rochman. We actually saw 10 percent, which was
shocking, because it was 10 percent of homes that had the
filters. There is always variability around that number. It was
significant enough that it really seemed to be making a large
difference.
Senator Merkley. Technological strategies are being
explored from the washing machine level, but also at the
tertiary water treatment level?
Ms. Rochman. That is right. We do see that in a tertiary.
Wastewater treatment can either be primary, secondary or
tertiary treatment, tertiary being the highest. In the tertiary
treatment plant, we do see less microplastics coming out of the
effluent than above.
Having wastewater treatment plants updated to be tertiary
will help the microplastic issue as well as other issues. That
is one solution. I think the filters on washing machines takes
care of upstream. It is a simple solution to implement them on
washing machines. People clean out the trap just like they do
their dryer. Then you do not have the problem of fibers going
into the sludge at the wastewater treatment plant, which is
sometimes land applied. It seems to be an easy win.
Senator Merkley. Five minutes passes incredibly fast. There
is so much more I want learn and understand about this, but I
am going to turn this over to my colleague, Senator Mullin.
Senator Mullin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate that.
I want to hit on this one more time, on the microfibers. Is
that from the clothes that you feel like you have so many
plastics now that are intertwined with our clothing? Is that
where the microfibers are coming from?
Ms. Rochman. In some environments, microfibers are the most
common microplastics we see. One of the sources, I think one of
the largest sources, is textiles. It is coming from our
clothing.
Just to give you that visual, when you clean the lint from
your dryer, those are microfibers. The same thing happens in
your washing machine. We are just not trapping them.
Senator Mullin. I have new towels at the house. I am always
cleaning that filter out at the house.
Ms. Rochman. That is right.
Senator Mullin. Sir, can you explain to me what all you
have here in front of you?
Mr. GangaRao. This is a bridge deck that I manufactured in
1991. We installed about 20 of them. They are doing extremely
well even today under what you call the 18-wheeler type of
loading conditions.
Here is a reinforcing bar like your rebar that you call in
construction. This is made of composite. Eighty percent of by-
weight is glass fiber.
We are now at a point, again, I built a lot of bridges in
West Virginia and a few other places. All I want to point out
is there is a big push now to try to use this in salt water as
well as salted sand without washing the sand. We are going to
save a lot of energy.
Senator Mullin. What is the weight on it?
Mr. GangaRao. This is about one-fourth the weight of steel
in terms of the same diameter and length.
Senator Mullin. We are talking about the deck bridge, you
are talking about being able to greatly increase the weight?
Mr. GangaRao. The deck bridges are about one-fifth the
weight of a concrete deck. That would also save a lot of energy
in terms of production and what have you. Again, like I pointed
out in my testimony a few minutes ago, we have wood composite
that will not only----
Senator Mullin. I have it on my deck. That stuff is great.
Mr. GangaRao. Yes. We have done a lot of, I think about
100-plus bridges across the Country using the wood composite.
As you might know, West Virginia is blessed with a lot of
composite-based wood industries and that is why I had the
opportunity to do that.
Senator Mullin. In our coastal areas, the rebar we see in
bridges rusts out all the time, you see it from underneath the
deck and you see it when we are repairing it. This would be a
great replacement, right?
Mr. GangaRao. Absolutely correct. As I said, the first
bridge I built was in 1995. It is holding up extremely well
even today. Concrete does crack but there is no spalling of the
concrete.
Senator Mullin. Concrete is guaranteed to do two things,
get hard and crack. That is common. We get that. What else do
you have there?
Mr. GangaRao. We have some carbon fibers made of coal as
well as the petrochemical type things. We have some foams to
keep the structures lighter, stronger and longer.
Senator Mullin. Foam like for insulation?
Mr. GangaRao. The idea of insulation is not just one type.
Senator Mullin. Bring down the sound?
Mr. GangaRao. Bring down the sound, bring down the heat,
bring down maybe various kinds of things and increase the
strength.
Senator Mullin. Like in overpasses by neighborhoods, bring
down the traffic noise and stuff going across the bridge?
Mr. GangaRao. Exactly.
Senator Mullin. What else do you have?
Mr. GangaRao. Here are some of the recycling materials we
did using recycled and manufactured products. We have installed
some of them as guardrails on the highway systems. They have
been functioning since early 2000.
Senator Mullin. Thank you. I yield back the rest of my
time.
Senator Merkley. Thank you. Senator Whitehouse?
Senator Whitehouse. Thank you. First, let me welcome
Professor Rochman. Thank you for your help when Senator
Sullivan and I did the Save Our Seas 2.0. You were helpful and
we are about to begin developing Save Our Seas 3.0 and hope we
can call on you again.
Ms. Rochman. Absolutely. Thank you. My pleasure.
Senator Whitehouse. Terrific.
Let me add to the report, if I may, Mr. Chairman, of this
committee hearing, the Minderoo-Monaco Commission on Plastics
and Human Health Report on Plastic Impact on Human Health
published in the Annals of Global Health.
Senator Merkley. Without objection.
[The referenced information follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Senator Whitehouse. Thanks.
To Senator Mullin, let me say I have been pushing to get a
bill that would expand the use of composites in construction
and infrastructure passed. The blockade against it has been on
the Republican side. Perhaps we can work our way through that.
If you do not mind, I will send you a copy of that bill for you
to have a look at.
Senator Mullin. Let me take a look at it.
Senator Whitehouse. It is actually bipartisan. I think
there is enormous progress to be made consistent with your
witness' testimony.
I am glad we are having this hearing because from whales
found with hundreds of pounds of plastic in their bellies, to
human babies ingesting microplastics through their mother's
milk, the waste management failure of the plastics industry is
undeniable, conspicuous and irresponsible.
They barely even try, fobbing off responsibility to public
recycling programs that only recycle 10 percent or less of what
you actually get into the blue bin. Forget the rest of it. The
stuff you actually get into the blue bin is barely recycled at
all.
There is a recurring problem here. I have colleagues who
tend to like market theory in principle. In practice, not so
much, particularly not where the fossil fuel industry or the
plastics industry are concerned. For fossil fuel and plastics,
Congress usually encourages them to privatize profits and
socialize their costs onto everybody else.
For fossil fuel, the negative externality of carbon
emissions, which we allow them to pollute for free to the tune
of about $600 billion a year of harm according to the
International Monetary Fund. In plastics, there is an absolute
plague of plastic waste that is out there for which the
industry takes minimal responsibility.
I think, as best I understand it, the high point of
plastics industry responsibility has been set by a company
called Unilever which has a pledge that as of 2025, for every
pound of plastic they put out into the economy, they will
recover and responsibly dispose of a pound of plastic from the
environment which essentially means going plastics neutral,
which is terrific.
By virtue of bringing that plastic back out, there is no
way to bring the plastic back out of the environment without
spending money to do so. That actually puts a price on waste
plastic collection, which can have very, very significant value
particularly in very low-income countries where the ability to
meet Unilever's demand for those millions of pounds of plastic
waste they will have to be bringing out of the environment in
order to meet their pledge, will actually provide some
meaningful revenue.
There are ways to go forward. The plastics industry has
begun to take this seriously, but it is baby steps at this
point when you look at the unbelievable flow of plastic waste,
particularly into our oceans.
I look forward to continuing to work on this problem.
Conservative market economics, a la Milton Friedman, ought to
be something Democrats and Republicans can agree on, keeping
this material out of our precious lakes and rivers and streams.
There was actually a scientific experiment that was testing
the rain in Colorado. The results were weird so they went back
to retest. They found microplastics falling in the rain in
Colorado. That is a long way from the oceans.
It is terrific to have this hearing. I look forward to
working with the panel and working with your subcommittee,
Chairman, to get our arms around this before we are completely
drowned and gagging in plastic waste, both micro and macro.
Senator Merkley. Thank you, Senator Whitehouse. Thank you
for your going in-depth into this really significant challenge.
Senator Markey?
Senator Markey. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Plastics are petroleum products. Plastics bring along all
the harm and destruction of big oil and fossil fuel extraction,
releasing greenhouse gases and toxic emissions into our
atmosphere. I think we should talk a little bit about air
quality and climate impacts of plastic production.
Dr. Ravikumar, if we see the projected doubling or tripling
of plastic production by 2050, will that jeopardize our target
of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius by 2050?
Mr. Ravikumar. There are several ways what doubling
plastics could mean for climate and emissions. One of the
things that is happening within the oil and gas industry as
well as with State and Federal regulatory agencies is that
there has been a concerted effort in addressing methane
emissions from oil and gas operations.
The U.S. Inflation Reduction Act has several provisions
that are going to reduce methane emissions from this operation
over the next 10 years. A doubling in plastics production does
not necessarily have to double its greenhouse gas emissions. In
fact, that critically depends on upcoming methane regulations
from the EPA as well as innovations in technology that have
been deployed in the industry helps in reducing our methane
emissions by up to 87 percent by 2030.
Senator Markey. According to the research, Doctor, if the
global plastics industry were a country, it would be the fifth
largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world.
Mr. Ravikumar. That is correct.
Senator Markey. Just here in the United States, it is
estimated that the plastics industry is responsible for at
least 232 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions
per year, as much as 116 coal-fired power plants, or 15 million
cars on the road every single day.
Doctor, could you please provide examples of actions
Congress should additionally take to effectively address
environmental and climate effects of plastics?
Mr. Ravikumar. On the greenhouse gas emissions side, there
are three major pockets where you have emissions. The first one
is the upstream oil and gas feedstocks, where most of them are
methane emissions. The second one is the plastic manufacturing
facilities themselves, which emits mostly CO2 and carbon
dioxide. The third one is the electricity use during plastics
manufacturing.
There are three separate solutions for this. On the
electricity side, as we decarbonize rapidly because of
provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act, those emissions will
go down.
On the upstream side, the key factor that can contribute up
to 50 percent to total life cycle emissions of plastics are
methane emissions. We need to rapidly reduce methane emissions
across the supply chain. It can be done through a combination
of regulations, which EPA is currently working on. Recent
innovations in technologies such as satellites and drones have
led to their adoption voluntarily by some of the companies in
the oil and gas industry, not everyone.
Last, innovative processes to quickly find methane super
emitters using satellites and other technologies are there to
help us find and fix these methane emissions quickly.
Then in the middle is plastics manufacturing itself, which
is where carbon capture technology could play a role in
reducing those emissions. That is where we need to have a
combination of both industry efforts as well as regulations to
make sure that we reduce emissions in the manufacturing sector
itself.
Senator Markey. Thank you.
The science is clear but our environment is not.
Microplastics are everywhere. They are interacting with other
contaminants in our environment creating cocktails of chemicals
that are even harder to clean up.
Dr. Rochman, can you tell me more about how plastics
interfere with our ability to clean up toxic substances in our
environment?
Ms. Rochman. Sure. I think I would almost flip that.
Plastics contribute toxic substances to our environment in
terms of chemical additives. There may be additives that can go
into plastics that may be safer.
Then you are absolutely right, that once they enter the
environment, they start to accumulate these contaminants we
already consider toxic pollutants under the Clean Water Act,
for example. PCBs and other chemicals will accumulate on the
plastics.
The plastics can be toxic in and of themselves. There is
evidence that at certain concentrations, just like for PCBs
that we consider toxic pollutants, that these microplastics can
cause these effects.
Under the Clean Water Act, the word pollutant just means
the contaminant in the environment. The word toxic means it has
an ability to cause a reproductive effect, a developmental
effect or a tumor.
Microplastics themselves in addition to the chemicals they
interact with can lead to these things. It is this, maybe
microplastics, how do they, I think your question was how do
they interact or interfere with our ability to clean up these
contaminants. Another question is, should we be considering
whether we label them as toxic pollutants under the Clean Water
Act, the way that countries, like for example, like Canada has
just labeled plastic as toxic under the Canadian Environmental
Protection Act.
Senator Markey. Should we?
Ms. Rochman. I do not have an answer to should we, but I
think that it fits the definition under the information that we
find similarly to other contaminants we consider toxic
pollutants under the Clean Water Act.
Senator Markey. Of course, oceans absorb about 90 percent
of excess carbon in the atmosphere. What role do microplastics
play in interfering with normal ocean ecosystem activity?
Ms. Rochman. I do not research how microplastics affect the
carbon sink, but I can tell you we know that ocean warming is a
stressor on organisms and that we are seeing effects that harm
biodiversity from ocean warming as well as changes in pH.
We also know that microplastics and large plastics cause
stress to organisms. I think one of the reasons it is so hard
to know in the environment what is harming that whale, what is
harming that fish, it is because there are multiple things at
the same time.
It is climate, for your question about how it is affecting
climate, if the plastic is causing the stressor, now that
animal is even less resilient to the climate effects that we
add. We need to take care of both.
Senator Markey. Okay, great. Thank you so much. Thank you,
Mr. Chairman.
Senator Merkley. Thank you, Senator Markey,
Senator Sullivan?
Senator Sullivan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I want to make a compliment to my good friend, Senator
Whitehouse, on the progress we have made, started, by the way,
in this committee and subcommittee here, on the Save Our Seas
Act and then Save Our Seas 2.0, which is the most comprehensive
ocean debris cleanup in the history of the Congress according
to the congressional Research Service. You can say that.
Senator Whitehouse. It is mutual, my friend. It is mutual.
Senator Sullivan. Yes. Now we are working on SOS 3.0. This
is an issue that really unites Republicans, Democrats, the
Trump Administration was for it, and the Biden Administration
is working hard to implement it.
Some of you played an important role in helping us with the
science and everything. Thank you on that, Mr. Chairman. It is
a good news story that brings together all political parties.
I want to talk about an issue that maybe does not
necessarily bring together everybody. Dr. GangaRao, I want you
to comment on this.
There has been this push in Europe and by some in America
to say, hey, we are just going to get rid of all plastics. As
you know, you cannot do that overnight. I do not think it is a
good idea. A big reason I think it would not be a good idea is
that it would drive plastic production overseas, primarily to
China, and we know about their environmental record, the worst
in the world on almost everything.
Would you rather see the plastic industry move to China
with some of the worst environmental standards, or bolster our
capacity here in the United States where we have some of the
highest environmental standards in the world? What would be the
long term realistic environmental consequences of relying on
China for the production of plastics compared to investing in
domestic production?
Mr. GangaRao. Our economy has about half a trillion dollars
of impact coming from plastics, about a million jobs that are
being undertaken through this effort.
Senator Sullivan. In the U.S.?
Mr. GangaRao. In the United States.
Senator Sullivan. That is a lot of jobs and a lot of money.
Mr. GangaRao. That is right.
Senator Sullivan. We do have the highest environmental
standards, certainly relative to China.
Mr. GangaRao. That is correct.
Senator Sullivan. One hundred percent, no doubt about it.
Mr. GangaRao. Absolutely. As I said before, we know that
about 23 percent of plastics coming into the mainstream in
Europe is being recycled with a target of 35 percent going to
being recycled in the year 2030. We should not concede any
ground to anybody, for that matter, China or otherwise, in
terms of developing plastics that are going to be safe in a
variety of senses.
Yes, I do concede that we should seriously think about
eliminating or decreasing the use of one-time, single use
plastics. As I have indicated in my presentation, some of the
composites I show here are going to survive in service for 100
years. This is extremely important because this is going to be
contributing a great deal to our economy.
For example, earlier I mentioned the windmill blades. You
cannot make an efficient 300-foot-long windmill blade with any
material other than a composite to be efficient.
Senator Sullivan. I think our Country has learned a lot
over the last several years, particularly with the pandemic.
Outsourcing key industrial capacity to China is just a bad
idea. It is a bad idea for jobs, for the environment, for our
national security. I certainly hope we do not go down that
path. I will oppose it adamantly. It makes no sense.
Let me turn to Dr. Rochman very quickly. I am just about
out of time. I want to thank you for your help on Save Our Seas
2.0. We want to keep focused on solutions. Here is one
challenge, though, that I would love your view on.
As you know, my State has more coastline than the rest of
the Country combined. A lot of people do not know that but
Alaska has more coastline than the entire lower 48 in terms of
coastline. As you can imagine, we get tons of plastic and ocean
debris that washes up on our beautiful shores in Alaska, almost
all of it from Asia and Africa, not from America.
When we collect it, which is a big task, and that is what
our bills focus on, there is no place to put it, including
landfills. The largest one in Anchorage can not accept this
kind of debris. It has to be shipped to the lower 48, which is
very expensive.
What would you say in terms of the technology for recycling
some of that, keep it local in Alaska that can create jobs, and
converting some of this plastic waste and the components for
building materials and things like that? Isn't that a good
solution for my State but for the rest of the Country?
Ms. Rochman. First of all, my pleasure and I am excited to
work on 3.0.
Second of all, I do think around the globe we do need to
scale up sustainable recycling programs for the types of
materials that I think Dr. GangaRao is talking about.
I agree we should be getting rid of some of these
unnecessary, single-use items. For some of the materials that
we put into our infrastructure and use, absolutely, we need to
be able to make sure that they fit into a circular economy.
Cleanup, as you are doing on the coasts, is still really a
necessary part of the solution. One day, hopefully, we do not
need it, but today, we do.
Senator Sullivan. Yes.
Ms. Rochman. The question of where we take that material to
be able to use it to build construction materials or to be able
to recycle it things that are useful, I agree with you. In our
Country, I think we need to scale up some of the infrastructure
that is sustainable but also to help other places around the
world. With our globalized world, some of our waste is being
shipped to other places that are then losing it. It is bouncing
back to you.
Senator Sullivan. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Merkley. Thank you very much, Senator Sullivan.
Just to be clear, this set of hearings is not with the goal
of eliminating plastic production, nor of eliminating
composites. As Senator Whitehouse pointed out, who has worked
in-depth on plastic pollution, the composites have a
significant role, a role that he is working to further.
What we are looking at to try to just be honest about the
life cycle understanding of how plastics are made, there are
very different roles, and what the impact is of both the lumps
of plastic and the microplastics getting into our waterways,
our air, our soil. What is its real effect on human health and
what measures can we develop to mitigate these consequences?
In some cases, it may be an alternative material. In other
cases, it may be a microfiber trap on a washing machine. In
other cases, it may be effective recycling and reintegration.
Of course, plastic comes in many different chemical positions.
I am going to halt my comments because we have been joined
by the Chair of the Environment and Public Works Committee who
has both a statement to make and also would like to ask some
questions.
I am so delighted you have been able to join us. Welcome.
Senator Carper. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, for your
leadership and to Ranking Member Mullin for holding this
hearing today. Thanks to all of you for joining us.
I ride the train, my colleagues know I ride the train back
and forth to Delaware most days. A guy who used to ride the
train a lot, a professor someplace up north, Philadelphia,
whose name was Einstein. He used to ride the train. One day he
got on the train, and he would either go to Washington or go to
New York, and he got on the train and started looking for his
ticket. He couldn't find it. He looked in his coat, he looked
in his pants and looked in his briefcase but couldn't find his
ticket.
The conductor came along and said, Dr. Einstein, we know
who you are. You do not have to worry about it. You ride the
train a lot; you are good. The conductor walked away and he
started to walk out of the car going to the next car. He turned
around and Dr. Einstein was down on his hands and knees looking
under his seat, looking for his ticket.
The conductor runs back to where Dr. Einstein is searching.
He said, Dr. Einstein, we know who you are. You do not have to
worry about it. We know who you are. Dr. Einstein looked up at
him and said, I know who I am too. I just do not know where I
am going.
[Laughter.]
Senator Carper. We have a pretty good idea who we are and
we have a pretty good idea of what our responsibilities are.
The question is on one of the most challenging issues we face
in this Country and on the planet, which is plastics, what to
do about them and what should that path forward be.
I am grateful to our leaders on this subcommittee and also
especially the Ranking Member of the committee, Senator Capito,
for not just talking about these issues but being willing to do
something real about them with your help.
Earlier, I had an opportunity to address the World Wildlife
Fund's Plastics Policy Summit. They assembled a diverse group
of participants who came together to discuss the plastic
crisis.
As many of us on this committee know, plastic pollution
plagues our communities, threatens to overpower our landfills
and our oceans. We need to discuss and explore solutions that
can move us toward a more sustainable future when it comes to
plastic waste.
Advancing commonsense policies that reduce plastic waste is
vital if we are going to leave behind a cleaner planet for
those to follow, our kids and our grandchildren. Most of us
have them. If we look at the numbers, it is clear that we still
have a lot of room for progress when it comes to recyclable
materials, including waste and protecting our planet.
I am told, in 2018, less than 9 percent of plastics were
recycled in the United States, less than 9 percent. To put that
figure in perspective, I have a friend, if you ask him how he
is doing, he says, compared to what? We will ask the same
question, compared to what, 9 percent of plastics were recycled
compared to the overall recycling rate in this Country, about
32 percent. With respect to plastics, it is about one-quarter
of what we are doing overall in terms of recycling.
For me, the takeaway there is, we can do better than this.
We have to do better, both in plastics and non-plastics when it
comes to being recycled.
Where does the majority of plastic waste end up? You have
probably been talking about this already today but it largely
ends up in our landfills and sadly, in our oceans.
A number of us come from States where we have an ocean and
beaches and we care a lot about those natural resources in our
States. Earlier this month, a group of scientists estimated
that in 2019, there were somewhere around 171 trillion pieces
of plastic floating in the world's oceans. Think about that,
171 trillion pieces. That is hard to imagine. That many pieces
of plastic would not be there if it were not for humans and our
dependence on plastic products.
Even worse, scientists predict that number could nearly
triple by 2040, nearly triple, that is a lot of zeroes, unless
significant action is taken to reduce the amount of plastic
products that we create and use globally.
The sharp increase in plastic pollution not only destroys
our natural resources and harms wildlife but also impacts our
health. Many of these plastics end up breaking down into tiny
microplastics, as you know, that make their way into our food
supply, our drinking water, accumulating in our bodies and
those of our families, and impacting critical systems.
Production of plastic products also contributes
significantly to global greenhouse gas emissions, as you know,
which is a driver of climate change from drilling to
refinement, to manufacturing and shipping plastic production
which was responsible for close to 2 billion metric tons, 2
billion metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions in 2019. That
is the equivalent of about 3 or 4 percent of the world's total
emissions.
Only by reducing the rate of plastic production, improving
recycling systems and encouraging the innovation of plastic
alternatives will we be able to reduce the impact of emissions
of plastic have on our climate, our planet and our health.
I encourage everyone here today and those who would like to
be here today who may be watching today to keep that in mind as
we work to fight climate change, reduce plastic pollution, and
create jobs and economic opportunities while we are doing that.
That was a long statement I think I have run out of time.
My time has expired.
Senator Carper. Can I ask a question for the record, Mr.
Chairman?
Senator Merkley. Absolutely.
Senator Carper. Thank you so much. Here is my question for
the record.
I think it was about two or 3 years ago the American
Chemistry Council conducted a survey that found that 87 percent
of Democrats, 74 percent of Independents, 64 percent of
Republicans in this Country once they see plastic waste as a
critical issue that we should address now, there is clear
bipartisan support for our government to take action to reduce
our reliance on plastic products.
The question I am going to ask you to answer for the record
is this. Please share with us three actions, three ideas that
Congress should consider to reduce petrochemical and plastic
pollution and its lifestyle impacts on climate change. Give us
three good ideas. That would be much appreciated. We will
recycle them widely.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Merkley. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
We will turn to Senator Capito. Welcome.
Senator Capito. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you all for
being here.
Dr. GangaRao, it is nice to see you. I am very proud of the
work you are doing at West Virginia University and the
innovation and the inspiration that you are. I got to visit
your lab and see your bridge materials and all the things that
you are doing.
I am really pleased you are here to be a part of this
really esteemed panel of academics. I have not been here. I
have listened a little bit in my office but I am hearing from
those who have listened to every word that it has been a very
beneficial panel.
If you could you help us on the composite issue. You might
have covered this, but I would like to hear it again. Most
people are unaware that plastic polymers or resins are
essential to innovative composite materials and their use in
technologies, not just roads and bridges, but electric cars and
windmills, and everything.
What kind of role do polymers play in the composition of
the composite materials you are working with?
Mr. GangaRao. As I indicated earlier, the United States
produces about 120 billion pounds of resins of which about 20
to 25 billion pounds is going into composites. This industry is
approximately $100 billion to $150 billion.
The most important thing I want to highlight here today is
the fact that we are dealing with lightweight materials that
are going to be lasting much, much longer than conventional
materials. Once we move toward natural fibers and natural
resin-based composites, we are going to absorb the carbon
dioxide from the atmosphere through the agricultural operations
and still maintain this high quality of a composite product.
This is not well understood. When people speak about
composites, they talk about it from a negative standpoint based
on the conventional wisdom, no doubt about it.
However, we want to bring a slightly different perspective
where we can bridge this gap between the rural and urban areas
by generating a much higher volume of natural fibers and other
kinds of synthetic fibers and also natural resins that will
help a great deal in not only making the product durable but
also less expensive, but even more important, emitting lower
magnitudes of carbon, enhancing the carbon sequestration.
Senator Capito. Thank you.
This next question may be a part of what you just
explained. Are there technologies being developed now to
address the end-of-life challenges for reusing composite
materials? Are you looking at recycling composited materials,
and do you already use recycled and reused plastics in your
materials?
Mr. GangaRao. As I said before, about 23 percent of the
discarded plastics are being recycled in Europe. We are
unfortunately, at this point, doing only 5 percent of
recycling.
Senator Capito. Is that because the recycled material is
not available or it is too expensive? What do you think is the
reason we do not have a higher percentage?
Mr. GangaRao. There are a number of reasons. One of them is
obviously the composites are not going to break down like your
single-use plastics. Therefore, the availability and the supply
chain is not there. That is one issue.
The other issue is we are beginning to understand the
impacts of these discarded materials. It will take us a little
bit longer to try to ramp up the recycling issues.
Senator Capito. Basically, what you are tell me here, at
least the way I am hearing it and have seen in your lab, again
thank you for hosting me, is there is a market for reused and
recycled plastics within the composites industry or development
of those materials which could, and would, I think, lead to be
a solution to where we are.
You mentioned composite materials last longer, are lighter
weight, and they also in the end, with more natural materials,
will absorb more and have more carbon sequestration. That
sounds like a winning formula as we move forward with the
innovation you are doing and inspiring that next generation of
students to do as well. Thank you very much. Would you agree
with that statement?
Mr. GangaRao. Yes, certainly that is correct. I totally
agree with that.
Senator Capito Thank you. Thanks for coming.
Senator Merkley. Thank you very much, Senator.
Senator Carper, did you want to ask some questions?
Senator Carper. I would welcome it if I could.
We have two or three hearings going on today. Actually, we
have a lot of hearings going on at the same time so we come in
and out. Please forgive us if we appear to be rude. As you
know, there is quite a bit going on. This is important stuff.
I asked one question for the record. I would ask you to
respond to the first question for the record.
I am going to ask a second question. I am going to ask you
to respond to it now if you do not mind. How are the
investments from the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan
Infrastructure Law driving innovation and helping to address
climate change?
Mr. Ravikumar. A key part of the greenhouse gas emissions
of plastics manufacturing is the upstream oil and gas
operations that provides feedstocks to the plastics. One of the
key ways of significantly reducing the greenhouse gas impacts
of plastics is reducing methane emissions. The Inflation
Reduction Act provides billions of dollars to the EPA and the
Department of Energy to innovate and develop technologies to
reduce methane emissions from the oil and gas supply chain.
As we speak, the EPA is developing regulations to address
that which will reduce methane emissions by up to 87 percent in
2030. That is going to significantly reduce the greenhouse gas
emissions of plastics. That is part of what is in the Inflation
Reduction Act.
The second part is the methane fee provisions in the Act
which specifies a target for methane emissions by different oil
and gas companies to reduce emissions. We now have access to a
lot of different technologies that many operators are deploying
in the oil and gas facilities to detect and mitigate methane
emissions. The methane fees combined with the available funds
for new technology and innovation is going to significantly
reduce methane emissions which in turn will reduce greenhouse
gas emissions impact of plastics.
Senator Carper. Thanks for pointing that out. My staff and
I on this committee work with Senator Manchin and his staff at
some length and the private sector as well to develop other
methane emission reduction programs. Which is not just to say,
we are going to fine you for continuing to put out emissions.
We are going to help you stop doing that and provide quite a
bit of money, especially for smaller oil and gas companies to
do that.
The other thing is, we need to increasingly find ways to
harness private sector market forces. We have one son who lives
out on the West Coast in California. When we were visiting him
not long ago, we visited a company that takes food waste, they
collect a lot of food waste.
You go into the San Francisco Airport, they have three
bins. One for recycling, one for waste not recycled, and then
they have food waste. One of the things they do with food waste
in the Bay Area is mix it with cow manure. We have a lot of
chickens in Delaware, like 200 chickens for every person. We do
not have a lot of cows. They have a lot of cows in California.
They create a lot of cow manure.
What they have figured out is how to take some of the cow
manure, which has a lot of methane, as you might imagine, and
mix it with the food waste and create a renewable fuel for
vehicles, like for buses and for trucks. That is the kind of
market solution that we are looking for.
My second question, I would ask this question for the
record. I will butcher this name, but Dr. Ravikumar, thanks.
How are the investments--you answered that. Let me see. I have
another question.
Dr. Rochman, in 2019, a report released by the Center for
International Environmental Law predicted that plastic
production is going to increase by about 4 percent by 2020. If
plastic production increases at this rate, not only am I told
will it account for 12 percent of the greenhouse gas emissions
allotted under the Paris Accords, 2015 Paris Agreement, but
aims to keep global warming down under 1.5 degrees Celsius, but
also exacerbate the impacts of plastic pollution on wildlife,
on oceans and on natural resources.
Aside from emissions, what other impacts do plastic
production and plastic waste have on our climate? How might
increased plastic production influence climate change in the
short, in the medium and the long term?
Do you want to take a shot at that, and then I will ask you
to probably respond to a similar question for the record? Thank
you.
Ms. Rochman. I can sort of take a run at that. I would
rather answer your first question which is give you three
solutions.
Senator Carper. Go ahead, answer that one.
Ms. Rochman. The reason I will do that is because most of
what I research is the effects on the wildlife of plastic. I
can talk about that. I do not study how the microplastics
impact the ability of the oceans as a carbon sink.
Senator Carper. We do not always let witnesses choose their
questions but this is a special case.
Ms. Rochman. Your first question was to give you three
options. I would say that in the big picture, I think the three
things I would suggest is first of all, and I have heard
everyone say this, is to reduce the use of these unnecessary,
single-use items. Where there are plastic items being used once
and then thrown away, they do not fit into a circular economy
and we could get rid of those.
No. 2, I would say we need to increase recycling. You have
all mentioned our recycling rate, which is incredibly low. We
need to increase reuse first. In terms of the pyramid, second
is recycling.
One way we could do that is by incentivizing post-consumer
recycled plastic. It is currently, to my understanding, more
expensive to buy post-consumer recycled content than it is to
buy virgin plastic, which was actually a question that Senator
Capito asked.
In order to force those markets to increase, I think we
need to incentivize post-consumer recycled material and maybe
create standards that say all plastic made by X year has to
have X percent of recycled content in it.
The third is clean-up. I understand that in some ways that
looks like a band-aid, but for these microplastics, we are
losing microplastics via tires as we drive. They are escaping
into the environment from our clothing, as we paint buildings.
We should be thinking about treating stormwater, using
trash traps for some of the garbage that is out there, putting
filters on washing machines, and things to trap these materials
as clean-up. I think all of those need to be turned on at the
same time right now in order to reduce emissions, which will
increase the resilience of the oceans to be able to handle some
of the other stressors that we also need to reduce.
Senator Carper. You picked a great question to answer.
Ms. Rochman. Thank you.
Senator Carper. There is a lot of food for thought there.
Thank you very much.
Thank you all for joining us today. It is great to see you.
Senator Merkley. Thank you, Senator Carper.
Senator Mullin?
Senator Mullin. I just want to thank our witnesses again
for being here.
I am actually surprised. I did not know what to think when
we started this hearing. It has been informative. I loved the
testimony from all of our panelists. I think this has been
somewhat productive, starting us off on the right foot.
I do apologize, though, because we are running everywhere.
I have to run out the door. Thank you again for being here.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for calling the meeting and
conducting it in this manner. I appreciate it.
Senator Merkley. Thank you very much. If you have any
questions for the record, we can put them in the record. You do
not have to give them to us now.
Senator Mullin. I think I have to submit one for the
record. I would like to submit for the record, an independent
review by the McKinsey Company that recognizes plastic's role
in enhancing the uses, efficiencies, and establishes data
showing how plastic provides lower greenhouse gases in 13 or 14
applicants where plastic was compared with alternative
material.
Senator Merkley. Without objection.
[The referenced information follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Senator Mullin. Thank you.
Senator Merkley. I will note that I have a number of
studies I will submit for the record as well pertaining to some
of the issues we are discussing today.
[The referenced information follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Senator Merkley. When I paused before for Senator Carper, I
was in the midst of microfiber issues, or hoping to get there
with you, Dr. Rochman. A statistic I was shown is that the
microfibers or microplastics, I am not sure if we are
distinguishing between microplastics from clothing being
microfibers and other microplastics being separate from those,
is that my understanding?
Ms. Rochman. Synthetic microfibers, meaning microfibers
made of plastic, are a type of microplastic.
Senator Merkley. Thank you. Was it the microfibers alone
that are equivalent to grinding up 33 billion tee-shirts each
year and distributing them into the world's water, soils and
air? Have you ever heard that?
Ms. Rochman. I have never heard the stat around that. We do
definitely need numbers to put it into perspective. It is one
of the most common items we see in addition to tire dust, the
microplastic.
Senator Merkley. I can not imagine what 33 billion tee-
shirts' fibers look like, but when I think about how light the
dust is you mentioned, the microfibers from our dryers. You
also mentioned that washing machines do not trap those fibers,
and when you had 100 washing machines that were blocked, there
was a 10 percent reduction.
In terms of the amount of fibers that came from the washing
machines themselves, does that type of filter eliminate 90
percent of the fibers from the washing machine? How effective
are they?
Ms. Rochman. We started our research by testing just that.
We had undergraduate students in the lab washing bright red
blankets so it was easy to see the fibers. They put the filters
on the washing machines and they quantified and weighed the
fibers with and without the filters. Of the size that we were
counting, it removed up to 90 percent of the microfibers from
the washing machine. It was very effective.
Senator Merkley. In your testimony, you mentioned plankton
are digesting microplastics. This is something I had not heard
before. Plankton is at the very base of the sea chain.
We hear about how mercury moves up through the food chain
and gets concentrated along the way. Does this happen with
microfibers? I had not heard this piece of the puzzle starting
with the plankton on up.
Ms. Rochman. For all microplastics that get into organisms,
so it does get into even our smallest animals. We digest
zooplankton in the lab, and find microplastic in their stomach.
When that has been eaten by a predator, say a fish eats the
zooplankton, maybe 100 of them, it is in that fish's gut and
the bigger fish eats that. You do see this transfer of
microplastics up a food web.
What is more striking to me, and what I really want to
understand, is we see small particles move from the gut into
the fillet and into the liver and other organs. That can lead
to toxicity.
A big part of my research right now is trying to understand
do those accumulate and magnify similar to mercury. Regardless,
we are seeing them in those internal organs. I would like to
understand why and what that means.
Senator Merkley. These microplastics do not simply float at
the top of the ocean. There is some floatability but
essentially, fish that are not feeding at the surface are still
consuming microplastics.
Ms. Rochman. That is correct. It is in the water column, it
is on the bottom, it is in the biofilm, the organismal goop on
rocks and other types of things in the ocean. Actually, we see
more microplastic in fish that feed from the bottom because
eventually a lot of it does sink.
Senator Merkley. I think my colleague has to leave at
11:30, so I am going to interrupt because I am deep into this
piece and will come back to it. Senator Whitehouse?
Senator Whitehouse. I will pick up where you left off, Mr.
Chairman.
I have to say, organismal goop is one of the best phrases I
have heard recently. Thank you for that, Dr. Rochman.
You were talking about fish in freshwater lakes and how all
have detectable levels of microplastics, not just in their gut,
but in the actual flesh of the fish that people would consume.
All?
Ms. Rochman. That is right, yes. When I moved to Toronto
and started doing work in the Great Lakes, I was shocked that
every fish that we sampled had microplastic in it, sometimes up
to 900 pieces in an individual organism. I had never seen
anything like that before. In the middle of the ocean, it was
one in four fish.
Senator Whitehouse. In the middle of the ocean, one in four
fish? It is in the oceans as well but to a lesser degree?
Ms. Rochman. I think it is because it is more dilute. If
you think about the ocean, you have microplastic coming off the
land, it is a vast environment. The Great Lakes, while huge,
are less dilute.
Senator Whitehouse. Shellfish?
Ms. Rochman. We see microplastics in shellfish. That
includes oysters, mussels, shrimp and all kinds of animals that
we like to eat.
Senator Whitehouse. What is the reach? Is it 100 percent
like the lake fish, or 25 percent like the ocean fish? Do you
have a guesstimate on how much of the shellfish population has
plastic in it?
Ms. Rochman. I think it would be fair to say that if I were
to go out and sample every species of shellfish in the ocean
that I would find microplastic in every species of shellfish in
the ocean. Would I find it in every organism? Maybe not.
Microplastic, because it transports in air and rains down
in remote places, it is transporting in the global dust cycle.
It truly has become ubiquitous, similar to perfluorinated
compounds.
Yes, I think if you are eating seafood or other things, you
can expect to be eating microplastic. It is in the dust in this
room, so it is also likely in my cup of water.
Senator Whitehouse. Seabirds?
Ms. Rochman. Absolutely. I teach a marine ecology class.
This year, we decided to dissect seabirds as one of our labs.
We found microplastic in quite strikingly large pieces in 90
percent of the birds that we were looking in.
Senator Whitehouse. I think many of us have seen the
horrible pictures of the albatross and other sea birds on
Midway Island which, in their feeding, pick up fairly large
bits of plastic, discarded plastic, lighters and things like
that, and then are unable to fill their tummies with edible
food because they are already stuffed with plastic.
With stuffed bellies, they starve to death and their bodies
are lying on the soil of Midway Island. As they open up and as
the flesh degrades away, you see the skeletons with these
little pockets of plastic where the stomach was.
Ms. Rochman. That is right. A lot of those organisms are
chicks, because their parents are feeding that to their young.
For population perspective, you need those to grow up and
reproduce to sustain a population.
Senator Whitehouse. In addition to that horrible scene of
what is trapped in the chicks' stomachs, it has also cleared
the gut and it has gotten into their flesh as well at the
microplastics level?
Ms. Rochman. I have never looked in the fillet or the
muscle of a bird to see whether you see translocation. For
example, there are papers that show microplastic in the blood
of humans. I think somebody mentioned breast milk. The idea
that these small pieces are translocating should be organism-
wide based on our biology.
Senator Whitehouse. To be a little bit blunt but thorough,
the baby not only ingests the microplastic through breastmilk
but it appears in baby diapers as well. It is pretty well
throughout.
Last question, mammals?
Ms. Rochman. Human mammals or marine mammals?
Senator Whitehouse. Start with marine mammals and non-human
terrestrial mammals. ` Ms. Rochman. We understand that marine
mammals, whales, dolphins, sea lions, they certainly have
microplastic in their stomach. They are eating it. I think of
more concern is you find whales washing up on the beach with
bellies full of plastic bags. There is no doubt from a necropsy
that that is what caused that mortality or the death in that
animal.
Entanglement is another thing. When it comes to
entanglement and ingestion of large plastic, absolutely it is a
problem for marine mammals.
Senator Whitehouse. Entanglement pretty much means
drowning, does not it?
Ms. Rochman. Entanglement can cause a laceration like
actually a cut on the body. It can also lead to drowning. It
can cause an organism to be stuck and not escape a predator. It
is basically like an organism being unable to operate as it
normally would if it is covered in a net.
Senator Whitehouse. It is sort of a peripheral point but
anybody who has ever had a loved one who has gone through any
kind of digestive blockage and is familiar with what an
extraordinarily painful experience that is for a human, I
suspect that for the whales that die because they have filled
their stomachs with waste plastic we have not bothered to take
proper care of as humans, it is a mighty painful way to die.
Thank you.
Senator Merkley. Thank you very much, Senator.
Returning to this issue of microplastics and the role they
play, talking about how it moves up through the food chain,
these plastics have many thousands of chemicals embedded in
them. Are these microfibers and other forms of microplastic,
are they releasing these chemicals or are those chemicals
permanently trapped in the fiber and therefore are of little
concern to the health of our animals or the health of humans?
Ms. Rochman. If I may, I want to answer that question by
describing work we have done in our lab. Plastics can have both
a physical effect as well as a chemical effect. To answer your
question briefly, yes, the chemicals can escape the plastic and
get into the animals.
We did a life cycle assessment where we had fish that were
exposed to microplastics that we took from the Great Lakes and
ground down and exposed them the way they would be exposed in
nature. We saw a lot of physical effects from kind of what
Senator Whitehouse was just discussing. They were eating less
food, eating more plastic. We saw changes in development. We
saw changes in the growth of the organism.
What was striking was from the chemistry, we saw endocrine
disrupting effects. We actually saw the thinning of eggshells
within the ovaries of the fish similar to what we saw in DDT
with sea birds. We actually saw this reduced layer of the
chorion when those eggs were laid, they were friable and broke
easily so you have less reproduction. The larvae, the
offspring, the babies, were deformed.
We actually saw kind of both the physical effect and this
chemical effect. There certainly are effects from the chemicals
that can leach in addition to a physical effect of the
particle.
Senator Merkley. A few years ago I read about a chemical
leaching issue. You mentioned car tires. Most people think of
car tires as rubber, but do they in fact have plastics and the
tire dust becomes a microplastic issue?
Ms. Rochman. Today, a lot of rubber is synthetic, so it is
a type of plastic. The tire itself, as we drive our cars,
little bits of tire fleck off. They become this tire dust that
we see in the environment. It is likely one of the more harmful
types of microplastic similar to paint because they have a lot
of chemicals associated with them.
There is an amazing study, but also a little depressing,
from Washington where they showed that there is this thing
called urban stream mortality where you have die-off of salmon
in the streams as they are running. They linked that mortality
to a chemical, 6PPD quinone, which comes from the production of
tires. Tire dust will have that chemical in it, in addition to
lead and zinc and other components.
Senator Merkley. I was just reading that article. I
remembered it as you talked about tire dust. I remembered that
tire dust was having a huge impact on salmon.
As you mentioned, what they discovered was after a
rainstorm, the rainstorm would wash the dust off the roads and
parking lots and into the streams. There would be a die-off of
salmon before they spawn, which is extremely rare in nature.
Salmon are driven to spawn before they die, not to die before
they spawn or there would be no salmon.
The scientists undertook an analysis of all the chemicals
involved and were eventually able to trace it to this 6PPD, and
you call it 6PPD quinone. That is a fancier, more extended
term. I will submit this article for the record. It is an
example of how chemicals leaching out of microplastics, in this
case tire dust, do have a real impact.
[The referenced information follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Senator Merkley. In that regard, it is often mentioned that
plastics contain endocrine disrupters. What is an endocrine
disrupter? Why should we be concerned about that?
Ms. Rochman. An endocrine disrupting chemical is a chemical
that interferes with our endocrine system, our hormone system.
There are additives in plastics that mimic estrogens or other
types of hormones that interact with these receptors.
If you have, say, not the hormone binding with that
receptor but something else, it then can shut off the ability
for these important processes we need in our thyroid and for
reproduction. Hormones are involved in really important
processes in our body. Chemicals that interfere with the
endocrine system can have big effects on populations in the
wild.
Senator Merkley. I know that your studies are more related
to wildlife, so this may not be a question you can answer. Dr.
Ravikumar, I am not sure if this is at all in your portfolio.
There have been concerns expressed that endocrine
disruption may be associated with cancers in humans,
particularly breast cancer and prostate cancer, or other
disruption of reproduction including declining sperm counts in
men. There is a production called The Onion that creates fake
stories that make us panic over things that are not real. Are
those that type of story or are these real concerns?
Ms. Rochman. When I was co-leading the risk assessment
group in California, I was in the wildlife health group as you
mentioned because that is my expertise. There was also a human
health group running alongside it, and very similarly wanted to
do a risk assessment on microplastics in humans.
Now, they decided not to create a threshold for effect the
way that we did because there weren't enough studies at the
time where they didn't feel right putting a number on it. Every
study they were looking at, what they found to be the most
relevant effect to consider with the decrease was interference
and interaction with sperm count and motility.
Yes, there is a concern that the chemicals in plastics can
have endocrine disrupting effects in humans. They think that is
where a lot of the human health work is looking right now, in
addition to inflammation which can also lead to tumors and
issues with our cell function.
Senator Merkley. On that kind of deep concern for human
health, it is time to wrap up this particular hearing.
Our goal, again, of this series of hearings is to be as
honest as we can to understand the life cycle of plastics and
the impacts they are having and how to mitigate those impacts.
Hopefully, by the end of this series of hearings, we will have
a number of tools so that we will understand better and
consider whether there are strategies that we can take at a
national level to address the significant concerns.
Each of you have contributed to this conversation in a
substantial way. We very much appreciate your expertise and
your sharing that with us today.
I now have to give the official closing words having to do
with the record remaining open to a certain point of time in
which members of the committee can submit additional questions
or submit items for the record.
Senators will be allowed to submit written questions for
the record through the close of business Thursday, April 13th.
We will compile those questions and send them out to you. If
you all would be so kind as to help us answer them, that would
be wonderful. The request is that there be a 2-week turnaround
so that we can actually compile the record by April 27th.
With that, this hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 1:38 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
[all]