Biodegradable v Degradable
The term Biodegradable means an item is able to breakdown into natural elements.
A lot of plastics are degradable, this means that they will eventually break down but not into natural elements rather into tiny pieces, which are termed micro plastics. It may seem great that the plastic breaks down and so won’t appear to be ruining our waterways and ecosystem but in some cases microplastics are worse.
Microplastics are absorbed into the soil or infused in our water to be later found in the foods we eat. There are many studies of waterways, fish, even bottled water that all confirm that each of these things we consume all contain microplastics. In fact, according to research published on nationalgeographic.com, if you drink bottled water you are consuming greater than 20 times more microplastics than if you consume tap water. Most of us are consuming more than 74,000 micro plastics per year.
Unfortunately it is too early to tell exactly what the impact of consuming plastics is. At e.sup we don't really want to take that gamble so we are looking for great alternatives to using plastics. This is just one of the reasons we developed the soda range of single use plastic free cleaning products.