Plastic Pollution: Solving the Issue One Package at a Time
When was the last time you used and threw away a plastic item? Within the last day? The last hour? The last 10 minutes?
According to the Rolling Stone in 2009, The United Nations Environment Program estimated that plastic kills more than 100,000 marine mammals and 1 million seabirds each year. These numbers have only continued to rise since. Today, 8 million metric tons of plastic enter our oceans every single year and are said to be found in 60% of seabirds and about 100% of all turtle species. This colossal amount of plastic keeps building up in our oceans, impacting almost 700 oceanic species. Not only do birds and turtles mistake plastic items for food and consume them unknowingly, but they also ingest hundreds of micro-plastics, tiny plastic particles that have broken down from other plastic waste, every day. Although most people assume all plastic breaks down eventually, these toxic plastic building blocks are left behind for animal consumption. These micro-plastics spread throughout the ocean from large areas of garbage like the Great Pacific Garbage patch, where waste and debris have built up to form a vortex twice the size of Texas. Not only is this harming wildlife, but it's negatively affecting humans as well - we also ingest harmful micro-plastics! Essentially, plastic pollution is a giant issue that we must all work together to solve.
Here at the Northland Clothing Company, we try to do our part in starting to eliminate some of the plastic waste that ends up in our environment, which is why we use HEROPACK mailers that are 100% home compostable. Even if they ended up in a landfill, they would still completely break down waste-free! No more harmful micro-plastics for our wildlife (or for us) to consume. HEROPACK mailers take 2 years to decompose in a landfill - much less than traditional plastic, which can take 400 years or more to breakdown and even then, won't break down completely. And even better, you can compost them at home! Just remove the labels, cut up the mailer, place it in your compost bin, and they will breakdown within 90-120 days.
We hope you can join us in cutting the waste.
Sincerely,
