The study by the environmental group raises serious concern on the current focus on ‘recycling’ to address the challenges of dealing with rising e-waste volumes globally and stresses on the need to bring in holistic solutions and shift focus from mere recycling to other aspects of a circular economy like reduce and repair.
The study by the environmental group raises serious concern on the current focus on ‘recycling’ to address the challenges of dealing with rising e-waste volumes globally and stresses on the need to bring in holistic solutions and shift focus from mere recycling to other aspects of a circular economy like reduce and repair.
The study by the environmental group raises serious concern on the current focus on ‘recycling’ to address the challenges of dealing with rising e-waste volumes globally and stresses on the need to bring in holistic solutions and shift focus from mere recycling to other aspects of a circular economy like reduce and repair.
The study by the environmental group raises serious concern on the current focus on ‘recycling’ to address the challenges of dealing with rising e-waste volumes globally and stresses on the need to bring in holistic solutions and shift focus from mere recycling to other aspects of a circular economy like reduce and repair.
In the study, 6 face wash, 3 body washes, 3 face scrubs from different brands, 1 face mask and 5 varieties of leave-on lotions were analysed for detecting the presence of microplastics (water insoluble) of more than 0.45 micron size. Large numbers of particles, especially granular material were observed with naked eye. Stereomicroscopic examination as well as filtration indicated presence of micro particles in 9 out of the 18 samples tested. The findings indicated presence of microplastics in most of the rinse off cosmetics. Interestingly, none of the leave-on products were detected with microplastics or even microparticles. Presence of insoluble micro particles in majority of the rinse off products does raise an alarm. These are designed to be disposed of with no possibility of recovery or recycling. Out of the 12 rinse off products included in the study, 5 of them were found to have microplastic. Since these are direct body to drain products, the beads from these products get directly into the water system and through the water channel reach the larger water bodies.
EDCs are widely used in the consumer products and researchers claim their human and environmental health impacts through their wide research. Some of the Indian researchers tried to show the direct relationships between these EDCs and animal, environmental impact in their experiments but were not able to produce much information on human health. But the research data from various international sources proved that these EDCs have acute health impacts on human health too. Further research in Indian context can support this. It is also observed that in some cases there are no standards or regulation in place; hence there has no control or restriction of its use in consumer products so it leads to the downstream contamination. The document has tried to bring out the current scenario in Indian context regarding some of the EDCs.
