Working Towards a Zero Waste World: Plastics

Join us for Working Towards a Zero Waste World, a targeted virtual workshop series to address the next big questions in waste, recycling, and manufacturing. Each workshop will provide a forum to discuss common problems and brainstorm approaches to overcoming them across fields—including non-degradable plastics and other artificial compounds in the environment, high levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and emissions from all sectors, and the need to develop sustainable, zero waste manufacturing practices and materials with low environmental impact. The series brings together academic researchers, industry leaders, and federal agencies to consider these problems from multiple angles. Co-hosted by the Boston University Institute for Global Sustainability, Energy & Sustainable Technologies Lab, and the College of Engineering. PLASTICS (November 8, 1:30 pm - 3 pm) While plastics have revolutionized modern society in numerous beneficial ways, the benefits of plastics have come at a rising environmental and health cost. Because of their intrinsic properties, and low cost of production, it is unlikely plastics will ever be completely replaced, though work to reduce plastic waste has accelerated in recent years. Work in plastic waste reduction consists of many research topics, including producing plastics from biobased sources, improving the recyclability of plastics, and chemical breakdown/recycling of discarded plastic waste. This multi-pronged approach is necessary due to the gargantuan scale of plastic production (and plastic waste discarded). In this workshop, experts will discuss their approaches to sustainability in plastic production and recycling. Speakers: Alex Balzer, Postdoctoral Researcher, University of Delaware Luiz Falcon, Recycling I&T Platform Leader, Braskem Aaron Sadow, David C. Henderson Professor, Chemistry, Iowa State University Facilitated by Eric Cueny, Linda Doerrer, and Malika Jeffries-EL (Boston University). Location: Zoom