McKinsey Reports on the Impacts of Plastics
In a new report by McKinsey, Climate impact of plastics the total green house gas contribution of plastic versus the alternatives is scientifically measured. McKinsey looked at examples from the top five plastic consuming sectors and measured not only the product lifecycle of plastic vs other options, but also the impact of our use. The results may come as a bit of a surprise to many.
It feels safe to assume that to many people plastic is given a pretty bad reputation and the general consensus is that choosing non-plastic options is more sustainable or environmentally friendly. This McKinsey article does acknowledge that plastics and the impacts on things around marine pollution, recyclability, even leakage to the environment, toxicity, etc. are important considerations and need to be considered and addressed. However, these may not represent the full story.
This analysis is based on the United states in 2020 and makes sure to be sensitive to illustrate the impact on other regions, and how results of this analysis will very likely changes as we move towards a decarbonized world in 2050. As previously noted, McKinsey looked at examples from the top five plastic consuming sectors. These sectors include:
Packaging
Building & Construction
Consumer Goods
Automotive
Textiles
These five sectors represent about 90% of the global plastics volume. The report also outlines that they “selected representative applications for which at-scale, viable choices between plastics and alternatives exist today, avoiding niche or new solutions. “ This ended up putting plastics emissions and impact against 14 other cases. Selected examples included soft drink containers, milk container, and building insulation. The results were as follows.
“Among applications for which nonplastic alternatives are used at scale, the plastics examined in this paper offer lower total GHG contribution compared with alternatives in 13 of 14 cases (exhibit). GHG savings range from 10 to 90 percent, considering both product life cycle and impact of use. In addition, in many applications, particularly those concentrated in food packaging, there are few alternatives to plastics today. In fact, plastics adoption in the near term can help decarbonization efforts in these areas, particularly in terms of food spoilage and energy efficiency, given their lower GHG footprint.
It seems that based on this report, while plastic does have problematic impacts and changes do need to be adopted, the current alternatives are not proving to truly be a “greener” choice within the current circumstances.
When considering greenhouse gas and environmental impacts, this report highlights the importance of capturing the entire journey, from product life cycle, to supply chain, and everything in-between.
Ultimately, in a decarbonized and highly circular world that many are aiming to achieve, the GHG footprints for all materials - including plastics - will be improved by a cleaner energy mix, improved recycling rates, and higher commercial BEV penetration rates. The report ends to say,
Our 2050 base and best-case scenarios represent two potential pathways. As previously mentioned, the relative GHG performance of different materials is sensitive to the energy and end-of-life disposition mixes, suggesting that each material has the potential to have the lowest GHG emissions under the right set of conditions (Exhibit 13). As a result, we have highlighted major levers that each material class can adopt to further reduce GHG emissions in the years to come.
What are your thoughts on plastics and the alternatives?
Sources:
https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/mckinsey/industries/chemicals/our%20insights/climate%20impact%20of%20plastics/climate-impact-plastics-v2.pdf
https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/chemicals/our-insights/climate-impact-of-plastics
