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zik@lemmy.world ⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

Despite claims to the contrary, PLA does break down into microplastics. It’s possible that under certain conditions (such as those found in industrial composters) those microplastics might be broken down into starches and consumed by bacteria, but most teabags will just end up in landfill and won’t break down beyond microplastics.

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Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca ⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
If it’s at least possible for those micro plastics to be broken down, would it really matter if they don’t break down ina landfill? Either they stay in the landfill forever causing no problems or they leach out / blow away outside of the landfill and voila, proper conditions to be broken down into starches and consumed by bacteria.

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- zik@lemmy.world ⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  They don’t break down completely in landfill. They just turn into microplastics.
  
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evranch@lemmy.ca ⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
These microplastics are digestible by your immune system, though, which makes them ultimately harmless. PLA is used for drug delivery for this reason.

Being concerned about incomplete PLA degradation is like being concerned about a piece of wood breaking down into micro-woods. Yet even if you get a dangerous shard of micro-wood embedded in your skin, your body can deal with this cellose polymer just fine.

Ultimately it will break down completely someday and in the meantime, nothing will be harmed.

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- zik@lemmy.world ⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  You appear to be arguing that even if microplastics are present in the environment it’s not a problem. That’s a brave stance to take given the wealth of information to the contrary.
  
  Even if they do break down it’s bad. Plastics have additives in them which are used to improve their material properties. These additives include BPA and PFAS (and similar). We know that these compounds cause problems in humans and the environment. So if they were “easily digestible by the body” that would absolutely be a big problem.
  
  There’s no world in which “nothing will be harmed” by plastic decaying. Some people even argue that conventional plastics are less dangerous in landfill than bioplastics because at least they don’t release dangerous by-products like microplastics or “forever chemicals”.
  
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