EKOPOPS

     Walk into any trendy kitchen today and there it is, staring at you like a crystalized dare: Himalayan pink, black lava, flaky Maldon pyramids—every influencer’s pantry is basically a geology museum. And behind that artisanal shine? A cargo of microscopic stowaways: plastic shards, fibers, and particles so small they’d make a fruit fly look like a linebacker. Welcome to the psychedelic nightmare of sea-salt production in the age of plastic. 1. The Sneaky Invaders: Micro- vs. Nano-plastics Scientists call them  microplastics  (anything between 1 micron and 5 millimeters) and  nanoplastics  (smaller than a micron—basically invisible gremlins). These things don’t just float around oceans like confetti; they worm their way into evaporation ponds, get cozy with algae mats, hitchhike on harvesting tools, and then crystallize right into your salt shaker. The lab rats with their lasers and Raman scopes are finally spotting  nanoplastics  in co...

The plastic problem isn’t some quirky riddle we can sort away with a blue bin and a warm conscience. It’s a global avalanche—300 million tons a year—that doesn’t care about your “wishcycling” impulses or the smug arrows stamped on a yogurt cup. And yet, the myth persists: recycling will solve it all. Let’s torch that fantasy. The Mirage of the Blue Bin Globally, only about 9% of plastic waste gets recycled. The rest? Half goes to landfills, a fifth goes up in flames, and nearly a quarter just bleeds into rivers, oceans, or backyard burn piles. That’s not a circular economy—that’s a busted carousel with one horse still standing. But somewhere along the way, the chasing arrows got rebranded from resin codes into a kind of eco-absolution. Toss it in, whisper a prayer, and voilà—planet saved. Except that’s not how it works. The numbers on the bottom of your takeout clamshell don’t mean “recyclable.” They mean “this polymer exists.” If your city can’t process it, it’s just a plastic g...

Compostable is one of those words that looks saintly on a box and then misbehaves in the wild. Here’s the straight story: what the standards actually demand, how real facilities run, where home composting works (and doesn’t), why landfills are the wrong destination, and why we still tip our hats to the scientists grinding to make the tech better. First, what “compostable” really means  In the lab, compostability is a three-part trial by fire (well, heat + microbes): the item must disintegrate (no big fragments left), biodegrade (most carbon converted to CO₂ under aerobic conditions), and leave clean compost (no eco-tox). The big specs: ASTM D6400 / D6868 (US) for plastics and coatings on paper. EN 13432 (EU) for packaging, with nearly identical targets: ~ 90% disintegration in ~12 weeks and ~ 90% biodegradation in ≤6 months . If you don’t see a trusted mark (BPI, OK compost, Seedling), treat the claim like a rental car contract—assume there’s fine print.

There’s a new breed of plastic alchemy in town: enzymes tuned like race engines to chop polymers back to their building blocks. It’s elegant, lower-temperature, and—done right—circular. It’s also still wrestling with scale, feedstock chaos, and economics. Here’s the straight dope on enzymatic recycling for PET (bottles, trays, polyester textiles) and PLA (the poster child of bioplastics), with zero fairy dust and full respect to the scientists pushing this frontier. What enzymatic recycling actually is (and isn’t) The move: Protein catalysts (PETases, cutinases, friends) snip long chains into monomers— PET → TPA + EG; PLA → lactic acid —under mild, aqueous conditions (think ~50–72 °C), not cracking reactors. ( PMC , ScienceDirect ) Why care: Works on stuff mechanical recycling hates—colored PET, multilayer trays, polyester textiles—while aiming for virgin-grade polymers after repolymerization. ( carbios.com , STT Info ) Fine print: Enzymes don’t love high crystallinit...

If “eco” copy were a sport, half the market would be Olympic-level vague. Here’s your no-drama decoder: the 12 phrases that set off my internal klaxon—plus what acceptable proof looks like. 1) “Biodegradable” Why it’s sus: Unqualified “biodegradable” claims are a legal booby trap. In the U.S., the FTC says you can only use it if the entire item completely breaks down within about one year after customary disposal —which usually means a landfill where that won’t happen. California flat-out bans the term on plastics. ( Federal Trade Commission , Legislative Information California ) Ask for instead: A certified compostable claim tied to a standard (ASTM D6400/D6868 or EN 13432) and the program name (e.g., BPI, OK compost). ( BPIWorld , okcert.tuvaustria.com ) 2) “Degrades in landfill” Why it’s sus: Landfills are anaerobic. If something does break down there, it can generate methane—the climate gremlin. FTC treats broad “degradable in landfill” claims as deceptive unless you p...