As a growing number of legislators
attempt to enact laws banning cosmetics and personal care items that contain
plastic microbeads due to their impact on waterways, a recent study has found
even a single use of a product going down the drain is a cause for concern.
The latest research at Plymouth
University, published in the Marine Pollution Bulletin,
has recently estimated between 4,594 and 94,500 microbeads, each a fraction of
a millimeter in diameter, could be released in a single use of certain
products, such as facial scrubs. Subsequent analysis using
electron microscopy show
"We estimated that between
4,594 and 94,500 microbeads could be released in a single use," according
to the study, which added that this could result in up to 80 tonnes of
unnecessary microplastic waste entering the sea every year from use of these
cosmetics.
Aside from these findings, it has
been a seesaw ride for legislative attempts to ban
microbeads in California, although a bill banning using them in
cosmetics and personal care has now passed the Assembly.
A revised version of Assembly bill 888, which
prohibits the use of microbeads, received a legislative nod, passing 24-14,
after a previous version was crushed by a vote of 19-16 in the California
Senate a day earlier. The first time around, the bill fell two votes short of
the 21 votes it needed to pass, even though a number of other states in the
U.S. have already banned the use of plastic microbeads in cosmetics and
personal care products.
A similar bill in California lost by
one vote a year ago.
The earlier version of AB-888 would
have prohibited, on and after January 1, 2020, a person, as defined, from
selling or offering for promotional purposes in California "a personal
care product containing plastic microbeads that are used to exfoliate or
cleanse in a rinse-off product, as specified." Also, it would have
exempted from those prohibitions the sale or promotional offer of a product
containing less than 1 part per million (ppm) by weight of plastic microbeads.
The newer version removed this
wording that required the use of natural products as exfoliants in any
alternative developed by the cosmetics industry as well as state oversight in
reviewing the microbead alternatives. Plastic microbeads under the bill are
still prohibited on and after Jan 1, 2020 and AB-888 passed the Assembly on a
concurrence vote on Tuesday.
Microbeads were found in the Los
Angeles River last year, according to the office of California assemblymember
Richard Bloom (D-Santa Monica). Proponents of the microbeads ban argue that
fish often mistake non-biodegradible plastic microbeads for food and eat them,
resulting in toxins further up the food chain. However, a number of product
manufacturers are using safe and natural alternatives such as crushed nut shells.
As of this report, Connecticut, New
Jersey, Illinois, Wisconsin, Maine and Colorado already have bans on non-biodegradable microbeads, with other
states with bills in process such as New York, which await state Senate
action.
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