Plastics

Take a look around: your toothbrush, the wrapping of your sandwich, the soles of your shoes, probably even parts of your clothes are made of plastic. Hardly any material has changed our everyday life as much. Time to understand what plastics actually are and why they can be a blessing and a problem at the same time.

Giant molecules made of building blocks

Plastics consist of giant molecules made up of many identical small building blocks. The individual building blocks are called monomers, the long chain is called a polymer. You can picture it like a chain of thousands of identical paper clips: small parts combine into something completely new with its own properties. The gas ethene, for example, becomes the solid plastic polyethylene this way.

PE and PET in everyday life

Two plastics cross your path especially often. Polyethylene, PE for short, is found in plastic bags, films and shampoo bottles: it is light, flexible and waterproof. Polyethylene terephthalate, PET for short, you know from drink bottles: it is transparent, sturdy and even withstands carbonation. Both are cheap to produce, extremely light and practically indestructible. That is exactly what makes them so popular.

The downside: durability

The greatest strength of plastics is also their biggest problem: they do not rot. A PET bottle can last several hundred years in nature, breaking down only into ever smaller particles, the microplastics. That is why recycling matters so much: old bottles can become new bottles, fleece jackets or pipes. Even better is using plastic consciously: reusable bottles, cloth bags and proper waste sorting help more than you might think.