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Papers
20 resultsShowing papers similar to Plastic Waste and a Circular Economy in China
ClearExploring Plastic-Management Policy in China: Status, Challenges and Policy Insights
Researchers reviewed China's plastic management policies and found that despite being the world's largest plastic producer, existing regulations remain insufficient, recommending strengthened extended producer responsibility and circular economy approaches to control plastic pollution.
Research and management of plastic pollution in coastal environments of China
This review summarizes research on plastic pollution in China's coastal environments, noting that as the world's largest producer of plastic waste, China faces significant environmental challenges. Researchers found that microplastics have been detected in surface waters, sediments, and the water column along Chinese coasts from both land-based and sea-based sources. The study highlights that while national-level policies address plastic waste broadly, there is virtually no legislation specifically targeting microplastic pollution.
An Overview of Management Status and Recycling Strategies for Plastic Packaging Waste in China
Not relevant to microplastics — this paper reviews Chinese policy and recycling technology for plastic packaging waste, focusing on regulatory frameworks, carbon emissions, and recycling infrastructure rather than microplastic contamination or health risks.
The Circular Economy in EU Policy as a Response to Contemporary Ecological Challenges
This article reviews how EU countries are implementing circular economy policies and progress toward reducing plastic waste, finding large variation across member states. Shifting from linear to circular plastic economies is critical for reducing the production of waste that generates microplastics.
Looking for a Chinese solution to global problems: The situation and countermeasures of marine plastic waste and microplastics pollution governance system in China
This study analyzed China's marine plastic waste and microplastic pollution governance system, examining policy frameworks across blue economy development, plastics industry reform, and public health awareness, while proposing countermeasures to curb marine pollution intensification.
Recycling and Reusing Strategies to Prevent Microplastic Generation: a Review
This review examines recycling and reusing strategies for plastic materials as a means of preventing microplastic generation, grounding the analysis in circular economy principles emphasizing resource efficiency through repair, reuse, and recycling. The authors evaluate current methodologies and propose strategies to reduce plastic waste degradation into microplastics, linking waste management practices to pollution prevention outcomes.
The challenge of plastics in a circular perspective
This review examines the challenge of transitioning plastics into a circular economy, analyzing Italy as a case study and discussing recycling rates, waste management strategies, and the systemic changes needed to reduce plastic pollution while maintaining plastic's economic utility.
Recycling and Management of Microplastic Waste
This review examines recycling and management strategies for plastic waste, describing the technical and economic challenges of reducing plastic pollution and the remediation approaches that have been attempted to address microplastic accumulation in the environment.
China’s regulatory respond to plastic pollution: Trends and trajectories
Analysis of 231 plastic-related Chinese government policies from 2000 to 2021 revealed increasing regulatory attention to plastic pollution with a shift from general waste management toward specific single-use plastic restrictions after 2020. The findings highlight China moving toward more targeted plastic governance despite its large contribution to global ocean plastic.
Global Plastic Waste Pollution Challenges and Management
This review examines the global plastic waste crisis, highlighting that over 6.3 billion tonnes of plastic waste have been generated and only 9% recycled, with microplastics now detected even in remote Arctic regions and in food consumed by humans. The authors discuss the environmental and health consequences of plastic pollution and argue for urgent action including alternative energy recovery and circular economy approaches to reduce plastic accumulation.
System innovation and life cycle thinking in packaging value chain: the circularity of plastics.
This paper examines the role of circular economy principles in reducing plastic packaging waste, noting that despite existing recycling systems, plastics remain pervasive environmental contaminants. The authors argue that redesigning packaging systems for recyclability and reducing over-packaging are essential steps to address microplastic pollution at its source.
Influence of Plastic Waste Management on the Environment: A review
This review examined how different plastic waste management practices influence environmental outcomes, discussing the limitations of landfilling, incineration, and recycling for fossil-based plastics that persist in the environment for hundreds of years. The paper argued that transitioning to a circular economy is essential to reduce the environmental burden of plastic waste.
The Legal dilemmas and pathways for managing plastic waste pollution in China: An assessment of current regulations and a vision for future governance frameworks
This paper systematically analyses the current state of plastic waste legal regulation in China and proposes a framework for future governance, examining how the rapid growth of the e-commerce, express delivery, and food delivery industries has sharply increased plastic product consumption. The authors assess existing regulatory gaps and outline pathways toward more effective and comprehensive plastic waste management law.
Gateway of Landfilled Plastic Waste Towards Circular Economy in Europe
This paper examines the challenges of recovering plastic from landfills in Europe and how it could contribute to a circular economy. Recovering and recycling landfilled plastics could reduce the environmental plastic burden, including microplastic generation from degrading landfill waste.
Plastic Industry Development and Natural Environment Protection
This paper from China reviews how rising plastic production and improper disposal are increasing microplastic contamination in the environment, threatening both ecological and human health. It calls for improved pollution control strategies and stronger regulatory oversight of the plastic industry.
Turning waste into opportunity: Advancing circular and equitable waste management
This chapter examines global waste management challenges, reviewing circular economy frameworks, equity considerations, and the environmental and social consequences of inadequate waste handling, with emphasis on plastic waste and its downstream microplastic effects.
Plastics in the Circular Economy
This book examines the role of plastics in the circular economy, reviewing how the current linear plastics economy generates environmental problems including microplastic pollution from fossil oil use and unmanaged plastic waste. The authors assess circular economy strategies including recycling, biodegradable alternatives, and design for disassembly as pathways to maintain the benefits of plastics while reducing their environmental footprint.
The contamination of microplastics in China's aquatic environment: Occurrence, detection and implications for ecological risk
This review summarized microplastic contamination across marine environments, freshwater systems, and wastewater treatment plants in China, one of the world's top plastic-producing countries. The study highlights that research on how microplastics transfer between connected water environments remains lacking, and the microscale toxicity of microplastics is still poorly understood.
Plastic Waste Management: Global Facts, Challenges and Solutions
This review summarised global statistics and challenges in plastic waste management, noting that most plastic waste ends up in landfill, with recycling remaining the least implemented disposal method. The authors highlighted that plastic degradation in terrestrial and aquatic environments produces microplastics that can enter human bodies through the food chain, skin-contact products, and bottled water, and outlined current and emerging solutions to the global plastic waste crisis.
Circular economy for plastic waste management
This overview chapter discusses circular economy approaches for plastic waste management, covering the history of plastic production and why strong carbon-carbon bonds make plastics so resistant to biological degradation. The chapter argues for redesigning plastic use and recycling systems to prevent plastic from fragmenting into persistent microplastics.