A healthy non-polluting glow

For years, the consumer products industry has given us plastic microbeads in toothpaste, liquid hand soaps, skin exfoliators, other personal care products and industrial cleaners. Products like Olay’s body wash, Dove Gentle Exfoliating Foaming Facial Cleanser and Clean & Clear Daily Pore Cleanser increase the plastic clogging the planet’s seas, “killing millions of sea creatures every year when they swallow it, choke on it, or get tangled in it and drown,” according to Slate. It was widely believed, however, that human health was spared. “Our assessment is that they will largely be removed during sewage treatment,” Jay Gooch, associate director of external relations in beauty care at Procter & Gamble, reassured Slate.

But last year the microbeads were found in water samples in three of the Great Lakes, implying that wastewater treatment is not removing them. The remaining Great Lakes have yet to be tested. The beads, which work their way up the marine food chain, “absorb and retain chemical contaminants,” says the Chicago Tribune. Some manufacturers are phasing out the beads but consumers should avoid any products that list the ingredient polyethylene.

California may ban cosmetic microbeads

By Ricardo Lopez
Los Angeles Times  Feb 14th 2014

LOS ANGELES ”” California is lining up to become the largest state to ban the sale of cosmetic products, such as facial scrubs, containing tiny plastic beads that find their way into waterways and the ocean.

Democratic Assemblyman Richard Bloom plans to introduce a bill Thursday that would ban the sale of products containing the microbeads, which are too small to be removed by water-treatment processes after they drain out of sinks and showers.

A New York legislator introduced a similar measure Tuesday after scientists found high concentrations of the tiny exfoliating beads in the state’s lakes and other waters.

Researchers warn that the microbeads, which are not biodegradable, are ingested by fish and other animals, potentially ending up in the food chain. The tiny plastic orbs have already been found in California waters and in the Pacific Ocean.

The bill, which would impose civil penalties, isn’t as far reaching as New York’s, which would ban not just the sale, but also the manufacture of products containing plastic particles 5 millimeters or smaller in diameter.

Nonetheless, its introduction is a victory for the 5 Gyres Institute, a Santa Monica, Calif., environmental and advocacy nonprofit with just five staff members. The group, which found high levels of microbeads in the Great Lakes in 2012 and is researching plastic pollution in California, helped craft the legislation in both states.

“5 Gyres is a really nimble organization,” said Stiv Wilson, the group’s policy director. “We take pride we were able to get this bill introduced in two really important states.”

Major cosmetic companies, including Procter & Gamble Co. and Johnson & Johnson, have already pledged to phase out the use of the plastic microbeads from their products.

“We are discontinuing our limited use of micro plastic beads as scrub materials in personal-care products as soon as alternatives are qualified,” said Mandy Wagner, a Procter & Gamble spokeswoman. “In addition, we have decided not to introduce micro plastic beads into any new product category.”

Wagner did not immediately provide a timeline for when the company would end the use of the plastic beads.

In a statement on its website, Johnson & Johnson said it hopes to complete the first phase of reformulations for about half of its products by the end of 2015. The remaining products will be reformulated once substitutes are identified.

Other cosmetic companies already use ingredients such as apricot and walnut shells that accomplish the same job without harming the environment.

Cosmetics-makers over the last decade have increasingly added microbeads to facial scrubs, soaps, toothpaste and other products.  Gyres said that a single product can contain as many as 350,000 of the polyethylene or polypropylene microbeads.

“Microbeads may seem insignificant, but their small size is what’s the problem,” Wilson said. The beads act as a sponge for toxic pollutants, which fish and other aquatic life can mistake for food, he said.