"The world is counting on us to deliver a new treaty that will catalyze and guide the actions and international cooperation needed to deliver a future free of plastic pollution," said Luis Valdivieso, chair of the negotiations at the UN-led talks in Ottawa, Canada.
"Let's not fail," Valdivieso added as he opened the session that will run to April 29.
Nations agreed in 2022 to finalize a world-first treaty by the end of 2024, with concrete measures to battle plastic pollution around the world.
The meeting in Ottawa is considered crucial as it is the penultimate session before a final round of negotiations in South Korea later this year.
Plastics have created a reliance on disposable consumer culture, Canadian environment minister Steven Guilbeault said, adding: "We're here today because we recognize that we must throw away this throwaway generation."
"We must acknowledge that we can't choose between recycling, banning or innovation. We have to do all three," Guilbeault said.
In an interview with AFP ahead of the talks, Guilbeault said the goal was to achieve "60 to 70 percent of the elements endorsed" by delegates.
- 'Time is against us' -
Although there is a broad consensus on the need for a treaty, environmental activists pleading for a 75 percent cut in plastic production by 2040 are at odds with oil-producing nations and the plastics industry.
The stakes are high, with widespread plastic pollution having potentially grave impacts on oceans and climate.
Annual plastics production has more than doubled in 20 years to 460 million tonnes, and is on track to triple within four decades.
Only nine percent is recycled, and according to the OECD, its contribution to global warming could more than double by 2060 -- having accounted for 3.4 percent of global emissions in 2019.
"Time is against us both in terms of finalizing the instrument, but also how much more the planet can take as we deliberate," said Inger Andersen, executive director of the UN Environment Program.
During talks in Kenya in November, the length of a draft agreement leapt from 30 to 70 pages, with oil-producing nations such as Saudi Arabia recording their objections to limiting plastic production, instead emphasizing recycling.
For the plastic and chemical industries, recycling is the most effective way to end plastic pollution with the least environmental and economic costs, said Chris Jahn, of the International Council of Chemical Associations, a global trade association.
Stewart Harris, of the American Chemistry Council, told AFP that any agreement should focus on ending plastic waste. "We don't support reducing production as a solution to address the problem," he said.
Meanwhile, the 65 members of the so-called "high ambition coalition," chaired by Rwanda and Norway and including the majority of European Union countries, want to tackle plastic production.
Graham Forbes, of Greenpeace, said he hoped nations would "step up to the handful of those that are trying to undermine progress and really show the courage to protect people on the planet."
Czechs 3D-print Eiffel Tower from ocean waste for Olympics
Prague (AFP) April 22, 2024 -
A Czech company is 3D-printing a giant Eiffel Tower model for a local Olympics event, using recycled ocean waste as the primary material.
The 14-metre-high (46-foot) model will be installed at an Olympic festival in the north of the Czech Republic, where the public can try different Olympic sports during the Paris Games in July and August.
Jan Hrebabecky, the owner of the 3DDen printing farm, uses printing filament made from ocean waste.
"The material for the Eiffel Tower comes from the shores of Thailand," he told AFP.
"It has excellent mechanic and chemical qualities, great UV resistance, and it is practically immortal."
Collected by Thai fishermen, the plastic waste is sorted, cleaned, desalinated and dried.
A Swiss company turns the waste into granules which a Czech company then processes into 3D-printing filaments.
Hrebabecky had to build a new printer to cope with the material.
"It can crystallise in the printer and destroy it immediately," Hrebabecky said.
But advantages prevail, including the price which is lower than that of traditional filaments.
"There are huge deposits of this priceless material, and anybody can come and take it," said Hrebabecky.
- Plastic Eiffel Tower -
With more than 200 printers, his company has so far printed key rings, miniature sculptures, medals and USB keys.
"But my goal is to print really large things, so we're making furniture and interior decorations as well," Hrebabecky said.
His printers are now busy with the Eiffel Tower, a puzzle of 1,600 3D-printed pieces fortified with steel rods, which Hrebabecky says will be solid enough to hold a helicopter.
He said the two-tonne structure, made from material equivalent to 800,000 plastic bottles, would stand next to the Most lake in northern Czech Republic, which will host the Olympic festival on July 26-August 11.
Nada Cerna, a Czech Olympic Committee manager in charge of the event, said it would allow people to try 52 Olympic sports, watch the Games on large screens and meet Czech athletes in person.
She told AFP 3DDen had impressed the organisers with its environmental-friendly approach.
"It's very important for us. Oceans are a place where people do sports like sailing and windsurfing," she said.
"So if we can highlight the problem in this way and maybe help a bit, we're really happy," Cerna added.
For Hrebabecky, the Eiffel Tower is a step towards a dream he wants to accomplish soon -- a printed house.
"If you build a house using this material, it is almost certain that it will never return to the ocean again," he said.
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