According to a new report from the environmental activist organisation Break Free From Plastic and NGO the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), plastic production was responsible for nearly 9 per cent and 8 per cent of the EU’s final fossil gas and oil consumption respectively in 2020. This is about as much as the final gas consumption in the Netherlands and almost as much as the final oil consumption of Italy in 2020.
Crucially, the report finds that 40 per cent of this gas and more than a fifth of this oil came from Russia in 2020, demonstrating the petrochemical industry’s significant reliance on Russian fossil fuels.
The authors add that moving away from plastic and petrochemicals – and from fossil fuels altogether – “would not only help to prevent war and armed conflict, but it would also help to protect consumers from escalating energy and food prices, in Europe and beyond”.
In July, in a response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and...