My views on polyester have shifted a lot over the years and perhaps sharing why helps. When I started my PhD in 2004 one of the first books I read was ‘Cradle to Cradle’ by McDonough & Braungart. Although problematic in parts, the book convinced me that polyester was ‘good’.

Here was an infinitely recyclable material; the idea was seductive. We just needed to create the systems to handle the collection and sorting and recycling. 17 years later those systems don’t really exist on any impactful scale and we are pumping out ever more polyester.

I became aware of the issues with microplastics around 2013; I think one of the first studies had come out in 2011. In the past decade study after study shows that microplastics end up everywhere. From Antarctica to our lungs to rat foetuses - everywhere. Our soil, oceans, air.

We don’t really know what the long terms impacts of microplastic accumulation in the soil, oceans and atmosphere are. Yet, in the name of growth, we are committed to making ever more of plastics, naively hoping some tech at some unknown point in the future will fix things for us.

That proposition for me is terrifying. We don’t know how unsafe these materials are in the myriad ways they end up interacting within living systems. The only responsible thing, the moral thing to do is to phase them out as quickly as possible.

These materials are biologically incompatible with most life. Yes, I know of the mealworms eating polystyrene. Not a solution any more than a bandaid is to decapitation. And I’d say the same about most ‘solutions’ being proposed. These are materials unfit for purpose.

Materials made from fossil fuels have helped strengthen a mindset that we have transcended Earth’s systems and the limits of those systems. Though not designed to do so, these materials can foster disconnection. We must find the humility to see the reality.