I think Bruce Maine's comments answered that question very well. See
that post in the
GreenYes archives. www.grrn.org
I am from Louisiana and have actually seen areas so economically depressed
that they looked like ghost towns, surrounding plastics manufacturing plants
and resin plants. There are more than two dozen along the Mississippi River
between New Orleans and Baton Rouge (only 55 miles away). The area is dubbed
"cancer alley".
The people/families that owned land there before the manufacturers
came there next to them lived primarily a rural live of farming using the
water from the Mississippi. Now, the soil bubbles up with chemicals and
the area smells so bad that one has to hold their nose when driving down
River Road. I have seen this first hand. These land owners can not continue
to farm as there air and water is polluted. Their land value has plummeted
and they are without real compensation. In many cases they have no choice
but to continue to live there as the real estate values of land in that
area is almost valueless especially for smaller tracts of land too small
for other factories or plants to build upon.
So, in asking the question of "why make plastics in the first place?" We must consider not only effects from air and water pollution, the health aspects, recycling aspects (or lack of), but the effects of these plants on the health and economy of the people and families that live in those areas surrounding plastics and resin manufacturing plants.
This is not to say that plastics are evil but drastic improvements need to take place in the infrastructure of plastics manufacturing and disposal/recycling.
Should anyone wnat more information on those plants, please contact the Louisiana Environmental Action Network, LEAN. www.leanweb.org and http://www.leanweb.org/airproj.html. Maylee Orr is the Director.
~Debra Lombard
dlombard@earthlink.net
http://home.earthlink.net/~dlombard
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