Plastic bags and bottles, straws, balloons, stray fishing lines; these are all products swimming through the world’s oceans. Due to this rising dilemma, companies around the globe are working diligently to decrease the amount of unnecessary plastic in their products. Humans may not be feeling the effects of the over production of plastic, but the environment does. 

“I’ve been learning a lot about the negative effects of using plastic recently. I have seen images of turtles with straws in their noses and piles of trash in the ocean, and it really has changed my outlook on what to use and not to use. We are the ones destroying our planet, so we are the ones who need to find a way to fix it,” Gabriella Gibson, junior, said. 

Coca-Cola has been working diligently on this issue since 2009. They created PlantBottles to hold all of their products, which are made of Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET). PET is constructed of 30 percent of bio-based material. Bio-based substances are made of once living organisms, making the items biodegradable and good for the environment. Since then, the company has created over 35 billion PlantBottles, now made of 100 percent bio-based products. 

“I think they will help get rid of all the waste that the bottles did make, but there will only be a change if people go along with it,” Mikala Payne, sophomore, said. 

This year, Starbucks has also been contributing to the fight against plastic by introducing strawless lids for cold drinks. Starbucks shops in Seattle and Vancouver are strawless, and more Starbucks locations around the United States are following suit this fall. The company wants to get rid of plastic straws completely by the beginning of 2020. 

“I think that Starbucks cutting out plastic straws will possibly inspire other businesses to do the same. Starbucks is a highly known company, and it would probably be able to get the ball rolling,” Isabella McAdams, junior, said. 

The eco-friendly trends have been spread through many social media influencers, like Scotty Sire, from the Vlog Squad, and Buzzfeed. In one of Sire’s videos, he did the zero-waste challenge for the entire day, making it fun and entertaining by throwing a zero-waste party at the end. The zero-waste challenge is a trend going around the world to try to create no waste for either a whole day or a whole week. Participants must strategize what they plan to use and make sure all products are recyclable and waste-free. Buzzfeed took more of the daily life approach to the challenge by selecting a few of its co-workers to attempt the challenge during their daily lives. Both videos show the struggles these everyday people faced but offered easy ways to make up for the obstacle faced. 

“I think it would be fun to try the zero-waste challenge. It would definitely reduce the amount of garbage in landfills if more people were to do it with me. In general, though, small steps matter to helping the environment,” Jeremiah Caspersen, senior, said.  

The environment is struggling with the overproduction of plastic, and the smallest changes in the daily lives of students and parents can help this issue. Start recycling, and be mindful of how much waste is being created daily. Also, keep in mind that it all starts with one small task that can get everything rolling in a better, more environmentally-friendly direction.