Ways to Fight Microplastics at Home

Our consumption of microplastics is shocking-from 39,000 to 52,000 particles each year per person. 【小题1】 We do know, however, that many plastics contain harmful chemicals. Fortunately, there are some tips to reduce the amount you take in.

【小题2】 According to one study, of 259 bottles of water from major companies such as Nestle and Evian, 93% revealed microplastic pollution. A small number of single-use plastic bottles contained as many as 10,000 microparticles. It is wise to drink and use clean tap water or water sold in glass bottles.

Choose natural fabrics (织物). Many of the fabrics we use every day are made from plastic. In 2016, 65 million tons of plastic went into making fabrics around the world. Tiny bits of plastic fall off these fabrics during production, wearing, washing, and disposal. 【小题3】 To limit your contribution, buy fabrics made of natural products such as cotton, wool, silk, and even bamboo.

Clean up your clothes. It may be tough to remove all microplastic fibers from your clothing. Plus, a single load of washed and dried clothing can release a million microplastic particles into the water supply. Still, all hope is not lost. You can remove microplastics by fixing a filter (过滤器) in your washing machine and air-drying your clothes. 【小题4】

Stop microwaving plastic containers. 【小题5】 Make sure that the containers in your home are microwave safe. And if you use plastic to store your food in the refrigerator, be sure to put it in a glass or china container before heating it in the microwave.

Fifty millilitres of perfume rests inside a piece of an elegantly engineered glassware. This delicate bottle, in turn, sits within an equally elegant cardboard box. This box is wrapped (包装)in a thin layer of transparent plastic film and sealed with a holographic sticker. "Would you like it gift-wrapped?” ，asks the eager salesperson. Now another layer of glossy paper, complexity and ribbons is added. Finally, the whole thing is dropped into a cardboard gift bag, bearing the shop's branding.

Surely, it's the gift that counts. It turns out, however, that we appear to appreciate gifts more if they have been gift-wrapped. Studies found gift-wrapped presents were, on average, always rated more highly than non-wrapped ones. This preference was true even when gift-wrapping was pretty basic, that is, no bows or ribbons. One explanation is that, on some level, what we appreciate is the extra effort that it takes to package and gift-wrap items so delicately.

The downside of our love of beautiful packaging and seemly gift-wrapping, however, is that it has an impact on the environment. According to The Guardian, the United Kingdom alone consumes 8,000 tons of wrapping paper a year. Using the most conservative estimates, it takes approximately 12 trees to produce one ton of paper: that's about 96,000 trees in gift-wrap each year for the UK alone.

Perhaps during festive periods, we could launch highly visible campaigns urging the disposal of gift-wrap and product packaging within easily accessible recycling bins. Similarly, shops that offer gift-wrapping could be strongly encouraged to use only recycled paper. Beyond consumer and retailer efforts, producers also need to rethink their packaging - less is best. I would like to see all perfume bottles manufactured so as to be refillable, as they once were and still are in the more traditional Arabian perfume shops.

Air travel is growing around the globe, and so is its contribution to climate change. The climate cost of flying has drawn more public attention in recent years, even leading to“ flight shame” in some places, especially for local or avoidable flights.

And while a decline in air travel would help with climate change，flight shame can also be added by other ways that make air travel more environmentally friendly. That includes switching to cleaner，renewable fuel , but as a new study indicates , there's also another, less obvious option: flying at lower altitudes.

In a new study, researchers used computers to predict how adjusting aircraft altitudes might reduce the number of contrails(尾迹)，which we see as white lines across the sky containing black carbon particles (颗粒)，thus reducing their warming effect. The study found that aircraft would only need to adjust their altitudes by about 2 ,000 feet, and since some flights have a larger climate effect than others , only a small part of flights would need to make any adjustments.

Of course flying at a lower altitude might increase flying time and it also means burning significantly more fuel, and thus giving off more CO₂, but the benefits of controlling contrails are worth it.

In addition to changing altitudes，better engine technology could also help control contrails, the researchers add, since black carbon particles are produced by incomplete fuel combustion ( 燃烧). With more efficient engines, aircraft could reportedly reduce their contrail by as much as 70%。Combined with slight altitude adjustment for a small part of flights, this could help reduce overall contrail problems by 90%，the study suggests.

This is promising, but more research i still needed, and it may be a while before improvements like these take effect at a significant scale. So, while it's good to know air travel can have a smaller effect on the climate, for now the best way to achieve that is often by simply staying on the ground whenever possible.