Plastic-eating Fungi, Australia’s new waste solution?

It is no secret that our planet is facing a pressing environmental crisis when it comes to plastic waste and landfill. Each year human waste continues to accumulate and pollute the land and oceans. Working in the retail industry Alex and I understand the impact that consumerism has on the environment. On a personal level we do our best to minimise the packaging we buy our food in, aim to buy quality over quantity products, and even dedicate time to picking up other people’s rubbish in our local community. In the grand scheme of things this is only the contribution of two individuals and hey there are 7.8 billion people out there!

That said, not all hope is lost… ABC news released in April this year an article that detailed a new breakthrough with a “Plastic-eating backyard fungi”. In it, reporter Danny Tran explained that Australian scientists have managed to use fungi (Aspergillus terreus and Engyodontium album) commonly found in backyard plants and soil, with the aid of UV light or heat, to attack small samples of polypropylene, which is used to make items like takeaway containers, coat hangers, ice-cream tubs and cling film.

What is so remarkable about this discovery is that it took 140 days to completely breakdown the samples! Professor Ali Abbas from the University of Sydney research team quoted “It’s the highest degradation rate reported in the literature that we know in the world”. Now the next challenge is to find a way to upscale the project so that it can be used to address Australia’s waste problem.

Like many Australian’s, Alex and I were soft plastic collectors and often took what waste we had and deposited it at the REDcycle collection points before its collapse in November last year. Our main culprit being Polypropylene, a common household plastic, accounting for roughly 28 percent of the worlds plastic waste, but only 1 percent of it is actually recycled. This is mainly due to the short life-span of the material as packaging and its cross-contamination with other materials and plastics when collected in our waste bins. So how can we fix it?

Professor Abbas said scaling up the plastic-eating fungi process could take between “three to five years.” However, I am optimistic that it could be even less. Teams of Scientists in China and Pakistan have also been researching plastic-eating fungus on polyester polyurethane. The enzyme they are studying “breaks down molecular bonds in a matter of weeks, whereas this plastic normally takes up to 1,000 years to biodegrade in landfill on their own.” This got me thinking, wouldn’t this be amazing to eliminate the need for landfill and waste collection completely?

Maybe the future of recycling is similar to that of a home compost in our very own backyards. Just insert some fungi, add some UV light and your plastics are gone in so many days. Communities everywhere could rally together to eliminate the plastic waste in our environment. If this is possible, perhaps Alex and I’s small contributions could make a huge difference in reducing Australia’s waste problem.

By Rhiannon Eustice 

Sources:

ABC News: “Plastic-eating fungi discovery raises hopes for recycling crisis” – Retrieved from https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-04-15/plastic-eating-fungi-discovery-raises-hopes-for-recycling-crisis/102219310

University of Sydney: “Fungi makes meal of hard-to-recycle plastic” – Retrieved from https://www.sydney.edu.au/news-opinion/news/2023/04/14/fungi-makes-meal-of-hard-to-recycle-plastic.html

Global Citizen: “This fungus eats plastic & just might save humanity” – Retrieved from https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/this-fungus-eats-plastic-just