Quellen und Datenbasis.

Peer-reviewed LCA of a rigid powder compact (ABS base and lid, 7.29 grams, Toly Malta), modelling dematerialisation, recycled content and polymer choice. We use it for the rigid compact case weight and for the recycled-content effect, not for bottle, cap or pump weights, which it does not measure.

Swiss plant-based shampoo, measured per hair wash. Compares a 500 ml glass bottle with in-shop refills from tin and PE canisters and a PET stand-up refill pouch. Refills cut the packaging share sharply, while heating the shower water dominates the total footprint, which is why we treat refills as a packaging win rather than a whole-footprint fix.

Component-level breakdown of a shampoo container, bottle wall, cap, label and adhesive. Primary source for our material splits and cap and label masses.

Industrial study of recycled HDPE bottle production with measured wall thicknesses and unit weights.

LCA of cosmetic containers with packaging mass and material split per format. Primary source for our bottle and jar weights, read alongside the component-level studies below so no figure rests on one paper.

Compares pump, spray and flip-top dispensing systems part by part. Source for the closure and pump masses that a container-level study does not resolve.

UK-level disposal volume for toothpaste tubes, used to contextualise per-tube plastic mass.

Recyclability and material composition of mono-material HDPE tubes, basis for our recyclability percentages.

Industry case study confirming ~20 billion toothpaste tubes/year and the shift to mono-material HDPE. Written by the brand-led pact itself, so we use it for the material composition and volume, while the recyclability claim is carried by the independent WRAP and peer-reviewed tube studies above.

Quelle eines Branchenverbands: wird nur zusammen mit unabhängigen Belegen gelesen und nie allein für strittige Recyclingangaben verwendet.

EU technical reference for typical packaging-to-product ratios across personal-care formats.

Industry-wide benchmarks: virgin-plastic share, recycled content rates, and recyclability progress for FMCG personal-care signatories.

Pooled LCA evidence on PET bottle mass, recycled-content rates and end-of-life pathways, primary basis for our PET bottle weights.

UNEP-backed comparative LCA of PET, glass, aluminium and reusable bottles. Anchors our 'reusable bottle' alternative figures.

North American industry LCA with current PET bottle weights, recycled-content levels and production energy figures. Published by the PET value chain, so we use it for the engineering figures (bottle mass, production energy) and read its recycling and recycled-content numbers next to the peer-reviewed PET meta-analysis and the UNEP bottle report listed on this page.

Quelle eines Branchenverbands: wird nur zusammen mit unabhängigen Belegen gelesen und nie allein für strittige Recyclingangaben verwendet.

European PET value-chain body documenting decades of bottle lightweighting; a 0.5 litre bottle now weighs about 7.5 grams, with conventional bottles roughly in the 7.5 to 12 gram range. European counterpart to the NAPCOR bottle masses. Also an industry body, so we use it only for measured packaging weights, not for recyclability claims.

Quelle eines Branchenverbands: wird nur zusammen mit unabhängigen Belegen gelesen und nie allein für strittige Recyclingangaben verwendet.

Comprehensive review of why multilayer film (snack bags, pouches, lidding film) is almost never recycled in practice, backs our low recyclability scores.

Quantifies the impact reduction when multilayer film is redesigned as mono-PE or mono-PP for kerbside recycling.

Process-level guidance for modelling flexible packaging, whose worked examples run on film of 40 and 46 grams per square metre. We use it as an order-of-magnitude check on our bag, pouch and wrap weights, not as a measured grammage survey, and it is written by the converting industry itself.

Quelle eines Branchenverbands: wird nur zusammen mit unabhängigen Belegen gelesen und nie allein für strittige Recyclingangaben verwendet.

UNEP comparative LCA of disposable vs reusable nappies, material composition and per-unit plastic mass for disposable diapers.

Foundational government LCA quantifying plastic content (SAP, PE backsheet, PP topsheet) in standard disposable nappies.

Peer-reviewed comparison of pads, tampons (with/without applicators) and menstrual cups, backs our applicator and pad plastic weights.

Cradle-to-grave LCA of HDPE jugs vs refill pouches vs pods, direct source for our laundry-jug-vs-refill savings figure.

Cradle-to-grave LCA of five UK detergent formats per wash; finds the use stage dominates (>70%), which is why we treat packaging as the actionable share rather than the largest one.

Independent authority-level case study on HDPE detergent bottle design and lightweighting, used as a second opinion alongside the Kim and Park life cycle assessment.

UNEP LCA of plastic, paper, bagasse and reusable cups/cutlery, backs our foodservice plastic-per-use figures and the 'reusable beats compostable' claim above ~20 reuses.

Per-1000-meals LCA quantifying when compostable cutlery actually beats conventional plastic at end-of-life.

Full cradle-to-gate inventory for HDPE resin: 8.14 litres of water and 73.8 MJ of total energy per kilogram, with electricity only a small share of that total. Primary source for our per-gram water coefficient. Commissioned by the resin industry, so we read it next to the peer-reviewed polymer water-footprint study below.

Quelle eines Branchenverbands: wird nur zusammen mit unabhängigen Belegen gelesen und nie allein für strittige Recyclingangaben verwendet.

Companion inventory for PP resin: 9.13 litres of water and 75.5 MJ of total energy per kilogram. Same authors and same industry commissioner as the HDPE report, so we treat the pair as one industry dataset rather than two independent ones.

Quelle eines Branchenverbands: wird nur zusammen mit unabhängigen Belegen gelesen und nie allein für strittige Recyclingangaben verwendet.

Peer-reviewed water-footprint assessment across common polymers, confirming that fossil-based resin production sits in the single-digit to low-tens of litres per kilogram, not the thousands.

The European methodology behind the PET, HDPE and PP resin datasets, used to check that our coefficients match European practice as well as North American data. Industry-published, and cross-checked here against the peer-reviewed Korol water-footprint study and the Zheng & Suh energy compilation.

Quelle eines Branchenverbands: wird nur zusammen mit unabhängigen Belegen gelesen und nie allein für strittige Recyclingangaben verwendet.

Compiles cradle-to-gate energy across polymers at roughly 60 to 90 MJ per kilogram, the basis for our statement that total energy including feedstock is far higher than the electricity we display.

System-level framing of plastic production, resource use and policy. It does not publish a single per-resin litre or kilowatt-hour coefficient, so we use it for context rather than for the numbers themselves.

Industry-association reference for global resin production volumes and polymer mix, used to weight our averages. Its recycled-content shares are the association's own and have no independent equivalent at this granularity, so we treat them as indicative rather than settled.

Quelle eines Branchenverbands: wird nur zusammen mit unabhängigen Belegen gelesen und nie allein für strittige Recyclingangaben verwendet.

Official U.S. recycling-rate dataset by polymer (PET, HDPE, PP, film) used to ground our recyclability-percent estimates.

Landmark estimate of 4.8–12.7 million tonnes of plastic entering the ocean per year, frames the archive's pollution context.

Global mass-balance: of 8.3 Bt of virgin plastic ever produced, only ~9% has been recycled. Source for our recycled-content baselines.

Quantifies riverine plastic flux (1.15–2.41 Mt/yr), used to contextualise per-item pollution numbers in our blurbs.

Open-access review harmonising plastic degradation studies into one metric (specific surface degradation rate), with half-lives from 58 years for an HDPE bottle to 1,200 years for thick HDPE pipe. Peer-reviewed basis for our decomposition windows and for why thin films disappear far sooner than rigid containers.

Three-year field exposure of carrier bags in seawater, soil and open air; conventional and biodegradable bags alike were still intact enough to hold shopping. Measured basis for the persistence window on films, bags and wrappers.

Review of the chemical routes by which PE, PP, PET, PS and PVC break down at sea, showing that carbon-backbone polymers resist hydrolysis and rely on slow photo-oxidation. Explains why our persistence windows differ by polymer as well as by format.

Widely used government reference for marine litter timelines by item type (bag, cup, straw, bottle). We keep it as the plain-language companion to Chamas 2020.

Shows that popular persistence figures, above all the 450 years often quoted for a plastic bottle, cannot be traced to any measurement. This is why we present persistence as a modelled range and do not use the 450-year claim anywhere on the site.

Ranks PE, PP, PET, PS, PVC and nylon by degradation susceptibility and shows that thickness, crystallinity and additives move estimated lifetimes by one to two orders of magnitude.

Nine-month field exposure of PET, LDPE, HDPE, PP and PS in seawater, sediment and beach sand; conventional polymers lost only a few percent of their mass. Measured evidence behind our long marine persistence windows.

Polyethylene bags and film excavated after up to six decades of burial showed only partial surface oxidation, not disappearance. Real-world confirmation that landfilled film persists far longer than commonly quoted.

Peer-reviewed evidence of microplastic shedding from PET/nylon pyramid teabags into the cup itself.

Latest signatory-level data on recyclable/reusable/compostable packaging and recycled-content targets across 1000+ FMCG brands.

Global review of single-use plastic policy and consumption, frames the archive's category list and 'avoidability' badges.

UK industry progress data on problem-plastic elimination, recycled-content uptake and on-pack recyclability labelling.

Shows how little of a coffee or butter product's footprint sits in the flexible wrapper compared with the contents, the basis for our 'the food usually beats the film' caveat on pouches.

Compares HDPE bottles, cartons and pouches for the same litre of milk, including distribution and losses, used for our milk and drink container weights.

Detailed inventory of bottle, cap and crate masses across common milk sizes, a primary source for our HDPE bottle gram figures.

Recent assessment of mono-material and recyclable flexible packaging routes, including what recycling actually recovers, informs our pouch recyclability ratings.

Break-even reuse counts for takeaway containers, the source for how many uses a reusable box needs before it beats the disposable one.

Compares concentrated and ready-to-use cleaning formats including their packaging, supports our concentrate and dilution-at-home alternatives.

Measures the packaging avoided when detergent is dispensed in-store into a returned container, the evidence behind our refill-station savings.

Quantifies plastic content and end-of-life fate of wet wipes, including fibre release, used for our wipes entries and their alternatives.

Compares plastic, paper, PLA and steel straws across several impact categories, the basis for our straw weights and the honest caveats about paper.

Non-European carrier-bag study showing how reuse counts and local waste systems change the answer, keeps our bag guidance global rather than EU-only.

Measures fibre counts shed per wash by fabric type, the reference for our synthetic-textile entries and laundry-bag advice.

Per-wash microfibre release measured for polyester, polypropylene and polyamide garments, basis for our shedding notes on fast-fashion items.

Cradle-to-grave analysis of polyester garments: fibre production energy, dyeing and finishing, and end-of-life fate. Primary basis for our polyester weights and energy figures.

Life cycle study with measured masses for real retail garments: T-shirt 110 g, jeans 477 g, jacket 444 g, socks 43 g per pair. Independent cross-check for every garment weight in the archive.

Quantifies energy and impact savings of recycled bottle-to-fibre polyester against virgin PET fibre.

Review of 41 studies: reuse consistently outperforms recycling, and blended fabrics are rarely recycled fibre-to-fibre. Backs our low recycling odds for blends.

Standard reference for cotton's water footprint (~10,000 L per kg of lint), used for cotton and cotton-blend water figures.

System-level data on garment lifespans, collection rates and the share of clothing recycled into new clothing (<1%).

EU per-person consumption, water and land use of textiles and the design decisions that drive them.

Global fibre production volumes and the recycled-content share of polyester. Published by a fibre-industry membership organisation, so we use it for production volumes and read its recycled-content share next to the peer-reviewed bottle-to-fibre and textile-recycling studies above.

Quelle eines Branchenverbands: wird nur zusammen mit unabhängigen Belegen gelesen und nie allein für strittige Recyclingangaben verwendet.

Shows what mechanical recycling actually recovers from mixed household packaging, why our recyclability scores discount 'technically recyclable' claims.

Collected return rates across deposit and non-deposit systems, used in our local-disposal guidance for bottles and cans.

Country-level waste generation, collection and disposal data worldwide, the source for our non-European end-of-life assumptions.

Binding EU rules on recyclability, reuse targets, minimum recycled content and packaging minimisation, the legal backdrop for our EU disposal notes.

Plastic particles quantified in the blood of 17 of 22 healthy donors — the first demonstration that particles circulate in humans.

First detection of microplastic fragments on both the maternal and foetal sides of human placenta.

Microplastics identified in 11 of 13 surgical human lung tissue samples, including the lower lobes.

Microplastics detected in 26 of 34 human breast-milk samples.

Six polymer types found in cirrhotic liver tissue; none in healthy controls.

Microplastics present in every human and dog testis sampled; higher concentrations correlated with lower sperm count in dogs.

Post-mortem brains carried higher plastic concentrations than liver or kidney, and 2024 samples exceeded 2016 samples.

Cohort of 257 carotid surgery patients: plaque containing polyethylene or PVC was associated with a higher rate of heart attack, stroke or death over about 34 months.

Up to nine polymer types found in the stool of all eight participants across three continents.

New imaging counted roughly 240,000 plastic fragments per litre of bottled water, about 90% of them nanoplastics.

Polypropylene infant bottles released about 16 million particles per litre when formula was prepared at 70 °C.

Measured microfibre mass shed per machine wash by garment and machine type — roughly 0.2 to 4 g per load.

Peer-reviewed overview of exposure routes, plausible mechanisms of harm, and the gaps in the evidence.

WHO assessment of dietary and inhalation exposure: exposure is widespread, evidence for health effects remains limited.

Independent test of catch balls and in-line filters: fibre reduction ranged from about a quarter to roughly 87%.

Confirms multilayer films are effectively unrecyclable and end in landfill or incineration.

Shows the use phase and packaging split for hand dishwashing products.

Measures Teflon particles released from scratched and broken non-stick coatings.

Peer-reviewed review of PTFE coating breakdown at high temperature and the compounds released.

Antimony release from PET rises sharply with temperature and storage time, though it stays below drinking-water limits in fresh product.

Comparison of tap, filtered and bottled water across environmental and social indicators.

Industrial assessment of stainless-steel cutlery production, the basis for treating long-lived steel tools as an amortised footprint.

Cradle-to-gate emissions per kilogram for the commodity resins that dominate packaging (PE, PP, PET). Basis for the 2.9 kg CO2e per kilo of plastic used in the Swap Tracker estimate.

Average grid carbon intensity of electricity generation. Basis for the 0.35 kg CO2e per kWh applied to avoided production energy in the Swap Tracker.