WCI student isolates microbe that lunches on plastic bags

[bijou]

Getting ordinary plastic bags to rot away like banana peels would be an environmental dream come true.

After all, we produce 500 billion a year worldwide and they take up to 1,000 years to decompose. They take up space in landfills, litter our streets and parks, pollute the oceans and kill the animals that eat them.

Now a Waterloo teenager has found a way to make plastic bags degrade faster -- in three months, he figures.

Daniel Burd's project won the top prize at the Canada-Wide Science Fair in Ottawa. He came back with a long list of awards, including a $10,000 prize, a $20,000 scholarship, and recognition that he has found a practical way to help the environment.

Daniel, a 16-year-old Grade 11 student at Waterloo Collegiate Institute, got the idea for his project from everyday life.

"Almost every week I have to do chores and when I open the closet door, I have this avalanche of plastic bags falling on top of me," he said. "One day, I got tired of it and I wanted to know what other people are doing with these plastic bags."

The answer: not much. So he decided to do something himself.

He knew plastic does eventually degrade, and figured microorganisms must be behind it. His goal was to isolate the microorganisms that can break down plastic -- not an easy task because they don't exist in high numbers in nature. ...

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The greens will be upset by this news, it robs them of a reason to control our behaviour.

[SSG Snuggle Bunny]

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The greens will be upset by this news, it robs them of a reason to control our behaviour.

Which is ironic because I've always seen the political storm behind AIDS research geared to protecting uninhibited behavior.

I guess we know what the left holds in contempt vs what it holds sacred.

[Lord Undies]

This sounds like progress I can live with.  I use plastic store bags as garbage bags.  They are my only garbage bags.  

I do wonder why this kid was able to figure it out, but the great enviro-science-weeners missed it.

[Chris_]

This sounds like progress I can live with.  I use plastic store bags as garbage bags.  They are my only garbage bags.  

I do wonder why this kid was able to figure it out, but the great enviro-science-weeners missed it.

Simple interest in the outcome, my lord. Interest in the outcome.

[JohnnyReb]

This sounds like progress I can live with.  I use plastic store bags as garbage bags.  They are my only garbage bags.  

I do wonder why this kid was able to figure it out, but the great enviro-science-weeners missed it.

Suck-cess dries up gummint grants.