with located the policy, so let me know where to said conflict them and the response how do you decide a pin number? oh, i know that but yeah, we're not a man as long as people are gray. so next time that would always be somebody willing to risk everything, to get a share of the big money, the open, the lid, or in the hot water and enjoy all that's left afterwards is the packaging. what do we do with all the plastic weight? or could we manage without plastic? the welcome to tomorrow today is science show on dw. well noodles i've been a favorite for decades. the japanese version is especially popular among young people. it's known as rom and

a super fast food appreciated by busy students. the growth, paste, and hubs are packaged in plastic. a for an e, you competition. a curriculum for graduate students took on a challenge. could this evening be packaged in something non plastic and edible, maybe excels. 2 seasoned not, not actually part of the eggs that we can see, but that's still an important resource for us. because to us they also contain interesting properties that could help us create better food packaging people. that's of the items often have for him come with a hard boiled soft roll fake. so delivered in their own ideal packaging that going to hold it for you, jim, and so low each $20000000000.00 of them, so team edgy decided to focus its research on itself from the

university of holland high. and they still got, it's one of the best in germany for food science with a life that makes all kinds of experiments possible. the team spent 9 months conducting intensive research into edible packaging. in that time they perfected the formula. it's made of fine, the ground ex shells he didn't sanitize to be. i genic a vegetable protein and a binding agent. the exact composition remains a secret of water mix well then poured into a tray, drying. it helps in the oven, create that thing so that behaves like a plastic bag. another process to go property of the film is that it reacts to heat but can be fused together off at the contents of an audit. this means that can be sealed into separate portions. it's a very simple product, a cup of pasta and a seasoning sachet at home voltage on the substrate to solve in a split 2nd stairway to altogether. and that's it. an environmentally

friendly snack without plastic waste winning edgy the 1st prize and the competition . the site in the packaging succeed in retail food markets. i would say the chances are 5050 right now. the situation is quite favorable because companies are looking for new solutions. and this is an interesting solution into the front of those on the students. the already hoping to get a commercial partner with a view to funding that really will still tip a sign until the following day. it was great to eat my 1st port noodles with all the packaging packs, and evidently sustainable noodles sleep create, sustains satisfaction. the we use it for food, water bottles, detergent, plastic is everywhere. but what is plastic exactly? what is it made up? and why does it stay in the environment for so long?

it's of material that's been part of our lives since we were born. cheap stereo and practical plastic has assumed various roles over the decades. as toys accessory is, utility product and a dream for innovative designers. plastics consist of large molecules called polymers, which are generally manufactured from mineral oil. the oil is broken down into its constituent components, which are then recombined to create synthetic polymer change. the new material has very special qualities which like robust and can be molded into practically any. she may want. but plastics not as easy to dispose of this instead of polymers are almost impossible to break down and degrees extremely slow. they some need 500 to

a 1000 years to fully decompose plastics upgrade from an acid production. but not all of them are made for an oil. the some polymers are naturally occurring and are used to make bio plastic, cohen, sugarcane and cellulose can be chemically converted into most killer chains with comparable properties to boil derived plastics. they degrade easier and even if it takes them time to do so, there's obviously a need for non fossil basic solutions. 90 percent of plastics are manufactured from oil. the amount recycled corps qualifying is bio plastic, is not even 10 percent. so we're just the plastics

that doesn't get recycled and done. a lot of it enters our rivers and from there it's carried out to see our oceans are drowning implants. a team of scientists is analyzing what happens to the plastic left and the water these plastic tanks have been floating around in the school to for almost 2 years now. and they'll be there for at least another age. one of the tanks is filled with fresh water. the other with c will 10. you can see is encoded with quite a layer of salt sea water. a certainly having an effect because it's part of a long term study being conducted at the university in east and gemini, and bodies degree in this experiment. and we're looking to see how plastic still composed in water. that in particular because we want to know whether they can be recycled after by young and water for years, just like a fish. the researches from dr backs university of applied sciences are especially interested in what long term goal to exposure does to normal everyday. plastic

waste, how does it change its structure? how the surface is affected? the demonic is generally we concerned with what the material does to the eco system, the water. but we're looking at what the water does to our plastic. can we really get it out of the water and use it again because the desktop does and that's the plastic is being exposed to natural influences in as many different environments as possible. these types of been floating in the baltics that 18 months does not. what does it play as a bond with pocono of your home, but we also have 5 ohms of them. and that's the see, because you can't recreate that inner tax. and with miss austin, me the, the team of scientists hoping for lots of new insights, ones that will help us to better find the growing title, ways of plastic innovations. new studies and warning of an

exponential rise in the amount of trash you know, sees by 2050. that could be more plastic than fish in the see if in pool? yeah. every year, a total of about $300000000.00 metric tons of plastic is produced. we can just see mean at least 10000000 tons end up in our oceans. that's united nation is estimate and you could say a truckload of plastic is dumped into the sea every single minute. you think it kept? plastic can take hundreds of years to break down. it's practically invincible. in water, it decomposes slowly into micro plastic and then often it's not. it sinks down into the depth, the sea and shits. the fits estimated that already 80 percent of plastic is already lying on the sea bed and can no longer being removed except thought they would get

eaten by worms and all kinds of organisms. all goodness men want to create in short said lions back in our plates by the food chain. fish via the fish we know can i can and cannot become many green organizations trying to break this vicious circle . the ocean clean up is probably the best known project. it uses floating structures to capture learning letter. the one is one ocean is consuming a similar goal using phones to gather up the plastic sorted and recycle it. then that is the end of a wave project which involves trying to remove alicia from rivers before it can even get to the si se puede to putting of heat and fight. on the one hand, these projects raise awareness of the issue. warning us about our use of plastic

dom queen stuff and fuck, i'm going to is on the same on the other. they are dropped in the ocean shine by to the december coming in queen stores. we are currently dumping into the seas can, can be removed by any project or with any technology in the world and how school with that and kind of michelle steiger agrees. but he's determined to do something to cook the plastic, as well as the big projects service small businesses like his attempting to recycle, marine this to he and his team, but use rucksacks made completely of plastic from the ocean. this affiliate, there are already a lot of great projects out there getting the more the better. and we think that all these projects combine are also having an effect on the environment. it was in the philippines, some 100 people got the plastic from the waters off, one of the articles it goes on and the pacific ocean throws up a lot of trash on the beach is here. most of the plastic has only been in the water

for a few weeks or months. the creek and recycled about 20 percent of the other 80 percent is made up of elastic coded wrapping paper. you can recycle back to anywhere in the world including germany. they are in center reading. this is the only currently existing way of getting rid of these materials. only learning that if i'm close to the beach is used to make his rock sucks, as it's unclear how suitable plastic is this been out at sea for years. in the future, assign to check new lights on that fucking mach to book the experiments currently being carried out. done until 5, much time as much as a. so i'm, i know for the material is so contaminated for the cleaning and preparing it to get to a point that it could be turned into something new. it's so much effort to 1000 the chances of sight in this trust of the songs. on the middle of this research on marine michel, they say it's important to them. one thing in mind now is the stock needs to

message the message can't be no problem. we can recycle it. we comp that's, that's done. it shouldn't end up at, in the 1st place in black on that stuff done mission on. and we will need to keep on researching a for the next few years to find out what we can do with the plastic. if it does end up that the, the ideal solution for the world's waste problem would be a plastic eating pac man. type need a huge appetite, be able to eat fast and digest plastics like p t that's used for water bottles. amazingly, scientists have discovered an enzyme that can do just that. researchers in the city of leipzig have found an enzyme that breaks down plastic very fast. but to work it has to be heated between 60 and 70 degrees celsius. christiane and so on. and dick is team building is bio technology holds the key to our plastic problem,

your cell. and we look at how nature does things and then copy it, and not a tree uses enzymes to break down polymers. so that's what we're doing. all the team heads down to one of the live 6 main cemeteries. this is where they found their enzyme on a compost heap. let's see what we find to the researches identified an enzyme that decomposes leaves and it can also break down p t plastic. so a lot the south, no irvings have a wax like coding formed by an outer layer of eugene which is a polyester and it's uh, that's a polymer that's built up by a ester bond. just like with p t o by few buick and stuff. and this is the same for many bio plastics to the end. semi enzymes are so non specific that they can recognize and breakdown of broader spectrum of polyesters. and that's designed, that's the advantage we're lucky to have

a biological answer into our plastic problem. opens up plastic covering for christie and zoning. decker showed us how fast the enzyme works, just as long as it's capped at 60 to 70 degrees celsius. the p e t packaging dissolves completely in one day. all that remains is the basic building blocks. the enzyme was lucky, fine for the researchers. we have all that paid show 7, which stands for polyester, hydrolyzed slide $600.00 on the 7th candidate out of the 9 that we found out, that was the best performing enzyme. and this is what it looks like. they produce the 3 d printed model to show how the reaction works. i mean, it seems the enzyme and here's the key chain with the esther bonds. once we're studying multiple layers at the same time, can i get the ones that will generate the data? we need to feed our a, i to then train it to identify new, improved enzymes that can break down plastic couple and they're analyzing thousands

of enzymes each day in search of a super enzyme. and they have a larger vision to yeah, well, any manufacture ultimately we want to get to market to work more with poly yesterday. that are easy to breakdown with enzymes and damage that will allow us to develop really efficient circular economies in good enough for you. and we have no alternative because right now we can cope with the plastic waste of money. so we're looking to the future and we're having a vision of recycling, plastic waves, sustainable fluid is also not high different. so i think the most plastic is made from crude oil, which was produced long before we came along. our norful keentonia from el salvador, send us a question about that. how is crude oil made crude oil? wouldn't it be possible without the smouldering animals and puffs clinton itself

just food for sea creatures? the petroleum being extracted today, formed over millions of years, and tiny creatures just like these. as soon as clinton dies, it sinks to the bottom of the sea. since there is barely any oxygen at great to depth the plant and does not decay. instead it mixes with different settlements, like clay and found on the sea, but the settlements flowed from rivers into the oceans. together with you a gun at clinton, they form decaying sludge, the souls for rock petroleum over the course of 10000 to several 1000000 years. settlement trulia is stuck on top of each other, becoming hundreds of meat as high. this process increases the pressure on the petroleum sole salt and raises the temperature. when the temperature reaches 80 degrees celsius, the petroleum sol stroke begins to transform the loan chain hydrocarbons that make

it up. but he can to show to chains. this process is known as cracking the fine grains digested sludge transforms into viscous crude oil. one of the most complex organic compounds on our planet. extreme pressure force is the oil out of the rock . it my great stock boards and connex but need empower people. they use the salt, mostly defined plate, creating an oil deposit today about 15000000000 liters of the black gold are extracted from deposits every day. new crude oil is still forming all the time. as long as there is clinton, the substances needed to form petroleum. but it wouldn't be ready for millions of use. the petroleum has been hiring industry for the past 150 years and driving climate change to

electricity is one alternative. but electric cars, for example, need rechargeable batteries, and they're still full of precious raw materials. so scientists are looking into how to recycle them efficiently, the black box, and inside chunks of old batteries, they might not look like it, but they're very valuable. inside are lots of rare metals, including the much sought after lithium. the company i correct in the face of germany has been recycling old batteries from across europe for more than 20 years. engineer diagnose like a is a battery recycling pioneer p things, battery recycling has attempt to potential and not fix the market is used right now. but relatively few batteries are being returned because many countries still don't have the collection infrastructure. the contacts

cause the awareness of how batteries are collected for recycling is not very pronounced here in germany. either. this is within the best so some other countries have higher collection rates exceeded by lots of batteries getting mixed in with electronic waste. or they were exported in such a way that we're not able to trace their route so that so the overall return rates are pretty bad. decent is in fact less than half of all batteries get recycled. that causes big problems for recyclers. there's not enough demand to build the recycling machines needed to carry out the process. in this pilot plant depleted lithium batteries are being heated to 550 degrees celsius design, not ones. i said, we develop this treasure here ourselves and it's a pilot plant, a larger one that will go into operation in a few weeks. the plants like this one don't exist anywhere on earth, means the batteries have only been on the market for 5 to 10 years since the same

demand for them went up quickly and now they're being recycled to the recycling itself is still very young. and that's why pilot plans like this one are enormously important if you want to recycle on a large scale in cost. and last up to visit to large amounts of lithium ion batteries will be ready for recycling. of these gold colored crumbs are clay minerals used to safely store lithium ion batteries, which are prone to catching on fire. sorting. batteries is still laborious. manual work, their components are very different, but from the outside they're virtually indiscernible. there's no description of which chemicals are inside. so each battery is a unique surprise. right next door recyclers are working on a destroyed car battery. it might still have some residual charging it. that's why

special high voltage electricians are at work here. engineer right, and that's like a says it's worth the effort due to the value of the coveted contents. been a lot of this, if we just focus on the metal lithium, it's one of the metals that's most available on the planet, but it's very finely distributed across the earth's crust. find a tie it in the costa. here we get the material for free. inside the lithium batteries, my tenant concentration of 234, or 5 percent 5 life puts in one test. and so these are of course and easily accessible source of a home, often not too wide, distracted, very laboriously from nature. when i can get it free of charge when recycling fly, it can be fun. lithium recycling may soon become big business. but at the moment it's still in the pioneering phase. 2, back to the increments of steps when use of the batteries have just come out of paralysis where we've removed the plastic,

send it to use it on the image of i'm not so yeah, we're left with the material mix of metals like steel aluminum, copper, and black mass, other meaning we now have to separate those metals. response must be we're working closely together with our w t h. often none of that is the hide. awesome to them are w t h. often there's one of the leading institutes in germany when it comes to recycling use batteries. the scientists like pose up on i develop recycling concepts for all types of use batteries, including this used ion battery. the coveted raw material is in the black dust between the thing copper foils. the 1st step is grinding it all into a fine powder. thoughts is the uh, the black bar to be active mass, also known as black mask, contains all the valuable materials that you make up a battery lease from lithium to nickel cobalt to gratified be all of which are

extremely rare, but critical according to your opinion. standard, so thinking that's why it's very, very important that we can extract the individual elements out of the black mass of them into is currently 16, ph. d 's. these, these are being written the simultaneously on lithium recycling. lead me on to reach had specialized in what is known as hydro metallurgy. in this process, the black masses stirred into a water the lithium dissolves into the water. but the other metals do not, which makes them easy to filter out. lilian trees trends one step black broth into a clear solution. around 90 percent of the lithium contained in the black mass gets recovered this way. it's laboratory work on the verge of becoming an industrial process. let's see, i'm in the water here. it's aiyona. and we can recover it from the foundation using environmentally friendly processes like membrane technology,

your i and exchange is. when we do that, let's see, and we get, looks like this. you see a white powder, which is lithium carbonate, a products that can be sold in this form. it can then be used in the production of new batteries. scientists and industry are predicting that that will be the case in the coming years. extracting elements like graphite, copper, iron, nickel, and cobalt from old batteries is way past the laboratory phase. now the focus is on extracting lithium industrially. the white gold of the green energy transition. blood is red. why do you have a science question? send it to us as a video, text or voice message. if we answer it on the show will send you a little surprises the thank you. so come on just at

the pencil for this week's edition of tomorrow today. joining us again next week for more science stories until then state curious by the the, the,

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the this is the w news, live from berlin tonight, a landmark court ruling in favor of swiss and senior citizens accusing their government of not doing enough to stop climate change. european court of human rights today, he said that switzerland's failure to act against global warming is a violation of human rights also in coming up at the wins top port. lawyers today argue that german support of israel does not violate international law. vicar road was easy, differently. it's suing germany, claiming proline is helping is real, commit

a leg genocide in garza and violent crime and germany rising sharply with many of the suspects coming from other countries.