The New York prosecutor’s office announced Wednesday a case, which it described as historic, against the beverage company PepsiCo for contaminating the environment and compromising public health with single-use plastic bottles, caps and wrappers. In a lawsuit filed in Erie County court, Attorney General Letitia James accused PepsiCo of contributing to public nuisance by generating large portions of the plastic waste found in and around Buffalo. River, approximately 17% of detritus can be attributed to specific brands among all waste.
The presence of the remains of the products of the multinational company along the Buffalo River, in the north of the State, pushed Democrat James—responsible for the accusation of fraud against Donald Trump—to sign one of the first cases from a state of the country against Donald Trump. a large producer of plastics. The fact that the packaging does not warn, as tobacco packages do, for example, of the risks to health and the environment especially weighed in the decision. That’s why the lawsuit also accuses the company of failing to warn consumers of the harmful effects of its elimination.
“No company is too big to (avoid) ensuring that its products do not harm our environment and our public health. “All New Yorkers have a fundamental right to clean water, but PepsiCo’s irresponsible packaging and marketing put the water supply, the environment and public health at risk,” said James. “No one should have to worry about plastics in their drinking water, plastic waste littering their beautiful river banks, or plastic pollution harming wildlife. “I will never hesitate to stand up to big companies that endanger the health and safety of New Yorkers and our planet.”
85 beverage brands and 25 snack brands
PepsiCo, headquartered in New York State, manufactures, manufactures and packages at least 85 different beverage brands and 25 snack brands that usually come in single-use plastic packaging. Plastic has become a persistent and dangerous form of pollution in the Buffalo River watershed over the past decade. Last year, the prosecutor’s statement explains, James’ office conducted a study of all types of waste collected at 13 points along the river and its tributaries and discovered that PepsiCo’s single-use plastic containers is the most. Of the 1,916 pieces of plastic waste collected from a recognizable brand, more than 17% were produced by PepsiCo. “PepsiCo’s plastic containers exceed any other source of this identifiable plastic waste to the river, and are three times more abundant than the next largest pollutant.”
From 2013 to 2022, approximately 78% of the trash collected by Buffalo Niagara Waterkeeper volunteers in the river basin will be plastic. Large amounts of single-use plastic food and beverage packaging are found each year, including food wrappers, plastic bottles and bottle caps of the types sold by PepsiCo. Once in the environment, these packages quickly begin to decompose and release dangerous microplastics.
A study by the NGO Break Free From Plastic inventoried 2,125,415 items of plastic waste from 2,373 garbage collections between 2018 and 2022 across the United States. identifiable) plastic waste throughout the country. The company has yet to comment on the complaint.
According to the text of the lawsuit, plastic pollution can cause health problems such as early puberty in girls, reduced sperm count, impaired functions of the reproductive organs, obesity, changes in sex-specific behavior, and increased rates of certain types of cancer. . The effects of plastic additives have been observed in mammals, and researchers hope that the same effects can be seen in humans, the lawsuit emphasizes.
