“Only 5% of single-use plastics are recycled in the United States,” the attorney general said. Email LinkedIn Twitter Facebook Reddit Email California Attorney General Rob Bonta and a coalition of non-profit environmental groups filed a landmark lawsuit against ExxonMobil at the Fifth Fair, alleging the company’s role in the global plastic pollution crisis. São Francisco County Superior Court Case It accused major oil and gas companies of involvement in It is a “decade-long campaign of deception” to mislead consumers about the sustainability of plastic recycling. The process accused the company of perpetuating the belief that plastics Including disposable plastics, they are sustainable and recyclable. But I accuse the company of knowing this to be a lie and that 95% of plastics would end up in landfills sanitary. Today’s complaint alleges that ExxonMobil is the world’s largest producer of synthetic polymers. Polymers are essentially the raw material for most plastic bottles, containers, and disposable plastic bags.
“Plastics are everywhere, from the deepest parts of our oceans, the highest peaks on earth, and even in our bodies, causing irreversible damage — in ways known and unknown — to our environment and potentially our health,” Bonta said in a press release announcing the lawsuit. The lawsuit alleges ExxonMobil intentionally passed on the burden of plastic waste to consumers by making them feel it’s their work to recycle plastic when, in reality, Exxon knows its recycling rate is an implausible solution. The company issued a response to the suit saying, “For decades, California officials have known their recycling system isn’t effective. They failed to act, and now they seek to blame others. Instead of suing us, they could have worked with us to fix the problem and keep plastic out of landfills.” The lawsuit was filed two years after the attorney general started an investigation in 2022 while stating that his office issued several subpoenas and obtained detailed materials to create a case against ExxonMobil.
“For decades, ExxonMobil has been deceiving the public into convincing us that plastic recycling can solve the plastic waste and pollution crisis when they knew this obviously couldn’t work.”. “We are focused on solutions and meritless allegations like these distract from the important collaborative work that is underway to enhance waste management and improve circularity,” the company said in a written response to Reuters after the state attorney general opened the investigation in 2022. Bonta also accused ExxonMobil of hawking “advanced recycling,” an emerging recycling solution it in fact describes as neither new nor effective, the suit alleges. ExxonMobil’s “advanced recycling” can’t process large volumes of post-consumer plastic waste like potato chip bags without risking the safety and performance of its equipment, the lawsuit alleges. The lawsuit states the recycling program constitutes “less than one percent of ExxonMobil’s total virgin plastic production capacity, which continues to grow.”
The company continued in a statement to ABC News: “At this time, we have processed more than 60 million pounds of plastic waste into usable raw materials. This saves us from two health hazards. As of September 2024, the company ranked ExxonMobil 18th in market capitalization, with a value of more than $512 billion.
“ExxonMobil lied to further its record-breaking profits at the expense of our planet and possibly risking our health. Today’s lawsuit shows the fullest picture to date of ExxonMobil’s decades-long deception, and we are asking the court to hold ExxonMobil fully accountable for its role in actively creating and exacerbating the plastics pollution crisis through its campaign of deception,” Bonta said. The agency and its attorney, general, Xavier Becerra, are seeking billions in civil damages with its complaint Thursday in federal court in San Francisco-in-part for environmental destruction, in part for harming public health, and in part to end what the agency described as the company’s “deceptive practices.” Some 26.2 million pounds of trash has been taken from California beaches and waterways since 1985, according to the lawsuit. And of that, about 81 percent was plastic. Most items collected on California Coastal Cleanup Day can be traced back to polymer resins produced by ExxonMobil.
