Flash Forward

This episode is all about a world without plastic. What would that look like? Is it even possible?   Today, plastic is seen as one of our great environmental enemies. But it actually wasn’t always that way. Bradford Harris, a historian of science and the host of a podcast called How It Began: A History of the Modern World, and Susan Freinkel, a journalist and the author of Plastic: A Toxic Love Story, walk us through how plastic started out as a solution to unsustainable practices. Then we talk to Sherry Lippiatt, California Regional Coordinator for the NOAA Marine Debris Program, about what exactly is going on with garbage in the ocean. And finally I visit Danielle Trofe at her studio in Brooklyn, where she grows sustainable materials using mushrooms.   Further reading:  Debbie Chachra on peak plastics "On a scale beyond all previous conceptions" [electronic resource] : plastics and the preservation of modernity Bradford Harris: Plastics and Sustainability Our 'Toxic' Love-Hate Relationship With Plastics 99