There is no Planet B

India pioneered using plastic to make/mend roads:

www.thebetterindia.com/43685/plastic-waste-in-road-construction-plastic-man-india-prof-vasudevan/

Let's face it Happiyogi - it's not governments who run the world; they can fly to all their summits (polluting the world as they go) but it is big business which is in charge, coupled, of course, with demand from consumers.

Greta Thunberg - quite a girl!
www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/feb/15/the-beginning-of-great-change-greta-thunberg-hails-school-climate-strikes

But the polystyrene boxes are made and sold by adults, and though it'd look nicer, neatly sending them to landfill does not save the planet. The damned things will still exist.

And when I see this happening I think to myself 'Well, it's your future'.

There are some who are trying their best though.

Well, where I live it's the teens from the nearby school who throw plastic and everything else all over the place.
So much so that we watch out for them so we can tell them to pick up their sandwich boxes, polystyrene cups and so on.
Then we have the parents in their cars with the engines running, almost running people over to make sure they park the closest (and on the pavements) to pick up their darlings.

reports last year about microplastics in our rivers.

"British river has worst recorded microplastic pollution in the world, study finds"
The report was about one river, wasn't it? The River Tame.

Unless we can find something which 'eats' plastic I cannot see a way back from this.

Are some age groups worse than others at polluting? Most older people I know seem to be very aware and are carefully recycling, doing their best, young people are becoming increasingly aware. Schools teach environmental studies, school children are careful to recycle.

Who are the people throwing out plastic bags, containers from fast food outlets all along roads in AONB as is increasingly happening on a road I frequently travel along?

lemongrove, the UK having the "worst recorded microplastic in the world" cannot be construed as doing just as well as other countries environmentally. It is something to be deeply ashamed of, and yes we do need placards waved to highlight this.

We are certainly NOT “doing all we can” for the environment. Anyone seeing all the rows of plastic packaging in supermarkets, the plastic debris , much of it from fishing boats on our beaches, the use of pesticides, factory farming, air pollution, clogged sewers , river pollution etc., the decline of wildlife, knows there’s a great deal more to do. Big businesses such as BP are more interested in profit. Just because there are other countries on the planet which are worse is not a reason to be complacent, surely more reason to be cooperative with others to insist on certain standards in industry , manufacture, construction, fishing and agriculture.

gridwatch.co.uk
This website shows how much energy from the different sources we are using each day.

Happi you are entitled to disagree, profoundly or otherwise.
I said I think we are doing all we can for the moment, there is always more to do to get to 100% but as a country we aren’t doing too badly.Everything costs money to do, and I bet we are doing just as well as many other countries environmentally.
We don’t need children waving placards on an out of school
Jolly to show us the way ......we know the way.

Sorry Ilovecheese but it will be nuclear in the main, there would only be a smallish amount of electricity otherwise, there is simply no other answer for such a populated country as ours.
All options should be invested in as well though.

lemongrove, I profoundly disagree that here in the UK we're doing all we can to mitigate pollution.

Please look online at the many reports last year about microplastics in our rivers. Here's one, from the Daily Telegraph in March 2018: "British river has worst recorded microplastic pollution in the world, study finds". So, as another poster has already said, let's not go criticising others until we've taken care of our own mess.

I applaud the children who are focusing attention on these global issues and I am so sorry that their youth is already blighted by awareness of the problems caused by previous generations. I just hope that they will be able to devise solutions.

Nuclear energy is just too expensive now. Renewable energy is the least expensive due to new technology, and can provide for most of our needs, as long as we accept wind turbines etc. even in the countryside. Some sort of back up will still be necessary, but not nuclear because of the cost.

Pamela the only clean electricity ( and enough of it) would be nuclear.
paddyann wind turbines and solar power and other ideas will make up a proportion of the energy we need, but it could never be the whole answer.

The UK government removed subsidies for renewable enrgy sources ,maybe we could start with that .Many countries are getting rid of nuclear power stations so why are the UK government still entrnched in the idea that its the way to go?

Telly, was about to say the same thing.
Instead of taking a day off from school and waving placards start walking to school, ditch the cheap disposable fashion, keep the old iPads, phones etc, give the burgers a miss, stop buying fizzy drinks in plastic etc, etc.
We all know what we should be doing.
On the subject of population maybe ditch the IVF programme, especially for older mothers, those with children already and gay couples.
I don't expect many to agree with that.

Maybe we would achieve the same reduction of pollution if people stopped replacing their cars so frequently?
modern cars cause less pollution than older ones
but how much pollution does car manufacturing in itself cause?

It seems to be a Catch 22 situation.

But lemon where do we get the electricity from? How polluting is it to make and replace the batteries.
Maybe we would achieve the same reduction of pollution if people stopped replacing their cars so frequently?
I don’t know the answer BTW, only asking the question.

Has anyone seen the rivers choked to the hilt with plastic and rubbish that drifts out to sea ( miles wide) from Indian rivers.
Yes!

We can do our best but we are only a little country - unless governments worldwide start to take positive action there is no hope.

Would the schools have been sued if anything had happened to one of the children?
I don't think so - but I wonder if they are ready to send fines out to the parents for unauthorised absences?

Spot on winterwhite
Has anyone seen the rivers choked to the hilt with plastic and rubbish that drifts out to sea ( miles wide) from Indian rivers.
Here in the UK we do all we can I think to mitigate pollution for the moment at least.Petrol and diesel cars and lorries are the things to tackle, can’t be far in the future before we all drive electric cars.

I am bemused by the fact that thousands of children, apparently unsupervised, walked out of school and went off to a demonstration.

Don't tell me that the nanny state is beginning to wane, at last! Would the schools have been sued if anything had happened to one of the children?

My Scout Leader son has to jump through hoops just to take the children on a supervised outing.

Some posters write as though today's schoolchildren are the first to care for the environment or have social consciences. Not so at all, remember dolphin-friendly tuna? And DCs taking the lead in checking labels to ensure that everything was Fair Trade, boycotting Nestlés etc (while our own generation was banning the bomb) Today's children have learned how to protest en masse and have vastly more media attention to make them more effective, but they shouldn't think that they are the first, and nor should we.

Lot of sneery/ negative comments here. Climate change and pollution are amongst the biggest threats to the planet. Hundreds of species becoming extinct due to human behaviour. It’s a huge issue and the idea that we are all doing our best is certainly delusional. Governments aren’t interested in long term planning as they are only interested in their own survival for the next four years. More direct action is going to be the norm. Hats off to the children, some of them so articulate and informed they put many oldies to shame.

Agree with lemon on this one.