Scientists have created a mutant enzyme that breaks down plastic drinks bottles – by accident. The breakthrough could help solve the global plastic pollution crisis by enabling for the first time the full recycling of bottles.
The new research was spurred by the discovery in 2016 of the first bacterium that had naturally evolved to eat plastic, at a waste dump in Japan. Scientists have now revealed the detailed structure of the crucial enzyme produced by the bug.
The international team then tweaked the enzyme to see how it had evolved, but tests showed they had inadvertently made the molecule even better at breaking down the PET (polyethylene terephthalate) plastic used for soft drink bottles. “What actually turned out was we improved the enzyme, which was a bit of a shock,” said Prof John McGeehan, at the University of Portsmouth, UK, who led the research. “It’s great and a real finding.”
The mutant enzyme takes a few days to start breaking down the plastic – far faster than the centuries it takes in the oceans. But the researchers are optimistic this can be speeded up even further and become a viable large-scale process.
The question of what we’re actually going to DO when the cops fuck off has been almost completely ignored by street revolutionaries, but it’s one of the most important problems we face. There is no way that people are going to be grateful to see the back of the filth if they think that muggers, rapists, smack-dealers, wife beaters, and other anti-social bastards are going to have a free hand.
But it needn’t be like that. Someone once told me of an incident he witnessed in occupied Ireland. Rioting on the Falls Road had carried on ‘til early morning and vehicles were needed for a road block, when along whirred a milk float. Quick as a flash it was commandeered, however it wasn’t torched until the crates had been taken off and every local household had been delivered two pints of milk!
COMMUNITY RESISTANCE
This sort of interaction between street-fighters and the rest of the community is essential. When looting takes place, we must make sure that goods are distributed to those in need, not as an abstract matter of principle, but because we need to show that we care more for our fellow prisoners in the slum streets and rat-hole estates than any number of incompetent, grassing social workers. And of course, in a state of insurrection those who look after our kids, carry messages and weapons, lie for us in court, and give first aid are as vital to the struggle as the able-bodied, young, and largely male (though less so every time!) street-fighters. But it’s not just a question of handing out a few tins of beans to the old folk. If we cannot deliver safe streets and secure homes for everyone, ordinary people will be begging for the return of the law. Obviously informers must be dealt with, but the best way to stop them creeping out of the woodwork is to prove that the community can do a better job of preventing anti-social behavior than the filth.
STREET JUSTICE
Street justice is an ugly phrase. It carries visions of Clint Eastwood crazed vigilantes shooting black kids for being assertive; the IRA kidnapping kids for smoking dope; the Ayatollah’s “Party of God” beating women for daring to dress the way they want. But somewhere along the line, as individuals, as communities and as a class, we are going to have to learn how to dispense our own justice. Otherwise, people terrified to walk their own streets and estates will continue to fall for all that law ‘n’ order bullshit.
IT STARTS NOW
It starts now. With thinking what you’d do if you saw next-door getting broken into. There’s got to be a better answer than calling the cops or letting it happen, and we need to find it before every street has a neighbourhood-watch snoop snivelling back to the smiling community bobby with his plastic bullets and computer files.
It starts now. With making sure that in this summer’s riots, the muggers are challenged and the rapists eliminated. With making sure that clumsiness or drunken stupidity don’t result in ordinary people getting their homes burnt out.
It starts now. With discussions on the streets and estates about what we are going to do when the cops fuck off. Street justice is justice for ALL by ALL. Anything else is just a new set of cops. We need the answers quickly, and we haven’t begun to ask the right questions.
Behind this doorway lie the terrifying and unspeakable secrets of hell. No one who sees it lives to describe it. And you shall live in darkness for all eternity.
Lucio Fulci’s THE BEYOND, the comic book series, coming soon from Eibon Press
Don’t let your imagination be crushed by life as a whole. Don’t try to picture everything bad that could possibly happen. Stick with the situation at hand.
Sep 26, 2019 | Preissl said he has witnessed many trees being cut this week that he alleges are putting fish habitat at risk, with many other trees being marked for removal on the site.
“(Many) of the trees in Eagle Creek have been chopped down and they are still mowing down trees today,” Preissl wrote in an email on Thursday. “These riparian zones immediately adjacent to the creeks are critical for a healthy salmon and fish creek … The site is essentially one massive mud pit.”
Preissl says that with the fall rainy season arriving, these fish-bearing creeks are even more at risk due to sediment stirred up by work at the site.
Trans Mountain has told the NOW previously that the work being done has been approved and that the company is following strict standards set out in its permit.
Inspectors found four issues with the sediment control and erosion measures:
A sediment fence, meant to prevent particulate matter form entering a waterway, was found to be improperly keyed in along Silver Creek tributaries.
Another sediment fence at the bottom of a hill on the east side of the property “had been inappropriately installed and failed, resulting in sedimentation into a wooded area.”
Blankets meant to control erosion were also not installed properly along Silver Creek tributaries.
Hydroseed – a slurry of seed and mulch – was found on top of erosion control blankets along Silver Creek tributaries.
“Please do not tell me that Trans Mountain is abiding by their strict environmental conditions and their strict sediment control plan,” Preissl wrote in his letter to the CER. “Those plans have failed miserably and completely last year and will again now.”
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