When payment cards expire, their plastic remains for up to 1000 years. Eventually, their microplastics end up inside the food chain and then inside us. Worldwide, we use 30 million kg of PVC to make new bank cards every year. That’s the same weight as 150 jumbo jets. Most bank cards go into landfill when they expire, where they can live for as long as 1000 years, slowly turning into microplastics that invade our land, our seas and us. At the same time, many card payment terminals rely on mains electricity made with fossil fuels. Every time you use your card you make a hotter world.
You can read more about it here:
https://www.ngi.no/eng/News/NGI-News/When-plastic-is-part-of-the-food-chain
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20210510-how-to-recycle-any-plastic
