Great Lakes

Every year, 11.6 million pounds of plastic trash makes its way into Lake Michigan, Chicago’s largest source of drinking water. Even as the city tries to tackle this issue, it means that microplastics — the tiniest pieces — pass through the cities’ filtration systems and into our faucets. Researchers have found that ingesting plastics can have detrimental

“This is a huge problem that we need to address at a systemic level,” said Gabby Plotkin, senior policy manager at Illinois Environmental Council.  Right now, she added, municipal filters can’t remove microplastics. “The only way to do that would be on an individual level like buying a filter that particularly addresses microplastics,” Plotkin said.

Jennifer Walling, executive director of the Illinois Environmental Council, has been working for more than 12 years on the bill to reduce the use of plastic bags. She believes this is the year it will make it across the finish line. “(Plastic bags) are a huge percentage of litter,” Walling said. “They clog infrastructure, they’re

Whether you’re a hot cup of tea and meditate kind of person or a toss the leftover pizza in the microwave kind of person, you probably ate plastic this morning. Tiny plastic particles called microplastics easily find their way into the things we eat and drink — and there’s little you can do to avoid