Area innovators hope to reduce the unnerving amount of microplastics Americans consume

Look around and chances are you'll see something made of or wrapped in plastic. Tiny plastic particles, called microplastics, end up in our oceans, drinking water, food and even in the air we breathe.

A World Wildlife Fund study estimates humans ingest about a credit card's worth of microplastics each week. That's equivalent to about 50 plastic bags per year.

Microplastics can take thousands of years to break down, but North Carolina State University researchers Nathan Crook and Tianyu Li have discovered a way to speed up that process.

"We thought biology might give us a interesting solution to that biodegradability problem," Crook said.

Crook and Li genetically engineered a marine microorganism to break down plastic in salt water. The modified bacteria can degrade polyethylene terephthalate (PET), a common plastic used in water bottles, takeout containers and polyester clothing.

"Hopefully, with something like this, we can remediate the plastics at their source when they're concentrated and easy to collect, rather than when they're in the environment and hopelessly dispersed in the ocean or on the land or in the air," Crook said.

The bacteria can break down plastic about 10 times faster than it would naturally. Now, Crook says, they are working to make that process 100 times faster, so it can be commercially viable and used in applications such as wastewater treatment.

"This is definitely a first step, but we still need a lot of other measures to solve the whole plastic pollution problem," Li said. "For example, producing more biodegradable plastics and to reduce the plastic waste from the beginning."

Dillon Baxter founded "PlantSwitch" with the goal of doing just that. Staying on brand with its namesake, the company is setting up shop in a former plastic manufacturing facility in Sanford.

"Most of the alternatives to plastic currently on the market don't really work at scale," Baxter said. "They're either too expensive, they don't work well enough, or they're not truly sustainable."

PlantSwitch developed a raw material using rice husks as a replacement for the petroleum used to make plastic, giving a new life to the 150 million tons of rice husk agricultural waste that gets thrown away each year.

"That's at the core of our technology is utilizing these waste streams, creating a truly circular supply chain with a low-cost raw material," Baxter said. "We are helping solve [the agricultural industry's] waste problem and then using it to solve the plastic waste problem."

The bio-based resin can go into equipment already used to make plastic, cutting costs and giving manufacturers a drop-in solution.

“It's really important that these companies don't have to pay five times as much to do something eco-friendly,” Baxter said.

Unlike many products that are labeled compostable, but must go to an industrial composting facility, Baxter says PlantSwitch's bio-material can decompose in a backyard.

"And, it will go away in a matter of months instead of thousands of years,” Baxter said.

PlantSwitch aims to start commercial operations in January and already has partnerships for products made with its materials to be sold at big box stores and used by fast-food chains and cosmetic companies.