The Overlooked Environmental Impact of Vaping

Lined up end-to-end, the disposable e-cigarettes sold and (presumably) trashed annually in the U.S. could stretch across the country and back again, according to a new report that highlights a growing problem: vape waste. Disposable vapes typically have plastic bodies that are designed to be used until they’re empty and then tossed, as opposed to devices that can be refilled with nicotine e-liquids or pods. The CDC Foundation, a nonprofit that supports the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, estimates that each month in the U.S., consumers purchase 11.9 million disposable e-cigarettes. Based on that figure, the new report—from the U.S. PIRG Education Fund, a nonpartisan consumer-interest group—estimates that the disposable vapes sold annually would stretch longer than 7,000 miles if lined up, more than twice the width of the continental U.S. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Once little-used, disposable e-cigarettes accounted for about 53% of e-cigarette unit sales in the U.S. as of March 2023, according to the CDC Foundation. Single-use products like Puff Bar have also unseated once-dominant vaping brands like Juul (which sells devices that can be recharged and refilled with e-liquid cartridges) among underage users, according to federal data. That swift ascent started in part because of a regulatory loophole. In early 2020, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced a ban on the sale of many flavored vaping products&mdash...
Source: TIME: Science - Category: Science Authors: Tags: Uncategorized Environmental Health healthscienceclimate Source Type: news