Ban on the supply and sale of wet wipes containing plastic: Strategic Environmental Assessment Post-Adoption Statement

4. How the Environmental Report was taken into account

The Environmental Report details the key environmental impacts of the proposed ban. The key findings can be summarised as follows:

• Marine litter is caused by a range of materials, but the most common of these is plastic. Marine litter poses a number of problems across the economy, environment, and society. These detrimental effects include damage to marine wildlife, as well as wider ecosystem deterioration, public health issues, impacts on aesthetics, and a wider range of economic impacts across industries reliant on our coastal and marine environment.
• Marine litter threatens the realisation of a shared vision for ‘clean, healthy, safe, productive, and biologically diverse marine and coastal environments, managed to meet the long term needs of nature and people’. It may also impact upon Scotland’s strategic objectives, most notably to become a greener, wealthier and fairer, safer and stronger, and healthier Scotland. It is essential that Scotland’s marine and coastal resource is protected from the damage caused by marine litter, including sewage-related debris such as wet wipes containing plastic.
• Marine litter causes negative impacts to biodiversity, flora and fauna through ingestion, entanglement, entrapment, and smothering. Plastic marine litter may also act as a vector for contaminants. The inherent nature of the origin of items of sewage-related debris, i.e. items used for sanitary purposes or having contact with bodily fluids, means they can also be vectors of disease. Reduced pressure from this type of sewage-related debris could reduce the risk of harm caused to biodiversity, flora and fauna.
• Plastics degrade over time and through exposure to sunlight and wave action in the marine environment. Plastic breaks down into fragments, and eventually into micro and nano plastic fragments which are not visible to the human eye. These fragments can be ingested by species at all trophic levels, from zooplankton to the largest marine mammals. In turn, micro and nano plastics can be ingested by humans, through consumption of commercial species. A reduction in this anthropogenic pressure and an associated improvement in water quality could reduce the risk of harm caused to the health and resilience of marine species as well as ultimately to human health.
• Without the proposed ban on the supply and sale of wet wipes containing plastic these items will continue to be flushed down the toilet and littered, posing a threat to biodiversity, habitats and species. Such wet wipes that arrive in water bodies or in the sea will break down into micro and nano plastics, causing pollution and reducing the water quality status, which in turn will affect the species and habitats within the water body.
• Without the proposed ban the current situation will be likely to continue, if not to deteriorate further. Business and public behaviour change measures implemented to date have not altered the situation, and the use of wet wipes has increased due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Certain manufacturers already produce wet wipes that do not contain plastic, but these are generally restricted to moist toilet tissue wipes, and there is no incentive or push to change the formulation of other types of wet wipe. Only a ban on the supply and sale of wet wipes containing plastic will result in manufacturers changing to produce non-plastic wet wipes.
• The overall conclusion is that wet wipes containing plastic are a prevalent and persistent marine litter item in Scotland and their numbers are increasing. Their presence is adding to plastic pollution within the marine environment, as well as adding to micro and nano plastic pollution. This pollution is posing the risk of harm to biodiversity, species and habitats, to water quality, and to Scotland’s marine ecological status.

On the basis of these findings, which draws on the wider evidence base, and with the aim of facilitating the wider environmental benefits outlined in the Environmental Report, the Scottish Government consulted on a proposed ban on wet wipes containing plastic.