Since the 1950’s we’ve created more than 9.2 billion metric tons of plastic, and of those 9.2 billion tons a whopping 6.3 billion tons have never been properly disposed of. Now we all know the number “6.2 billion tons” but are we really aware of how much plastic that is?

Let’s say we organize a “March for Plastic” where for every kilogram of wasted plastic we march straight ahead one meter. Using our metric, we would march 12.6 billion kilometers; a march stretching all the way from Earth to Jupiter. Except we would have to make this trek approximately 12 more times before we hit our goal.

That’s a rather far walk, and I don’t think I can carry enough snacks for it.

Okay, so let’s pick something a little more manageable. Let’s say we walk 1 centimeter for every kilogram of plastic; now we only need march 126 million kilometers. The finish line for our March for Plastic now ends somewhere out in space, about half the distance between Earth and Mars.

While some people are in a rush to explore our friendly red neighbor, I think my feet might hurt after a while.

Alright, one last time. The Bohr radius is an insanely small distance; it is imperceptible to the human eye and cannot be directly measured. It is a physical constant that defines the most probable distance of finding a ground state electron in a Hydrogen atom, therefore it is one of the shortest possible distances. A staggering 52.9 picometers, or in imperial units, two trillionths of an inch. Finally, a number that sounds semi-manageable.

If we walk one Bohr radius per kilogram of plastic, our march has been shortened down to 667 meters, or just under half a mile.

While the Bohr radius may be the one of the shortest distances, we could never march that far length by length. So next time you go to throw away your plastic grocery bags, remember: Jupiter is a long march away.

Source: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2018/06/plastic-planet-waste-pollution-trash-crisis/

All distances were manually computed.