Beyond heating, cooling and cooking, Americans consume natural gas products at a rate of more than 250 cubic feet per person per day. Natural gas is composed of methane, propane, ethane, and butane. It’s the methane that arrives at your home or business through our pipelines. The other gasses have many uses, including making plastics like polypropylene (from propane) and polyethylene (from ethane). These two compounds have revolutionized consumer products and our everyday lives in ways we don’t even think about, and couldn’t live without, like...
1. YOUR CAR
Literally from bumper to bumper, natural gas products are working in your car to make it more fuel-efficient and to keep you safe. Seat belts, airbags, bumpers, crumple zones, interior cushioning, and safety-glass windshields are critical for safety. Parts of your dashboard, sound system, battery case, windshield fluid container and wipers are also made from natural gas – even your antifreeze is ethylene glycol. Combined, natural gas plastics comprise 50% of the body and interior of your car – yet account for only 10% of your vehicle’s weight. Strong, lightweight, and reinforced, these natural gas-based components have allowed auto manufacturers to steadily decrease vehicle weight and increase gas mileage, while still meeting standards for crash safety.
2. MODERN MEDICINE
If you’ve had heart surgery, chances are that a tiny valve or stent derived from natural gas is keeping your ticker going. In the Operating Room, sanitary, sealed instruments and medical drapes made of sterile “hygiene films” help prevent infection. In hospitals, both culture trays and cafeteria trays are made from natural gas. And at home, we cover the occasional boo-boo with a flexible, adhesive bandage often made from—you guessed it!—natural gas. Medical product advancements continue to amaze us, including in the field of prosthetic medicine, where custom, lightweight artificial limbs are helping veterans. And in the field of dentistry, the latest implants, bridges, and dentures keep us smiling!
3. DISPOSABLE DIAPERS
Disposable diapers are more than just convenient. Polymers derived from natural gas allow disposable diapers to be incredibly absorbent. Plus, those same polymers help to create backsheets that are permeable and breathable, which helps to prevent heat buildup and rash. The use of elastic films, fibers, and foams help to produce a form-fitting product. Today’s disposable diapers are laminated with polypropylene on the outside, as well, producing a softer, cloth-like feel. This same technology carries over into adult personal care and hygiene products, as well as household and personal cleansing wipes.
4. BIKE HELMETS
Bike helmets. Motorcycle helmets. Football helmets. Hard hats. Without question, there has never been a safer time to get hit in the head. Using the same technology developed in motor vehicle manufacturing makes helmets lighter, stronger, and more shock-absorbent than ever before. According to the Bike Helmet Safety Institute, helmet use has been estimated to reduce the odds of head injury by 50%, and the odds of head, face, or neck injury by 33%. The U.S. Department of Transportation has found that motorcycle helmets are about 37% effective in preventing motorcycle deaths and about 67% effective in preventing brain injuries. When shopping for a helmet for biking, motorcycling, skiing, or climbing, make sure that it has been licensed by a certifying body such as Snell, NOCSAE, UIAA, CE, or DOT. ANSI and ISIE test and certify hard hats by type of job performed.
5. FRESH FOOD
Natural gas-derived plastic packaging helps dramatically reduce food waste, and protects our food supply from contamination by dangerous pathogens. Because food stays fresh longer in plastic, less is thrown away. But advanced polyethylene technology permeates the agricultural process from seed to table, providing heavy-duty bags for shipping fertilizer, mulch fabric for weed control, supple tubing for irrigation, and UV- and fogging-resistant greenhouse films for off-season growth. Thanks to these state-of-the-art materials, the United States has the safest, most diverse food supply in the world.
But what happens to all this plastic? Thanks to you, plastic recycling has grown each year since companies began measurement in the 1990s. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Americans recycled more than six billion pounds of plastics in 2013, and the annual figure continues to grow. In 2014, nearly 1.2 billion pounds of bags and wraps were recycled, and bag recycling currently takes place at 18,000 grocery and retail stores nationwide. Recycled plastic is used in carpet, plastic lumber, patio furniture, roadside curbs, benches and truck cargo liners.
Given that natural gas is such a key part of our lives in the creation of all of these products, it is vital that we work hard to recycle plastics whenever possible to promote environmentally-friendly practices throughout the natural gas life cycle.