Most synthetic polymers are named plastics, meaning that they can be moulded into shapes withought breaking, but that's only until they harden. They are made from the chemicals found from the naphta fraction when petroleum is refined.

Plastics have any beneficial properties that makes their usefulness more appealing, like:

they don't conduct heat and electricity

they are unreactive, meaning they can be used as food storage

light to carry

don't break easily and are strong because of their long molecules that are attracted to each other

and they don't catch fire easily

By changing the conditions of a reaction between two monomers, the properties of a plastic can be changed to your particular needs. For example, long chains that are closely packed together ake the polythene dense and rigid, making a good material for mugs, bowls or chairs, while long chains that have been branched won't be closely packed, resulting in a less dense polythene that is good for plastic bags and gloves.

Synthetic polymers have many uses in our day to day lives, and make up mmost of the things we use, from clothing to ropes to covering for electricity cables to flooring and waterpipes. But as they are used everywhere and for everything getting rid of them has become a problem. Them being unreactive eans that they are hard to break down and rot away. This has caused a series of problems:

birds fish and other animals choke on them while trying to eat them or die when they fill up their stomachs

they clog up drains and cause flooding

they also collect in rivers and interfere with the fish

To prevent this some wastes have begun to be reused, by:

melting them down and making new plastics

soe are melted and have their long chains scracked to make smaller molecules for new plastics

and some are burnt and their heat used to produce electricity

But only a small percent are being reused as there are counltess dinffrent forms of plastics that need to be separated before reusage. Burning of plastics also gives out poisonous gases.

Degradable polythene has been made so that it can easily be disposed of. Some is biodigradeble, meaning that it ca\ountains additives that bacteria can feed on, and some is photodegradeable so that it breaks down in sunlight. Also, plants have been developed so that they can make plastics in their cells, whihc is then extracted using a solvent.

Bio-polymers have two advantages:

they are a renewable resource

they are biodegradeable