If they can do it Ireland, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Thailand, Thailand, Australia and South Africa, why can’t we do it here?
Each of these nations have either banned plastic shopping bags outright, or taxed the consumers who use them.
Ireland began their efforts to limit the use of plastic bags in 2002 by charging shoppers 15 cents for each bag they used. In the first year, they reduced plastic bag usage by 90%, and raised $9.6 million. Retailers were happy to encourage shoppers to buy their reusable bags, and were doubly happy because they saved $50 million a year on wholesale purchases of plastic bags.
Why it makes sense to eliminate plastic bags
Plastic bags are petroleum products. In American, we use and throw away roughly 100 billion plastic bags a year--the equivalent of 12 million barrels of oil.
Plastic bags photo degrade, meaning they have to be exposed to light to break down, so only the bags that end up as litter will degrade. When they do, they release toxic, carcinogenic petrochemicals and lead and cadmium-laced inks and dyes into the environment. And, because they take hundreds of years to photo degrade, nearly every plastic bag ever used is sitting in a landfill, caught in a tree limb, twisted around a water bird’s neck or is blowing along a roadway somewhere. Only 2% are recycled.
Other environmental effects of plastic bags
Every year, approximately a million birds and a million more marine mammals and turtles dies after eating or becoming entangled in plastic bags. In the northern Pacific Ocean, there are an estimated 46,000 pieces of plastic per square mile.
Change is coming slowly in the United States
Last year, San Francisco and Oakland outlawed plastic bags outright. Santa Monica is set to ban the single-use plastic bags, but will still allow a heavier plastic bag designed for re-use. Seattle just passed an ordinance that charges shoppers 20 cents per bag. A native village in Alaska banned the bags and drummed up support of the new resolution by distributing pins that say “Plastic bags blow.”
Similar actions are being considered in Steamboat Springs, CO; Boston, MA; Baltimore and Annapolis, MD; and Portland, OR.
Say “No” to plastic…and paper bags
Many people think eschewing plastic bags in favor of paper bags is the middle road—a way to minimize their contribution to planetary degradation. If only it were so.
Unfortunately, paper bags are just about as bad as their plastic kin. Just like plastic bags, paper bags that end up in landfills cannot degrade because of a lack of oxygen and sunlight; in fact, a paper bag takes up more landfill space than a plastic bag.
They also contribute to deforestation and ozone loss. In the United States, we harvest 10 million trees to produce 10 billion paper bags. And, of course, there’s the additional environmental damage caused by the fuel used to truck the fallen trees out of the forest, and the pollution caused in the manufacturing process, and—just like plastic bags—the bags are made market-ready with a logo or smiley face printed with ink containing lead and cadmium.
Reusable bags the only solution
Many stores are now selling reusable bags made of recycled materials. The weekly groceries for a family of four fits nicely in approximately 10 of these sturdy bags. So, for a $10 investment, a family can easily eliminate their part of the damage done by paper or plastic bags. As a bonus, the bags fold neatly and can be stored in less space than the heap of twisted plastic bags that reside in a million pantries across the nation.