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Loading...Monstrous Waste: Citizens Unite to Ban Plastic Bags in California
Assembly Bill 1998 goes to the California State Senate in mid-August; if passed, the bill will outlaw plastic bags at large retail outlets throughout the state. Passage would be a major victory for environmentalists and the planet, and hopefully would set the trend for other states to follow.
TAKE ACTION: NO MORE PLASTIC BAG POLLUTION!
What harm can a little plastic bag do? A lot. Californians dispose of 19 billion plastic bags a year. Those bags don’t dissolve into air…they end up in landfills and, even worse, in the ocean, where many become part of the swirling mass of plastic garbage known as the Pacific Garbage patch. The ‘patch’ is the size of Texas, a swirling vortex of plastic and other waste that persists in the ocean and in some patches now outweighs the plankton in the water by a ratio of 6:1.
According to Greenpeace, about 10% of the 100 million tons of plastic produced each year ends up in the ocean; while about 20% of this waste comes from ships and platforms, the rest is from land. The durable plastic does not degrade, but accumulates; the UN Environmental Program reports that plastic waste kills up to 1 million sea birds, 100,000 sea mammals and countless fish each year. UNEP has called for a global ban on plastic bags; Mexico City and other countries and municipalities around the world have nixed them, and China banned free plastic shopping bags in 2008.
Plastic bags are often used for mere minutes, but they persist in the environment for centuries. Those “free” bags cost us a lot: they are derived from costly and finite petroleum; they kill wildlife, and they clog our landfills. The City of San Francisco, before passing a ban on plastic bags in retail outlets in 2007, estimated that the city spent 17 cents per bag to clean up, recycle or landfill plastic bags. Recycling is not the answer; Californians recycle only 5% of plastic bags currently; recycling them is costly and difficult.
Californians have been agitating to get rid of plastic bags for years. One particularly creative anti-bag campaign is carried out by the BagMonster. Created by the inventor of a brand of reusable bag, BagMonsters are volunteers in costumes made of 500 plastic bags, representing the 500 bags that Americans use on average every year. BagMonsters turn up at rallies, farmers markets and other green events, wafting along, covered in 15 pounds of plastic baggery, a visible and visceral demonstration of an expensive waste that could so easily be avoided.
Sometimes making the best sustainable, green decision is a tough choice, but living without mountains of single-use plastic bags? I think we can do this!
Take Action:
Sign the Care2 petition in support of AB 1998 today!
Read more: activism, environment & wildlife, legislation, ocean, plastic, plastic bag ban, pollution, sustaintmc, vortex, waste
Be very afraid! BagMonster photo courtesy bagmonster.com.
Used with permission.
Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may
not reflect those of
Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.
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+ add your ownSo true Vipul S it would be hard to fit canvas bags into the trolley. Paper bags aren't used very much in the uk. A solution will appear i am sure that has to be better than plastic bags.
To Sue Cannon:
If you were to buy 20 canvas bags worth of stuff, you won't be able to stuff it in a single cart (and possibly your car if it is a small one).
None of the stores I have been to mind loading into bags. And if I do not have bags or have more stuff than the bags can carry, I just ask them to load it in the cart. I then unload all of that stuff in my trunk and then unload at my home.
Just in France- there,
No bags are given and if u need a bag u have to purchase a recycled one.
U.S.A! It's time to change!
Bring back paper bags or make an environmentally sustainable bag.Canvasbags are not always that practical for everyone.
im wondering what we would put the huge weekly supermarket shopping in that was cheap and didn;t mean taking 20 canvas bags with us? For small local trips i can understand using the canvas bags. Also im sure for security reasons shops like us to use the thin plastic bags we leave the shop with that advertise their shop. Not sure on the marketing and security side large stores would like us taking our own bags. The staff are trained to load the plastic bags so is it more work on the staff to have to load the assortment of canvas bags people might bring in?
I reuse my plastic bags when shopping at the supermarket and as dustbin liners.
It's very easy to use reusable bags and boxes. Often we don't even need bags for the purchases we have made!
there a lot of items that need to put in bags?
it's so easy to carry canvas bags in the car-glad we're coming to our senses about this waste!
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