[HN Gopher] Plastic bag bans work
___________________________________________________________________
Plastic bag bans work
Author : Brajeshwar
Score : 202 points
Date : 2024-02-04 14:28 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.zmescience.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.zmescience.com)
| 486sx33 wrote:
| How many plastic coated "reusable" bags that are in everyone's
| closet, car, and boat were imported during the same period? These
| cloth / plastic / bags are full of evil chemical dyes and
| surfactants from manufacturing in India !
| macintux wrote:
| Still seems like a shift from single-use (well, often double-
| use) plastic bags to multiple-reuse bags is a net win. I know I
| use my reusable grocery bags for all sorts of activities.
| ajsnigrutin wrote:
| This depends. Sometimes the reusable ones have so much more
| plastic, that you would need to use it a 100+ times to make
| it worth it, while at the same time, they last maybe 10, 20
| uses, before the handle snaps or something.
| tomtheelder wrote:
| I feel like cotton canvas ones should be the thing we move
| toward. No plastic, and they last for so long. Never had
| one wear out before.
| ajsnigrutin wrote:
| https://edition.cnn.com/2023/03/13/world/reusable-
| grocery-ba...
|
| > According to one eye-popping estimate, a cotton bag
| should be used at least 7,100 times to make it a truly
| environmentally friendly alternative to a conventional
| plastic bag.
| da768 wrote:
| Only if said plastic bags are used as trash bags and
| incinerated.
| positr0n wrote:
| Cotton bags must be used 7100 times to be less
| environmentally impactful than single use thin plastic
| bags. Organic cotton bags 20,000 times.
|
| Source: https://www2.mst.dk/udgiv/publications/2018/02/97
| 8-87-93614-...
|
| (First time I've posted hoping I'm wrong and get down
| voted and yelled at for spreading FUD, haha. But I've
| seen this figure a lot)
| oftenwrong wrote:
| I think that is possible. My mother has had the same
| cotton canvas grocery bags for ~40 years. They are faded
| from washing, but are still strong, and she still uses
| them.
|
| The other advantage is that cotton bags do not shed as
| many microplastics (the thread is almost always
| synthetic).
|
| Many of the "re-usable" woven plastic bags I've acquired
| in recent years are of extremely poor quality. I have had
| to re-stitch many of them, and some had to be discarded
| after a very short service life.
| superkuh wrote:
| I use the disposable plastic bags as insulation for the
| windows in my apartment. I use them for trash bin bags. I use
| them for catching the hair when I save. Etc, etc. I'd be sad
| to see them go but find it very doubtful they'll ever be
| banned in my US state.
| seagulls wrote:
| > Still seems like a shift from single-use (well, often
| double-use) plastic bags to multiple-reuse bags is a net win.
|
| Is this based on your feelings/sentiment, or do you have some
| hard data to back up this baseless assumption?
| ajsnigrutin wrote:
| Also, how many more trash bags were sold in the meantime? I
| used to never buy trashbags until the random bans and charges,
| and now I have to buy them.
| da768 wrote:
| Same, though the "biodegradable" plastic bags stores tended
| to use lately would end up completely teared apart after a
| single use.
|
| Also it seems like every store around only has non machine-
| washable reusable bags. Any meat or vegetable leaks in there
| and they'll quickly become disgusting.
| twisteriffic wrote:
| It doesn't really matter if they work when they're ballot box
| poison for anyone who implements them. In western Canada there
| are large groups of people who are absolutely wildly outraged
| about plastic bag and cutlery bans. They're a constant refrain in
| the right wing rage farming ecosphere here, because you're
| exposed to the (very, very mild) negative effects of the ban
| almost daily, but never to the positive outcome. It's a very easy
| lever to pull if your goal is to paint any environmental or
| climate change action as pointless posturing, and it's being used
| as such.
| ethanbond wrote:
| Some people are just complete and utter snowflake softies.
| Having meltdowns over their plastic bags or whatever and then
| shouting "fuck your feelings" is the pinnacle of irony.
| AlexandrB wrote:
| I think they're only ballot box poison _in western Canada_ ,
| which is not going to vote for anything other than conservative
| MPs regardless.
|
| Having grown up in Western Canada, no one does more whinging
| and complaining than Albertans. Every little thing, from taxes
| to masks, is a huge imposition. But the whinging is then
| rationalized as "defending freedom".
| xgkickt wrote:
| Plus the added irony of having to put all your recyclables in
| a specific type of single use plastic bag for collection.
| jacquesm wrote:
| The back of my house looks (and smells, in the summer) like
| a recycling center. The thing that really pisses me off is
| that after all that work it all ends lumped together more
| often than not, and the only thing that is really valuable
| (metals) is quite frequently lost because there is no
| separate way to collect them.
|
| In my childhood days _everything_ got recycled. Glass
| bottles, metals, paper, clothing, vegetable matter (skins,
| off-cuts) and so on. People made a living going door to
| door to collect them. Single use plastic was absolutely
| unheard of.
| ck425 wrote:
| So I don't know Canada but when the ban was first bought in in
| Scotland a lot of people, albeit still a minority, had similar
| views but within a year or two no one really cared.
| twisteriffic wrote:
| I suspect that'd be the case here, but there's a cottage
| industry of social media rage farming to keep it at the top
| of mind.
| exabrial wrote:
| I've always preferred paper, and it's a carbon sink. Instead of a
| plastic ban, I'd like to know my paper bags are coming from a
| sustainable logging operation or where the forest is being
| protected from fire by targeted logging operations.
| doomrobo wrote:
| Do you have a source on it being a net carbon sink? I'm
| skeptical bc there's a lot more effort to make and distribute
| paper bags than cutting down a tree
| Areading314 wrote:
| Plastic is about the best carbon sink you could imagine, locks
| up those Cs for hundreds of years, unless it gets combusted.
| woodruffw wrote:
| I can imagine a better carbon sink: not extracting the carbon
| to begin with.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Those Cs were already locked up.
| gruez wrote:
| Maybe if you're only looking at the environmental impact angle.
| From a utility angle paper bags don't handle moisture well, the
| handles aren't as strong, and are more bulky than plastic bags.
| loeg wrote:
| Paper is only a carbon sink until it breaks down.
| karaterobot wrote:
| Plastic bags bans work at banning plastic bags, granted. But
| banning plastic bags is not an end to itself, and is pointless if
| the end result is not reduced plastic pollution and greenhouse
| gas emissions. Ideally, those reductions would be commensurate
| with the effort involved in the ban, compared to other actions
| you could take with the same costs. I note this article doesn't
| say anything about the actual impact. It's consistent with the
| hypothesis that we banned plastic bags as a token gesture,
| because we mistake movement for progress, and now we're patting
| ourselves on the back while nothing is actually improved.
| nomilk wrote:
| Depends what's meant by "work".
|
| In my country, single use plastic bags were replaced with thicker
| reusable plastic bags that many people discard after a single
| use. So the total volume of produced/discarded plastic probably
| increased despite the number of bags used probably going down. I
| don't have sources other than anecdotal evidence based on
| behaviours I observe.
| nativeit wrote:
| I think it means "Billions of plastic bags were avoided in the
| US alone," but that's just me reading the headline.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| And if your goal is to eliminate a specific type of plastic
| bag, that's great! It's also a stupid goal.
|
| if your goal is to eliminate _plastic_ , or _fossil fuel
| emissions_ , I'm not convinced these bans have been
| effective.
| dario_od wrote:
| Great! Can you show me the numbers that make you think that
| these bans were not effective?
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| https://www.freedoniagroup.com/press-releases/freedonia-
| repo...
|
| Edit: Apparently this is commissioned by the plastic
| industry. It does match my anecdata of how many people I
| see buying "reusable" bags at the supermarket check out,
| combined with https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/grocery-
| bag-environmental...
| HPsquared wrote:
| "Number of bags" is only one way to measure this. It's
| probably the only metric that went in the right direction, so
| that's the one they report.
| LeafItAlone wrote:
| > In my country, single use plastic bags were replaced with
| thicker reusable plastic bags that many people discard after a
| single use.
|
| What country?
| risho wrote:
| same thing happened here. it became illegal for grocery stores
| to give out single use plastic bags here so now they just give
| out thicker bags that they call multi-use.
| treme wrote:
| the replacement bags are usually made out of another type of
| plastic that needs to be reused 100+ times minimum to make the
| trade off worthwhile, which is rarely the case.
|
| This is what superficial activism looks like.
| jasonkester wrote:
| Superficial is good in this case. One of the worst things about
| plastic bags is that they end up wrapped around every roadside
| bush in Africa, Southeast Asia and South America.
|
| I've never seen one of those beefy reusable carrier bags
| blowing around on the side of a road.
| postepowanieadm wrote:
| How American plastic bags ban affects Africa, Southeast Asia
| and South America?
| dymk wrote:
| We ship our plastic to those countries
| treme wrote:
| Instead they will wreck havoc on marine life because they
| decompose into loops of stringy rope that's difficult to
| break
| kibwen wrote:
| Why does this comment feel like someone trying to vice-
| signal about their lack of care for the environment while
| attempting to manipulate the people who do by making up
| complete nonsense? No, reusable shopping bags are not worse
| for the environment than disposable ones.
| HPsquared wrote:
| Exactly. It's like the straws. Something highly visible and
| conspicuous, with very small impact. The definition of
| tokenism.
| slimrec77 wrote:
| It is literally a type of religious ritual to the Earth gods.
|
| The point is not that it helps or doesn't help, the point is
| "we have to do something!"
|
| Just like it is obvious from a breakdown of the data that is
| beyond stupid to send one giant diesel burning truck to pick up
| "garbage" then another giant diesel truck to pick up tin cans
| and cardboard at a net energy loss. Of course, it is impossible
| to stop this even if it would be rational thing to do.
|
| "we have to do something!"
| kibwen wrote:
| This is a preposterous talking point, I wish people would stop
| parroting it.
|
| Reusable bags carry as much weight and volume as _multiple_
| disposable bags. And yes, you can use them hundreds of times. I
| have used mine every week for years and years.
|
| Disposable plastic grocery bags are wasteful and pointless, and
| those defending them so virulently come across as bafflingly
| pathetic.
| mjevans wrote:
| I'd prefer a _ban_ on plastic bags rather than the 10 cent ding
| for a dime routine.
|
| Require the stores to offer a free paper bag, and allow them to
| offer an upsell to a handled paper bag.
| acheron wrote:
| You know, or not.
|
| "This shift from plastic film to alternative bags resulted in a
| nearly 3x increase in plastic consumption for bags, which is not
| widely recycled."
|
| https://www.freedoniagroup.com/press-releases/freedonia-repo...
| seagulls wrote:
| Hilarious. Wait until people think critically about what solar
| panels and lithium ion batteries (for their "green" EVs and
| homes) demand has done to the environment.
| dymk wrote:
| Well? What's it done?
| cratermoon wrote:
| That study was paid for by a plastic industry trade group.
| Funny how their press release leaves out that detail.
| mealkh wrote:
| I found this article that seems to paint a contrasting picture.
| https://archive.is/BCd0w
|
| "Commissioned by the American Recyclable Plastic Bag Alliance,
| the report acknowledges that the total number of plastic bags
| declined by 60% since the ban--as its backers hoped. But because
| shoppers still had to carry their groceries home, they needed
| alternatives. Mostly that meant switching from the thin plastic
| film bags to the heavier, reusable bags now sold in many
| supermarkets.
|
| The problem is that most of these alternative bags are made of
| non-woven polypropylene, which takes much more plastic to make
| and isn't widely recycled. And what about the supposed climate
| benefits? Well, the study finds that, owing to the larger carbon
| footprint of the heavier, non-woven polypropylene bags,
| greenhouse gas emissions rose 500%. The problem is compounded by
| the way people use these bags. Though intended to be reused many
| times, the report says 90% of the new reusable bags are used a
| mere two or three times. So they are piling up in landfills and
| homes. Think of your own behavior in misplacing bags around the
| house or forgetting to bring them when heading out for
| groceries."
| Retric wrote:
| Misplacing bags in your home is unlikely to continue
| indefinitely. If nothing else you would run out of room.
|
| So it's likely for someone to have many bags used a few times
| and lost and the remainder get used a great deal. Therefore
| what's important is the average amount of reuse not simply what
| happens to individual bags. A single bag used 1,000 times makes
| up for a 9 used a 2-3 times.
| Thorrez wrote:
| Is it possible to use a bag 1000 times? California's SB 270
| says:
|
| > It shall be capable of carrying 22 pounds over a distance
| of 175 feet for a minimum of 125 uses.
|
| https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml.
| ..
| beej71 wrote:
| It's really not easy for me to compute how many times each
| of my canvas bags has been used. But it's probably about
| 200 on average, since I've been doing this for over a
| decade and I've only had one canvas bag fail to death.
|
| I'd bet 1000 uses is within the realm of possibility, but
| you'll probably need to do some repairs along the way.
| marcosdumay wrote:
| Yes, when they take up too much space, people will throw them
| on the trash.
|
| Or are you expecting a different result?
| beej71 wrote:
| I guess I was hoping that eventually they'd throw a few in
| their trunk.
| warkdarrior wrote:
| Why would one throw their trash in the trunk??
| tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
| > If nothing else you would run out of room.
|
| Yes, from time to time you realize that the entire box full
| of reusable bags isn't going to be reused. Then you take one
| of them, stuff it with the others until it's full, and stash
| that as the "maybe I'll reuse those".
|
| Then you take another one, fill that one with the rest, and
| put it in the trash.
| coding123 wrote:
| I use them exactly once more - cat litter waste
| anticensor wrote:
| I tend to reuse them twice: one more shopping and then
| becomes a trash can liner.
| Aurornis wrote:
| > Though intended to be reused many times, the report says 90%
| of the new reusable bags are used a mere two or three times. So
| they are piling up in landfills and homes.
|
| I could see people forgetting these bags at home for a while as
| they adjust to their new normal, but the idea that they're
| going to be buying these new bags ever other trip to the store
| because they're piling up in a room at home for years is hard
| for me to believe.
|
| Given that the conclusion of that article depends on people
| never getting good at reusing those bags and instead throwing
| them away or letting them accumulate forever at home, I have a
| hard time taking it seriously.
| gruez wrote:
| >>the report says 90% of the new reusable bags are used a
| mere two or three times. So they are piling up in landfills
| and homes.
|
| >but the idea that they're going to be buying these new bags
| ever other trip to the store because they're piling up in a
| room at home for years is hard for me to believe.
|
| What's likely happening is that they go out to buy something,
| forgot their bag, and is forced to buy a reusable bag. If
| enough people are forgetful, the "90% of the new reusable
| bags are used a mere two or three times" seems very plausible
| to me.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| What happens to me, living in a walkable city without a car
| (something I'm proud of for environmental reasons):
|
| * I'm walking to work / home / a social outing / etc, with
| no intention of going shopping.
|
| * I pass by a store on the way.
|
| * I now need a bag.
|
| Could I _always_ bring a bag with me when I go out? Yes,
| but I try to travel as light as possible because I 'm
| walking.
| dfxm12 wrote:
| * Bags aren't big or heavy
|
| * What spur of the moment shopping are you talking about?
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| Bags are big enough that they don't fit in my pants or
| jacket pocket. I don't understand your second question.
| oftenwrong wrote:
| Some companies offer compact reusable bags that can be
| stored in a coat pocket. For example:
|
| https://seatosummit.com/products/ultra-sil-day-pack -
| I've had a few different versions of this bag for years.
| There are also cheaper/bigger/different versions of the
| same sort of thing you can find online for "packable
| daypack".
|
| https://nanobag.com/products/nanobag - I have heard good
| things about these, but I prefer a backpack because it
| allows me to be hands-free, or to use my hands to hold
| more items.
|
| However, I would start by carrying a lightweight "single-
| use" plastic bag, and simply re-use it. Plastic bags are
| not as strong as these premium bags, but they hold up
| well enough to be useful in most scenarios.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| Thank you, these look amazing, I'm going to get one! They
| don't entirely solve my problem because they don't get
| large enough (for the smaller sizes, the larger sizes are
| too large when folded) but they'll be useful to have.
| bane wrote:
| The problem is one more unique to being a walker in a
| city. You're out and about, maybe just walking to the
| park or something so you brought nothing with you, but
| the park you like is a 15 minute walk from your
| apartment.
|
| Near the park there's a great bakery. You see they're
| having a nice sale on a box of a dozen croissants, and
| their croissants are the best in the city. So do you:
|
| - Grab a couple boxes, and a reusable bag to carry them
| in?
|
| - Walk 15 minutes home to get your bag, then 15 minutes
| back, then 15 minutes back home (45 minutes total) just
| so you don't pay $3 for a bag?
|
| - Carry around a bag all the time even though you had no
| intention to buy anything when you left, and use it only
| a few times over the hundreds of time you leave your
| apartment?
| latexr wrote:
| I'm not the person you asked, but I'd do none of the
| above. I'd buy the boxes and carry them. They're
| presumably perfectly ordinary parallelepipedical cake
| boxes, perfectly suited for carrying in your hands.
| There's no need for a bag.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| This is certainly an option (as is not buying the
| pastries), but it gets pretty uncomfortable over a 15 or
| even 10 minute walk, because you have to keep the boxes
| level. You can't just hold them by your side.
|
| It's even worse if you have to e.g. jump on a crowded
| subway.
| latexr wrote:
| And now you know for next time: "there's a great bakery
| near the park that I like, better come prepared". You now
| have two reasons to go there. Take a disposable plastic
| bag (hint: they are and always were reusable) folded in
| your pocket.
|
| This not a hypothetical. I learned pretty fast to always
| bring a mostly empty backpack with me to the park. I pack
| a couple of beach towels, maybe bring a jacket, and an
| e-reader. Sometimes I may not lay down on the grass, or
| not read. Or I may meet with someone and have a towel at
| the ready for them. But I have multiple options and none
| of them is a burden.
|
| Carrying an almost empty backpack for a recreational
| activity takes zero effort, and it can be used to carry
| groceries on the way back if I want. Each of the things I
| carry in it is the result of a previous time where I
| didn't have it. People in this thread are acting as if
| this is an intractable problem. It's not. Every time
| you're faced with a problem of this nature think "what
| could I do to avoid this next time?" then do that.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| If I had to bring a backpack or purse+ everywhere I don't
| think I'd want to live in a walkable city anymore. It
| makes the experience of walking substantially less
| pleasant.
|
| + Or whatever the latest euphemism is for a purse carried
| by a man
| latexr wrote:
| You don't have to bring it _everywhere_. I gave you a
| specific example of somewhere you may want to bring it,
| and why.
|
| Looks like you're not willing to endure any
| inconvenience, however minor, to avoid buying the plastic
| bag and being a bit friendlier to the environment. That's
| your prerogative, but let's not pretend these "problems"
| don't have simple solutions.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| My feeling is that these laws are mostly advocated for
| and passed by people who own and drive cars, even as they
| make life harder mostly for people who _don 't_ drive
| cars. This is despite the fact that driving a car
| _clearly_ releases orders of magnitude more carbon than
| some disposable plastic bags.
|
| If more people were willing to give up their cars (or
| accept something like a 100% extra tax on gasoline to be
| put towards carbon removal efforts), I would be more open
| to arguments to give up my plastic bags.
|
| Put another way: I would like legislation which makes
| walkable, car-free living as easy and painless as
| possible. Disposable plastic bags make car free living
| more pleasant, so they shouldn't be banned unless there
| is a very strong case for significant and meaningful
| carbon savings.
| latexr wrote:
| I don't drive either, so I should be inclined to agree
| with you. But when I'm drowning due to the effects of
| climate change, it won't do me any good to turn to the
| person drowning next to me and tell them it's their
| fault.
|
| Yes, we should pass better laws. Yes, we don't have them
| now. But when (if) we do, I'd rather have a fighting
| chance than it being too late because the water is
| already up to my neck.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| Yes, except that I'm not convinced these laws reduce
| emissions, and I'm concerned they do the opposite. I
| realize the study being cited around this thread [1] was
| commissioned by the plastic industry and is thus suspect,
| but just based off of watching people in the checkout
| line at the grocery store, I see far too many shoppers
| buying "reusable" bags for me to believe they're actually
| being reused enough times. [2]
|
| The inconveniences I'm describing are personal gripes,
| but I don't believe they only apply to me! On the
| contrary, I think they explain all the not-reused
| reusable bag sales. You can say "these people should just
| do X Y and Z", but unless they actually do that, plastic
| bag bans aren't helping the environment.
|
| (If we're exclusively discussing my personal carbon
| emissions, I used to reuse every single one of my
| shopping bags as trash bags. Now I buy separate plastic
| trash bags instead, so my emissions have gone up.)
|
| And then there's the other way they harm the environment:
| we need more people to give up their cars and move to
| cities (or form new walkable cities). If you make city
| life less convenient, fewer people will do that.
|
| ---
|
| 1: https://www.freedoniagroup.com/press-
| releases/freedonia-repo...
|
| 2: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/grocery-bag-
| environmental...
| latexr wrote:
| > If we're exclusively discussing my personal carbon
| emissions
|
| No worries, we definitely aren't.
|
| Unfortunately I have an early flight tomorrow so won't be
| able to continue the conversation. Still, thank you for
| the discussion. Have a nice <your time of day>.
| kibwen wrote:
| _> Disposable plastic bags make car free living more
| pleasant_
|
| Nonsense. I haven't owned a car for years, nor have I
| used anything other than a reusable bag for years.
| Disposable bags are awful for carrying because they tear
| so easily and can't be carried on your shoulder.
| bmicraft wrote:
| If I don't put something heavy in my 20L backpack I
| literally don't think it anymore after a minute or two.
| Even more so with a jacket underneath.
| prmoustache wrote:
| really?
| ruined wrote:
| usually when i'm walking in a city, i'll have a coat with
| pockets or a small bag with me, containing things like a
| water bottle, a snack, an extra layer, a book, maybe
| laptop. it's not hard to fold up a small cloth tote and
| carry that too.
| dfxm12 wrote:
| _Carry around a bag all the time_
|
| As I was saying, this is not the hassle it seems like it
| is being made out to be. Setting that aside, a box seems
| like just as good a vessel to carry as a bag, so in this
| specific case, I really don't understand the issue. If
| this place has such good pastries and you know, you can
| plan ahead and pay full price.
|
| If this really is somehow _life changing_ savings on
| pastries I mean, yeah, taking some extra time walking won
| 't do any harm.
| gruez wrote:
| >* What spur of the moment shopping are you talking
| about?
|
| "Honey, can you get eggs on your way home? We just ran
| out"
| dfxm12 wrote:
| If not being able to carry a carton of eggs in your hands
| a serious concern of yours, I think there are other
| issues at play...
| HPsquared wrote:
| Reusable bags are big and heavy to carry around
| everywhere. Ironically the old disposable bags are much
| better for this reuse scenario.
| orthoxerox wrote:
| There are reusable net bags that are very compact.
| crazygringo wrote:
| If you don't already carry a backpack or other bag, you
| don't have anywhere to put grocery bags. It's not like
| they fit in your jeans pocket.
|
| And I do a lot (the majority?) of my grocery shopping
| spur of the moment. Basically when I'm on my way home and
| realize I have extra time and it's not so late that the
| grocery stores have closed. And my life is such that
| knowing whether I'll have time to shop that evening is
| entirely unpredictable.
| ta1243 wrote:
| The reusable bags in the UK certainly do fit in your
| pocket (when correctly folded up)
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| Can you please link me to something I can buy? I've never
| found something both small enough when folded to be
| pocketable and big enough when expanded to be useful.
| joh6nn wrote:
| Not recommending this specific one, just an example of
| the category: https://www.amazon.com/Reusable-Shopping-
| Eco-Friendly-Waterp...
|
| Search term was "pocket shopping bag"
| crazygringo wrote:
| In a pocket on your bulky winter jacket? Sure.
|
| In your jeans pocket? Not unless you want to look... well
| let's just say that bulging pockets on your butt, _or_ on
| the front of your pant, are not a good look... not to
| mention not being particularly comfortable.
| tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
| They aren't heavy, but they are big/bulky. You can't just
| stuff them in a pocket. Ironically, the "bad" plastic
| bags (thicker and bigger than standard US grocery bags,
| but still a single layer of soft plastic film) could be
| folded into a pocket, while the new "reusable" ones
| can't, making it harder to actually reuse them.
|
| > What spur of the moment shopping are you talking about?
|
| Groceries. It's common around here to shop often but in
| small quantities, because the grocery store is likely
| somewhere on the footpath from work to home, from work to
| public transit, or from public transit to home.
|
| Which means you're either carrying the bulky bag with you
| all day, or using single-use bags. Or, of course, you
| could buy a car to follow the "stop whining just throw a
| few in your trunk" suggestions always posted /s
| dfxm12 wrote:
| _They aren 't heavy, but they are big/bulky. You can't
| just stuff them in a pocket. Ironically, the "bad"
| plastic bags (thicker and bigger than standard US grocery
| bags, but still a single layer of soft plastic film)
| could be folded into a pocket, while the new "reusable"
| ones can't, making it harder to actually reuse them._
|
| This is incorrect. There are reusable bags that fold into
| pocket sized. Ikea has them, among other brands. Now that
| you know, I'm sure you'll reevaluate your outlook on
| them, right?
|
| Additionally, if you're coming back from work, you
| probably already have a bag to carry stuff you need for
| work that you can use to carry a "spur of the moment"
| amount of groceries or other bags. However, this sounds
| more like a regular occurrence you are neglecting to
| prepare for rather than a spur of the moment thing.
| alamortsubite wrote:
| My technique is simply to ask myself if I might need a
| bag while I'm out, and if so, take one with me. Works
| great!
| danielhep wrote:
| I'm also in a city without a car (and am proud of it),
| and also struggle with this. One thing that helped me a
| lot is to buy a few ultra lightweight packable bags. Ones
| that can be packed into a pocket in themselves. Then I
| put these in every backpack I normally carry with me. It
| helps that I rarely leave the apartment without a
| backpack.
| prmoustache wrote:
| Why do you need a bag to begin with if you carry a
| backpack? Is it always full?
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| mine mostly is. It's a tight pack for carrying my laptop
| and similar paraphernalia. It's not really means for
| storing more than a few small pieces of groceries
|
| (note: this is rendered null anyway because I do need to
| drive everywhere in my suburb).
| alamortsubite wrote:
| Taxing the sale of reusable bags to fund a PSA campaign
| might be in order.
| matthewdgreen wrote:
| Our city banned single-use plastic bags. The result is you
| can have paper bags for 5 cents each, or you can buy re-
| usable plastic bags for $1-$2.50 each (usually tilted
| towards the higher end.) Nobody is forcing you to buy re-
| usable plastic, and it's expensive enough to dissuade
| people from buying too many.
|
| BTW, the biggest outcome is that I use fewer bags in
| general, and just don't take a bag when I don't need one.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| For some reason, a lot of retailers around me in New York
| seem to _only_ sell the "reusable" bags, with no option
| for paper. I don't know why, it's very annoying.
|
| My other problem is I can't reuse paper bags as trash
| bags (because even a tiny amount of liquid will leak
| through). So now I have to buy plastic trash bags, which
| sucks because I _do_ in fact care about the environment.
| matthewdgreen wrote:
| As far as I can tell, that's a retailer decision and not
| something mandated by the state or city.
|
| But the real problem with single-use plastic bags is that
| they blow out of dumpsters and landfills. They're
| incredibly bad for the environment, in ways that re-
| usable bags and even larger trash bags are not.
| dotnet00 wrote:
| The paper bags aren't that reliable though. They're fine
| if you're just carrying the groceries to/from your car,
| but then you're also likely to already have a bunch of
| bags/baskets laying in the car. They also suck for cold
| stuff (eg milk), as the condensation quickly renders them
| useless.
| cycomanic wrote:
| I'm confused, in all the places that I'm aware of (3
| countries) supermarkets sell paper bags for cases like
| these.
|
| Moreover if it is such an issue for you why don't you buy
| one of these soft thin fabric bags that essentially roll up
| into their own little bag and are small enough to always
| carry around?
|
| Like these https://www.ulsterweavers.com/collections/roll-
| up-bags
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| The problem with the roll up bags is they're still too
| bulky to fit in my pants or jacket pocket.
| graemep wrote:
| I wonder what the environmental impact of paper bags is?
| The paper has to come from somewhere.
| bmicraft wrote:
| Paper is literally renewable and also easily recycled
| didntcheck wrote:
| Sure, the disposal side of the story is probably better,
| but as I understand they require more energy to produce
| than plastic bags (at least the old thin ones), and
| anecdotally they get reused way less, partly due to
| frequent tears, but also ironically _because_ people
| instinctively shove them straight in the recycling when
| they get home
| graemep wrote:
| The renewable bit is not straightforward because it means
| greater land use to produce. Similar problem to biofuels.
| fooster wrote:
| Certainly in Canada where one time use plastic bags are
| banned the supermarkets do not provide paper bags. They
| will sell you reusable bags which are larger (and
| therefore more resource intensive to produce) which are
| often not reused. I have a huge collection of them at
| home.
| VancouverMan wrote:
| I've got some colleagues who live in apartment buildings
| in an area of Canada that's like that.
|
| About half a year ago, they were telling me about how
| they're seeing more and more of those thicker bags in
| their buildings' large shared garbage dumpsters, rather
| than the much thinner plastic bags that used to be used
| for bundling garbage back when they were still readily
| available.
|
| I wouldn't be surprised if it has gotten worse since
| then, as people have gradually used up the thin plastic
| bags they'd previously collected and used for bundling
| garbage.
| raydev wrote:
| > If enough people are forgetful, the "90% of the new
| reusable bags are used a mere two or three times" seems
| very plausible to me.
|
| Sure, and this definitely happened in my region of Canada
| where plastic bags were banned already, but eventually
| people will stop forgetting once their closet fills with
| too many reusable bags.
| dan_mctree wrote:
| We need supermarkets to provide places where people can
| donate or sell their excess reusable shopping so other
| people can pick them up and use. That should put a big dent
| in the necessity for people to make use of new bags if they
| didn't bring their own reusable bags
| gedy wrote:
| > the idea that they're going to be buying these new bags
| ever other trip to the store ... is hard for me to believe.
|
| Have seen these "reusable bags" that the store gives you?
| They are basically the same as before, just a lot thicker and
| more plastic.
|
| They are not nice woven bags or something. People then seem
| to keep using them as trash can liners.
| not_a_shill wrote:
| I reuse them once and throw them away, exactly the same way I
| did with the thinner bags.
| gambiting wrote:
| Really? Why? I have a bunch of thick Sainsburys bags that I
| bought probably 5 years ago and I still use them for
| shopping every week - they will have been used probably 200
| times each, easy. No idea why I'd throw them out.
| not_a_shill wrote:
| I just use them like trash bags /bin liners. I have
| fabric reusable ones I just forget or are unable to bring
| half the time.
|
| Re: throwing them out vs recycling them, our bags you can
| only recycle at the store themselves...so just a bit too
| much friction to bother with. I can't recall ever seeing
| or hearing of anyone recycling them that way either.
| gambiting wrote:
| I have a feeling we might be talking about different
| things. I'm talking about bags like these:
|
| https://www.google.com/aclk?sa=l&ai=DChcSEwjk8p3YqZKEAxVQ
| ZZE...
| not_a_shill wrote:
| They sell those kinds of bags here too, but these are the
| ones that a lot of people in this thread are talking
| about
|
| https://www.northjersey.com/gcdn/presto/2019/06/07/PNJM/7
| 4a3...
| revscat wrote:
| Is this something you are proud of?
| inpdx wrote:
| Suggestion - reuse them.
| samdunham wrote:
| Exact same thing here. I reused the thin plastic bags as
| trash can liners. And I use the new, thicker ones, the same
| way. I'm contributing exactly the same number of bags back
| into the environment, they just have a whole lot more
| plastic in each bag.
| eropple wrote:
| _> the idea that they're going to be buying these new bags
| ever other trip to the store because they're piling up in a
| room at home for years is hard for me to believe._
|
| One of the things that pushed me away from using Instacart
| was that they'd always bring groceries in the heavyweight
| bags.
|
| I reuse them now that I stopped using Instacart, but I
| certainly collected a whole pile of them.
| BandButcher wrote:
| Super anecdotal but when i first moved to Austin Tx and went
| to a Walmart, they told me i had to pay for plastic or paper
| bags. I was completely thrown off and the cashier told me
| they did a "ban" on plastic bags, and that many people buy
| the "tougher" plastic bags and resuse them.
|
| A week or so later i had bought resuable bags, like 2-3, and
| would always leave them in my car. It became 2nd nature to me
| almost instantly. Since them I've always used reusable tote
| bags until they break. I even have one from a party i threw
| more than 6 years ago that belonged to someone esle lol
|
| Ive since move back home to a city that has no plastic ban
| and im literally the only person who brings tote bags into
| stores. The only downside now is i can sometimes look sketch
| as hell but yea idc i support resuable bags hopefully more
| people can minimize their plastic footprint in plastic bags
| or other ways
| dvngnt_ wrote:
| I had a great time at the party you threw but I really need
| my bag back. you keep ignoring my calls
| dzhiurgis wrote:
| Now that I got used to reusable bag, touching plastic ones
| feels disgusting
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| If I'm driving in my car, no problem. But I often go to the
| store by foot from somewhere else and am unprepared. The
| disposable bags are only like 8 cents anyways.
| dazc wrote:
| In the UK, Waitrose sell a re-usable bag or PS1 ($1.25). It's
| a good quality bag and you're not going to throw it away.
|
| Not sure on the actual data but other grocery stores have
| gradually increased the price of re-usable bags to the point
| where they are cost enough to make you think twice about
| paying for them.
|
| Seeing people awkwardly carrying random items back home
| without a bag is not uncommon.
| graemep wrote:
| I do reuse those but not all that many times.
|
| I do still buy a lot of bags and I sometimes do not have
| one on me.
| eckesicle wrote:
| https://i.imgur.com/GKMjP7p.jpg
|
| Maybe I'm an outlier but I have another 3-4 of these bags of
| bags at home with reusable bags. Most people I talk to have
| the same.
|
| I do refill my car with them occasionally, but I either
| forget to bring them or do grocery shopping at unanticipated
| times and don't have a bag with me.
| starky wrote:
| They do pile up though even if you use them. I've never
| purposely purchased one of these bags, but have acquired way
| too many of them just from getting deliveries or picking up
| things I order in advance. I've disposed of so many of them
| after only a single use because I don't have room and will
| never use them.
|
| On top of that, I've made the problem even worse because they
| are just horribly bulky to carry around if you aren't driving
| to the places you shop. Due to this bulk I went out and
| purchased some nice thin nylon bags that are easily
| pocketable so I actually use them. But they came in a package
| of like 30 when I've needed maybe 5 of them including the
| ones I've given to people.
| BeetleB wrote:
| My reply will probably be lost in all the comments, but when
| they banned plastic bags here, many stores (Target, Safeway
| etc) introduced fairly thick plastic bags that they sell for
| 10c. The way they get around it is they label them as
| "reusable" - because they're quite sturdy/thick.
|
| But other than being thicker and stiffer, they look just like
| the old plastic bags.
|
| Most people I know don't know they're reusable (and probably
| don't care). So they use them as single use bags. It's only
| 10 cents.
|
| Textbook case of unintended consequence of regulation.
|
| Here's an example from WinCo:
|
| https://peopleinparks.com/2019/02/07/dear-reusable-winco-
| bag...
| niceice wrote:
| > Though intended to be reused many times, the report says 90%
| of the new reusable bags are used a mere two or three times. So
| they are piling up in landfills and homes. Think of your own
| behavior in misplacing bags around the house or forgetting to
| bring them when heading out for groceries.
|
| I have a hard time believing it's 90%. Seriously?
|
| They aren't _that_ cheap and it 's easy to keep track of them.
| gruez wrote:
| People aren't buying new reusable bags because they lost
| them. They're buying because they went to a store and forgot
| to bring a bag, and therefore forced to buy a "reusable" bag,
| even though they already have 10 at home.
| niceice wrote:
| You learn how to avoid that after it happens a couple
| times.
| yunwal wrote:
| Many don't. Also, even if it's only one in 10 times that
| you forget, it's still much worse for the environment
| than using paper bags
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| > They aren't that cheap and it's easy to keep track of them.
|
| I think some folks may be thinking of different types of
| reusable bags. Where I live the "default" reusable bags at
| the grocery store, which are basically pretty similar to
| disposable but bigger with thicker plastic, are 29 cents.
| They do sell hardier bags that you can by that are like
| $1.25. But I think tons of folks throw away those $.29 bags
| after one or two uses.
| lh7777 wrote:
| Here, they're only 8 cents each -- not much incentive to
| treat them as reusable. Plus these "reusable" plastic bags
| are magnets for dirt and difficult to clean.
| crazygringo wrote:
| Exactly this.
|
| Heavy duty plastic bags might work great if you always keep
| them in your car.
|
| But I live in NYC where you carry everything by hand -- and
| people certainly aren't always carrying empty bags with them,
| the way you might if you had a trunk.
|
| There are two supermarkets I go to where they don't have paper
| bags, but will charge you $0.25 to $0.45 for a heavy duty
| plastic bag (two sizes).
|
| I'd say that about a third of the time the person in front of
| me buys between 1 to 3 of them.
|
| So at least at those locations, the overall usage of plastic
| has gone _way, way up_ compared to the old thin plastic bags.
| 1980phipsi wrote:
| There was just an article about how this happened in New
| Jersey as well.
|
| https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/01/25/new-
| je...
| crazygringo wrote:
| Oh wow -- "New Jersey's plastic consumption triples after
| plastic bag ban enacted, study shows".
|
| And most people drive there. In NYC it might be even worse
| than just tripling.
| cratermoon wrote:
| That article sources the same report commissioned by the
| plastic industry lobbying group, so take it with a large
| grain of salt.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| ...wait, wouldn't the plastic industry be delighted that
| people are using more plastic?
| phatfish wrote:
| Indeed, which is why it is strange they are pushing this
| narrative that reusable is "bad", rather than keeping
| quite.
| cratermoon wrote:
| Maybe the narrative is obscuring something with
| statistics. If reusable doesn't really make plastic use
| go up, and that bag bans are effective in reducing
| plastic use, the industry opposing them has an incentive
| to make it _look_ like they are ineffective. They 're
| using the same tactics the tobacco industry used to
| counter the facts about cigarettes.
| dashundchen wrote:
| Yes, which is why they'd have a interest in publishing
| studies that make bag bans look useless or
| counterproductive, because they want to persuade people
| not to pass or to repeal bans.
| dfxm12 wrote:
| _But I live in NYC where you carry everything by hand_
|
| In the NYC I've been to (and large city I live in),
| everything is carried in a back pack, laptop bag, shoulder
| bag, etc.
| crazygringo wrote:
| That's what I meant by carrying by hand. In bags.
|
| But a lot of people _aren 't_ stashing 2 or 4 reusable
| grocery bags in their laptop bag. And people often aren't
| carrying any bag at all.
| bmicraft wrote:
| Why would you ever unexpectedly need _four_ bags in
| addition to your backpack or whatever? Or two for that
| matter.
| crazygringo wrote:
| When _wouldn 't_ you?
|
| When I go grocery shopping, I'm buying probably 20 pounds
| of veggies, meat, milk, cheese, eggs, etc. along with
| bulky items like tortilla chips. If you use the woven
| plastic bags that you carry in your hands (like the old
| plastic bags but twice the size), you need 4 -- two for
| each hand.
|
| There are also the jumbo super-heavy bags you get from
| e.g. FreshDirect where you only need one and you sling it
| over your shoulder, but those things are huge even folded
| up and I don't want to be carrying around one of those
| regularly. Folded, they're thicker than my laptop...
| superrad wrote:
| Do you not plan to go grocery shopping or do you always
| do it on the spur of the moment? I'm not sure what the
| issue is. If you need to pick up something small from the
| store on the way somewhere you can definetly get a small
| always carry on you bag that will fit in a pocket. When
| you're going to actual go grocery shopping just bring the
| bigger reusable bags. If the purpose of the journey is
| shopping it's not inconvenient to carry those bags and
| you'll have to carry the grocies back anyhow.
|
| I get that it's less conventient to have to remember a
| bag but it's not some insurmountable task and it does
| seem to reduce the amount of plastic bags that get caught
| by the wind and blow around as trash.
| crazygringo wrote:
| Spur of the moment -- my schedule is always changing. I
| know I need to go sometime during the week but it's
| totally going to depend on when I happen to have free
| time on the way home, and I generally won't know that
| until I'm heading home. It might be Tuesday, or it might
| not be till Friday.
|
| Always having a bunch of bags on me just isn't a thing,
| not when you walk and take the subway everywhere and
| don't want to be lugging around a backpack when you go
| out for drinks and have nowhere to put it when you're
| standing around a bar.
|
| I'll take the big bag when it's on the weekend and I'm
| making a special trip to the supermarket, but there isn't
| always an opportunity for that either.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| I live in NYC and I don't carry a bag when I go out, which
| is the problem. I don't think this is entirely uncommon.
| rayiner wrote:
| Yeah, at $0.50 I'm just going to buy a few and throw them
| away after. It's not worth $1.50 of my time to shlep a bag to
| the grocery store. You'd have to make the bags a lot more
| expensive to influence primary behavior.
| phatfish wrote:
| When I went to Germany for the first time in around 2009
| they didn't have any bags at the grocery store checkout.
| You either carried you shopping in your arms or took one of
| the cardboard boxes they brought out from the deliveries,
| if there were some left.
|
| You remember your own bags after that.
|
| At that time in the UK free disposable bags were in full
| force. Although i do remember when i was young we used to
| take shopping home in cardboard boxes stacked at the front
| of the store in the same way as they had in Germany still.
| bbarn wrote:
| There are a number of bag that pack down to self enclosed
| things smaller than a phone. When I lived in Chicago, and
| rarely drove anywhere, I had two of them in my coat pocket.
|
| Summer time I was always biking anyway, and used my backpack.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| > There are a number of bag that pack down to self enclosed
| things smaller than a phone.
|
| Are the bags of a reasonable size when expanded? Can you
| please link me? I've never found anything both big enough
| to be useful and small enough to keep in my pants pocket at
| all times.
| cycomanic wrote:
| Ijust linked above. I never used these specifically, but
| similar. Plenty big enough (definitely better for
| carrying things than disposable plastic bags)
|
| https://www.ulsterweavers.com/collections/roll-up-bags
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| Those are too bulky unfortunately. If I walked around
| with one of those in my pants pocket, it would look
| like... well, you know what.
| onlyrealcuzzo wrote:
| Why doesn't NYC have paper bags?
| crazygringo wrote:
| Some stores in NYC do, but it's up to the store.
|
| In my experience, higher-end national chains offer paper
| bags for $0.05 each (Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, etc.) and
| don't sell the $0.50 plastic ones at checkout, while the
| local chains (FoodTown, Associated, etc.) only sell the
| plastic ones and don't offer paper.
|
| I have no idea why.
| okl wrote:
| Couldn't imagine buying a damned plastic bag every single time
| I went shopping for groceries. I've been using the same fabric
| bags for 15 years. It is such stupidity, being to lazy to pack
| a bag, that humanity wastes resources on.
| gruez wrote:
| >It is such stupidity, being to lazy to pack a bag, that
| humanity wastes resources on.
|
| It's spending resources for convenience. It's not
| fundamentally different than buying coffee at starbucks
| (therefore necessitating a plastic lined paper cup).
| teamspirit wrote:
| Both can be true. Either way, both are the reasons why we
| are where we are with regard to the climate.
| zzzeek wrote:
| you can bring a reusable cup to Starbucks and they will
| fill it for you, this is not anything new
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| What percentage of people do you think actually do this?
| zzzeek wrote:
| wow where'd those goalposts just go? I was over here, at
| "buying at Starbucks *necessitates* (OP's term) using a
| plastic lined, paper cup". Which is false.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| The OP (who was not me) should not have said
| "necessitates". However, I don't think the distinction is
| significant given how few Starbucks customers use
| reusable cups.
| zzzeek wrote:
| until California (it's always California) bans paper
| cups.
| rayiner wrote:
| It's convenience. People are paying a $1.50 surcharge to
| avoid the advance planning. That's a no-brainer.
| zzzeek wrote:
| why would you cite a "study" that's commissioned by an industry
| trade group where their entire purpose for existing and for
| which they are paid millions of dollars is to ensure that
| plastic bags are not banned?
| zzzeek wrote:
| oh right, it's _odd_ numbered days that HN is all "There's a
| reproducibility crisis! 85% of studies are complete garbage!"
| this is an _even_ numbered day, HN is all "this study done
| by a fully biased source that's by definition a conflict of
| interest is fully iron clad and irrefutable!"
|
| know your days on HN when each version of reality is in
| effect!
| browningstreet wrote:
| I have 3 Whole Foods reusable bags I've been using for over 15
| years. I just don't believe people are using these only 3 times
| and throwing them away.
| Thorrez wrote:
| If you go Whole Foods and watch a checkout station, what
| percent of purchases will reuse a bag vs buy a bag. I think
| the ratio of reuse:buy will be less than 3:1.
| aeternum wrote:
| I've thrown away a ton of polypropylene bags because stuff
| leaked or you just accumulate too many.
|
| Those bags are so thick that throwing away one is like throwing
| away 500 of the other super thin plastic bags. There's no way
| the equation makes sense for most people no matter how much we
| want to believe it.
| phatfish wrote:
| You throw them because something leaked. Why not clean it
| with a cloth?
|
| I've used the same 3 long lasting plastic bags for the weekly
| shop for around 4 years now. I take a couple of thinner ones
| I reuse when just going to get a few things. Ive had some of
| those for years as well.
|
| I'm in the UK, we went to Canada last year. It was crazy how
| much disposable plastic i saw walking out the doors of Costco
| and other large grocery stores. Also, Costco put milk in a
| plastic bag in Canada! Why not a rigid plastic container that
| can be recycled?
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| > Why not clean it with a cloth?
|
| How much does it cost to clean the cloth? How much time and
| effort relative to the cost of the bag?
|
| This is why targeting specific products to reduce
| consumption is stupid. Just hit all fossil fuels with
| higher and higher taxes if you want less fossil fuel
| consumption. Or all products an externalities tax if you
| want less waste.
| crazygringo wrote:
| They can just get nasty though.
|
| When the inside has gotten coated with sticky chicken
| salmonella juices because of a leaking package, and the
| bottom has gross dirt from sitting on the sidewalk and
| subway, and the bag is made of a woven plastic so that the
| juices and dirt seep in...
|
| ...it's entirely understandable that you just trash it
| rather than attempt to clean it. This is what you carry
| food and fresh produce in, after all.
| phatfish wrote:
| Sure if it is horrible it might be necessary, if warm
| water and disinfectant spray don't sort it out. We have
| not had our grocery shopping leak that badly that I can
| remember.
| crazygringo wrote:
| It really depends on the supermarket. If they sell the
| expensive chicken that comes sealed in rigid plastic from
| the "manufacturer", it doesn't leak. But that's double
| the price. When you're buying the normal-priced chicken
| that the supermarket apportions out into those yellow
| styrofoam trays that they then seal in plastic
| themselves... ugh. Chicken juice everywhere.
| phatfish wrote:
| I see, meat packaging is different in the UK. Styrofoam
| trays are not used in any major stores, they all use the
| same rigid sealed containers, even the cheap options.
|
| Butchers cutting meat for you is much less common in
| store now, those that do have a butchers counter wrap it
| in a plastic bag which seals it pretty well. Small
| independent shops might do it differently.
|
| I think in general those styrofoam trays are not used
| much because they can't be recycled. You still find them
| used by some takeaway food places though.
| tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
| Because cleaning it is a PITA and I've accumulated dozens
| of them when I went shopping and didn't have a bag/didn't
| have enough bags and was forced to buy another heavy
| "reusable forever" bag because the lighter options were
| either banned or removed to appear more green.
| matthewdgreen wrote:
| I don't think you should throw away polypropylene bags
| because they got a little dirty. They're easily washable.
|
| That said, the main benefit of these heavier bags is that
| they tend not to blow out of dumpsters and landfills in the
| wind, the way thin single-use plastic bags do. A bit of
| plastic in a landfill isn't great, but entire forests and
| waterways choked with plastic bags is vastly worse. E.g.,:
| https://www.frontiersman.com/opinions/spectrum-plastic-
| bags-...
| chimeracoder wrote:
| That "study" was commissioned by a trade group whose sole
| purpose is to lobby against plastic bag bans, and whose members
| consist of entities who have a direct profit motive in
| disposable plastic bag sales.
|
| This is, almost literally, equivalent to citing a press release
| by Big Oil as evidence against anthropogenic climate change.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Recyclable_Plastic_Ba...
| gruez wrote:
| That's reason to be suspicious, but not a reason to dismiss
| it outright. Trials for covid vaccines were done by the
| manufacturers, who certainly have a profit motive in claiming
| they're safe and effective. Do you dismiss those trials for
| similar reasons?
| phatfish wrote:
| Is there an equivalent of the FDA for plastic bags?
| chimeracoder wrote:
| > Trials for covid vaccines were done by the manufacturers,
| who certainly have a profit motive in claiming they're safe
| and effective. Do you dismiss those trials for similar
| reasons?
|
| One is a set of clinical trials, conducted with
| prepublished scientific methodology peer reviewed,
| independently evaluated by a regulatory agency, and
| subsequently independently studied by independent
| researchers. The other is a self-published press release.
|
| Anyone who tries to draw an equivalence between the two
| either has no idea how the scientific method actually
| works, or is simply not arguing in good faith.
| dangus wrote:
| This is about as biased a report as one can get! An opinion
| piece by a Rupert Murdoch editorial staff citing a threatened
| industry conducting research on itself.
|
| I'm highly skeptical of the idea that people are throwing away
| their reusable bags after 2-3 uses.
|
| They're also hand-waving away the concept of alternative lower
| carbon disposable materials, because it's a plastic bag
| industry association.
| inpdx wrote:
| "the report says 90% of the new reusable bags are used a mere
| two or three times."
|
| I'm deeply skeptical of this. Who buys a reusable bag then
| tosses it? I've only ever thrown away one or two that got rips.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| I'm not skeptical at all. There are a lot of reusable bags
| like this, https://www.heb.com/product-detail/h-e-b-reduce-
| your-boot-pr..., which cost about a quarter (so not something
| that would really affect people's saving behavior).
|
| My guess is it's something like that famous "daycare late
| fee" study that was widely discussed after Freakonomics
| reported on it, https://freakonomics.com/2013/10/what-makes-
| people-do-what-t.... Essentially, the fee wasn't high enough
| to cause parents to need to be on time, instead the fee was
| more like something to pay off their guilt, so adding the fee
| caused _more_ lateness in parental pickups. I.e. before there
| was a late fee, parents would feel somewhat guilty if they
| were late. After the late fee, they didn 't feel bad - after
| all, they were basically paying to be late.
|
| My suspicion with these kinds of bags, which are very cheap
| and honestly feel just a bit sturdier than disposable baggs,
| is that the same dynamic is at play. People feel like "I'm a
| good environmentalist for reusing this bag once or twice" and
| then toss them.
| echelon wrote:
| Me. I've tried again and again, but they all wind up in a
| pile at home. I forget to empty them and take them. They're
| never in the car when I need them.
|
| I probably have had twenty to thirty reusable bags. Most of
| them get thrown away.
|
| Not everyone is built the same way. I think this is
| hard/impossible for people with ADHD to manage.
| yunwal wrote:
| FWIW, I have ADHD, and once I amassed like 30 of these
| things, I kept as many as possible stuffed inside one of
| them in my car. Then, I had like 30 opportunities between
| then and when I ran out to remember to bring all my bags to
| the car again. It worked out well. Now my grocery store has
| a give-a-bag, take-a-bag stand which is even better.
| yunwal wrote:
| The scenario is this: you show up to the grocery store and
| you don't have a reusable bag today. Maybe you forgot to re-
| stash it in your car after bringing in groceries last time,
| maybe you walked there and don't carry a bag on you.
|
| If you live in a state with a single-use bag ban, your
| options are: buy a reusable bag for 50 cents, or travel 15
| mins round trip to grab one of your bags.
|
| Once you get home, you note that you already have a dozen
| reusable bags so you throw it away and stash one of your
| existing ones for next time.
|
| I use reusable bags a lot, and did even before single-use
| ones were taxed, but maybe 5% of the time, I show up to the
| grocery store having forgotten one. I'm almost certain if I
| were in a state with a single-use ban my footprint would be
| higher (especially because I normally use paper bags when I
| forget, which have a negligible environmental impact).
|
| IMO, the entire ban was a gift to the plastics industry. I'm
| sure the margins on these reusable bags are much higher.
| CoffeeOnWrite wrote:
| I live in CA where we have a ban on single-use _plastic_
| bags. We still have single-use paper bags. So your
| footprint would be the same here, not higher.
| yunwal wrote:
| That makes sense and I'd support that. In New York and
| New Jersey all single-use bags are banned and I'm almost
| positive it's counterproductive. Especially in NYC where
| many people aren't using cars to grocery shop and can't
| keep a bag stashed
| CoffeeOnWrite wrote:
| Yikes. I occasionally forget bags, and appreciate that we
| can get paper bags here for 20-25 cents. I also reuse
| those paper bags once or twice, and then use them for
| collecting compost on my countertop, and then throw the
| whole bag in the big city compost bin. This system means
| I don't need to clean or line a proper countertop compost
| container.
| inpdx wrote:
| We absolutely should price reusable bags higher then.
|
| If I forget my bags and I don't have many groceries I'll
| just not use bags at all. Otherwise I'll use paper, which
| isn't great but it's not adding to plastic trash.
|
| Also plastic bags are generally around a $1. I'm not
| throwing those away, economic reasons and on principle.
| happytiger wrote:
| This seems like a setup to counter the bag bans by the plastic
| industry.
|
| It's not like _paper bags_ , which are _incredibly compostable
| and recyclable_ , didn't exist before this entire plastic
| nonsense came to fruition. And they are readily available,
| domestically produced and work great.
|
| All we need are better _handles_ because they aren't great for
| carrying long distances and break catastrophically instead of
| stretching like plastic. Not great.
| chimeracoder wrote:
| > This seems like a setup to counter the bag bans by the
| plastic industry.
|
| The "study" cited was literally conducted and written by the
| plastic industry, so that's exactly what it is.
| DavidWoof wrote:
| > Commissioned by the American Recyclable Plastic Bag Alliance
|
| AKA the lobbying group for plastic bag manufacturers, a group
| whose entire purpose is opposing plastic bag bans, quoted by
| the WSJ editorial board.
|
| This is about as bad a source as one could possibly imagine.
| cratermoon wrote:
| This is an interesting attempt by the industry most affected by
| the bans[1] to reframe the problem. Plastic bag bans address
| the nature of the system by applying a systemic solution,
| taking the responsibility off the individual. Here we see the
| industry lobbying group trying to reframe it to put the
| responsibility - fault, really - back on the individual. The
| report more-or-less is saying that the systemic solution
| doesn't work because individuals are irresponsible. The WSJ
| editorial doesn't even try to hid its bias. "Think of your own
| behavior", it says.
|
| 1 The ARPBA is connected to the Society of the Plastics
| Industry, an industry trade group.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| That all makes sense to me, but I'd just add that another issue
| not discussed there is litter. I used to live downtown by a big
| grocery store, and close to the store there was a creek that
| ran by. Before the bag ban there were always _tons_ of plastic
| grocery bags in the creek and along its banks. After the ban, I
| 'm not saying the creek was pristine (it is an urban creek in a
| major American city, after all), but there was way, way less
| plastic bag litter after the ban, and it made the walkway that
| ran alongside the creek much nicer.
| kyrra wrote:
| Sounds like a failure of not enforcing a broken windows
| policy.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| Never a fan of suggested "solutions" that are laughably
| implausible. Even if you support public canings for
| everyone ever caught dropping a plastic bag, can we not
| pretend that something like that could ever be implemented
| in the Western world? Plastic bag bans can.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| >can we not pretend that something like that could ever
| be implemented in the Western world?
|
| it says a lot that we simply dismiss "don't break stuff"
| as am impossibility in the western world. Wonder what the
| Easter world does so differently.
| throwawaymaths wrote:
| A lot of times litter is not from litter _ing_. A home
| trash can 's lid blows open in a strong wind and litter
| flies out. Trash escapes from an urban trash can. Trash
| flies out of the back of a garbage truck, etc.
| lolinder wrote:
| The biggest cause in my neighborhood is the pickup
| process itself: the machine lifts the can in the air,
| turns it upside down, shakes it, and _hopes_ that it all
| makes it into the truck.
|
| A lot of smaller stuff doesn't make it in, especially
| disposable plastic bags, which are basically little
| parachutes.
| pfdietz wrote:
| So, maybe Ogden, Utah's cleanliness was due to bear-proof
| garbage containers?
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| How do cities in Japan avoid these problems?
| davidmurdoch wrote:
| The people and culture.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| How does that help if a trash can lid gets blown off?
| davidmurdoch wrote:
| I don't know, I haven't spent much time there and have
| only visited 3 major cities. But in each it was evident
| that they prioritize cleanliness and order, so I might
| guess that they generally use cans with better lids.
|
| At around 9pm in downtown Tokyo I stopped to watch a
| clean up crew scrubbing something of the sidewalk. So
| perhaps it's partly due to where their tax money goes.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| To be clear, I asked this question because I was
| considering the claim "a lot of times litter is not from
| littering." It occurred to me that, if this were true,
| you would expect culture to have less of an effect on the
| amount of litter in a particular city.
|
| I suppose tax dollars and trash can technology would also
| be a plausible explanation, but it leaves me less
| convinced.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| Because Japan just has less trash can lids to blow off.
|
| https://livejapan.com/en/in-tokyo/in-pref-tokyo/in-
| shibuya/a...
|
| And as you see with the design of their cans they aren't
| just holes with some plastic top loosely strewn on it.
|
| But yes, I'd chalk up a society used to carrying their
| trash until they find a sparsely spaced trash can
| "culture".
| throwawaymaths wrote:
| fewer outdoor trash cans. People carry trash home or e.g.
| to a storefront with an public indoor trash.
| WalterBright wrote:
| The D Foundation had our annual conference a few years ago in
| Ogden, Utah. There was something unusual about the city,
| something it took me a while to figure out.
|
| There was an almost complete lack of litter.
|
| I don't know how the city did it, but I was impressed, and it
| made the urban landscape much nicer.
| wredue wrote:
| I bought rather large plastic totes. Way better than bags. Not
| as easy to store, mind you, but that's actually beneficial
| cause it makes me bring them back out to the car. Forgetting my
| reusable bags was a major problem.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| And no one was surprised.
|
| Still a wide success for the Environmental Theater: focus all
| attention on plastic _bags_ (why so specific? plastic is used
| in way, way too many things already), which is used by
| consumers. It doesn't matter if the use of plastic is reduced.
|
| Just spin the wheels and point fingers. It's much simpler than
| solving environmental problems.
| atlantic wrote:
| Along those lines: instead of banning plastic bags, or
| bottles, or straws, or whatever, why not simply ban plastic
| altogether? People managed to do without until the 1950s. Is
| there any use case for which there are no alternatives?
| bane wrote:
| That's very interesting finding. I can see how people buy the
| reusable bags more frequently than might be originally though.
| I often forget that I brought my bags in from my car and have
| to mentally remember to keep a couple in my trunk for the times
| when I'm out shopping. To be honest, because I have a car, when
| I forget, I just forgo the bag entirely and load everything in
| my trunk anyways.
|
| I've settled on using the catering bags from Panera because
| they
|
| - come with catering orders anyway
|
| - are incredibly heavy duty, I've used them dozens of times and
| they still are in great shape
|
| - are very large
|
| - usually just get trashed after the lunch
|
| My workplace caters lunches once a week or so, and so there's
| been plenty of bags leftover at the end so...
|
| _edit_ a quick look on ebay shows that there 's a secondary
| market for the bags where they go for around $10 each.
| skrebbel wrote:
| > American Recyclable Plastic Bag Alliance
|
| This is a lobby group. Their goal is to produce and sell as
| much plastic as they can. The more people reuse plastic bags,
| the less money they make. Their argument is worth as much as
| that of the tobacco lobby. That doesn't mean they're wrong,
| just that they sure won't quote any ideas or statistics in
| favour of reuse.
|
| Don't forget, folks: "recyclable" is an extremely low bar. Most
| things are recyclable. But many recyclable products are still
| so expensive (and energy-hungry) to _actually_ recycle that the
| term is borderline meaningless.
|
| Reuse trumps recyclable by a wide margin and anybody telling
| you otherwise is either working in a very narrow set of
| industries (eg paper) or malicious.
| devoutsalsa wrote:
| Lobbying groups are important. Great work was done by the
| National Frozen Pizza Institute to educate us all on the
| health benefits of eating frozen pizza => https://web.archive
| .org/web/20120704101823/http://www.frozen...
| paulmd wrote:
| Very healthy except for 6-8th graders, you mean
| up2isomorphism wrote:
| Can we get to the fact without first pointing out they are
| your dislike? This is a very bad argument and gets you no
| where.
|
| In this case, which part of the statement in the above claim
| is not true?
| lolinder wrote:
| Pointing out that research was paid for by an organization
| that has an inherent conflict of interest is an extremely
| valid argument. It doesn't necessarily mean that the
| research was biased or shoddy, but it absolutely should
| cause us to take their conclusions with a healthy helping
| of salt.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| It's not really about the claim being "true" or "untrue".
| It's about being clear from the outset, based on their
| obvious conflicts of interests, that this organization is
| only going to report on study outcomes that benefit their
| perspective, even if they are true. For example, given all
| the evidence I've seen on this topic, I believe all of the
| following are highly likely to be true:
|
| 1. Disposable plastic bag bans significantly reduce plastic
| bag litter and its effects on urban quality of life and the
| environment.
|
| 2. Most reusable plastics bags are only used once or few
| times before they are discarded.
|
| 3. Given #2, the amount of fossil fuels used to produce the
| reusable bags makes them a net negative in terms of
| greenhouse gas emissions.
|
| The basic problem with all discourse these days is that
| depending on your "side", you only talk about the items
| that benefit your viewpoint. American Recyclable Plastic
| Bag Alliance only talks about #2 and #3. At least the group
| referenced in the original article agrees that the current
| situation leads to more plastic being generated and should
| be corrected:
|
| "Grocery stores, restaurants and retail shops should not be
| permitted to distribute plastic film bags of any thickness
| at checkout. Stores should be required to charge a fee of
| at least 10 cents for single-use paper bags. A 10-cent
| paper bag fee will limit the expected increase in paper bag
| use after a bag ban is imposed and may even reduce paper
| bag consumption altogether."
| swells34 wrote:
| The point isn't that the original commenter doesn't like
| them, it's that this is a lobbying group. As such, they
| have no credibility on this topic. So, in any discussion
| involving them, everything they say needs to be looked at
| as a ploy in support of their agenda, because it is their
| job to do that. To treat their word the same as anyone
| else's on this topic would be very stupid.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| If I remember correctly, the effects of that study were driven
| by grocery delivery. People would have the bags pile up due to
| a lack of a bag-return process. (Please double check, though.)
| snakeyjake wrote:
| >Though intended to be reused many times, the report says 90%
| of the new reusable bags are used a mere two or three times.
|
| This is easily fixed. I know because I fixed myself and if I
| can change this behavior anyone can.
|
| I've been using the same three cloth bags to carry my groceries
| once per week for over ten years.
|
| That's, at a bare minimum (because they hold more), 1,560
| plastic bags not used.
|
| How does the carbon carbon footprint and greenhouse gas
| emissions of 1,560 plastic bags compare to the three "Earthwise
| EXTRA LARGE Grocery Bag Beach Shopping Tote HEAVY DUTY 12 oz
| Cotton Canvas Multi Purpose 20" x 14" PROUDLY MADE IN THE USA
| (Natural)" that I purchased for $13.99 for in 2012?
|
| Yes, it took me a while to get in the habit of using them. A
| frustratingly long time. But it happened.
|
| My county recently banned ALL plastic bags so for the
| occasional drug store or gas station purchase that used to come
| in a plastic bag I purchased a packable tote that stuffs down
| to the size of a pack of playing cards and keep it in my center
| console of my car.
|
| That habit was established instantly.
|
| I know for an unassailable and irrefutable fact that bans work
| because I am a volunteer watershed steward. It is my job to
| poke around storm drains and shorelines in my little section of
| the Chesapeake Bay to make sure they are clean. Less than 90
| days (four big cleanup pushes per year) after a styrofoam ban
| was enacted several years ago the amount of styrofoam I was
| personally responsible for picking up off the shoreline
| plummeted from "a depressingly large shit-ton" down to almost
| nothing.
| shipscode wrote:
| This sounds great, but there's just something about a shopping
| experience with plastic bags that just warms my heart. Life is a
| human experience, and localities shouldn't legislate away all the
| fun.
| xgkickt wrote:
| I'm old enough to remember when, even outdated at the time, one
| would see people carry (or push, or pull) a basket between
| shops or stalls engaging with others. To me that was a better
| human experience than currently experienced at a supermarket.
| tehlike wrote:
| https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/grocery-bag-environmental...
|
| Single use plastic may be more friendly environmentally.
| fastneutron wrote:
| In terms of cleaning up roadside litter in my area, I would
| anecdotally agree. But echoing the other comments, the
| alternative reusable bags I get mostly just wind up being shoved
| in the closet or thrown away when the handles inevitably rip on
| the 3rd use. At least the old style bags were waterproof enough
| double as handy trash can liners.
| datadrivenangel wrote:
| The design of handles is a shame for most of the cheaper
| reusable bags. Not intended to be strong at all.
| changoplatanero wrote:
| Sure, banning plastic bags means that there are less plastic
| bags. But that's a low bar to meet to call the result a success.
|
| For example, did the ban reduce the total amount of plastic
| produced? Plausibly, no it did not.
|
| From the report: > Because of the loophole in California's bag
| ban allowing the use of thicker plastic bags, the amount of
| plastic bags discarded per person (by weight) actually increased
| in the years after the implementation of the ban.
|
| Did the ban on plastic make a meaningful reduction in co2
| emissions? Did it make people happier? Did it make a meaningful
| improvement to the environment?
| rrr_oh_man wrote:
| > Did the ban on plastic make a meaningful reduction in co2
| emissions? Did it make people happier? Did it make a meaningful
| improvement to the environment?
|
| Those are the questions to ask.
|
| Instead, many people focus on behaviour control fantasies &
| gotchas.
| asynchronous wrote:
| This metric is the only one that matters and it's completely
| sailed over in the article to instead support their point
| pokstad wrote:
| This is a joke. I go to my store and now they give you beefier
| "reusable" plastic bags. There is many times more plastic in
| these bags than the old ones.
| scoofy wrote:
| The point is that _you_ aren 't reusing them. Comments like
| this are after they banned people smoking indoors, complaining
| "all this did was make us walk outside, which is a huge waste
| of time."
|
| The point is to change behavior. If you're choosing not to
| change your behavior, that's fine. Most people are changing
| their behavior.
| Solvency wrote:
| This is such a red herring. The entire country is wearing
| polyester and other plastic clothing that breaks down and sheds
| microplastics in EVERY single laundry cycle into the water.
| Millions of cars driving every single day wear down tires
| shedding microplastics into the air, soil, and ground. Millions
| of packages with styrofoam padding are breaking down into tiny
| spherical plastic balls as we speak. We're absolutely
| systemically fucked and plastic bags and straws are genius levels
| of distraction from these unsolvable modern conveniences.
| seagulls wrote:
| Don't forget there's also ~100 billion additional creatures
| needlessly existing: all breathing, consuming and polluting.
|
| https://www.humanesociety.org/blog/more-animals-ever-922-bil...
|
| Plastic bans only work at making corporations more money.
| Apreche wrote:
| Once I went on vacation to a tropical island. I went to a grocery
| store on the island. I didn't bring a bag because I was a doofus
| who had not previously lived or traveled to a tropical island.
|
| There were no plastic bags. There were no paper bags. There was
| no option to pay money to get a reusable grocery bag like we see
| in the US. If you were a doofus like me who didn't bring some
| kind of bag, you only had two options. One was to miraculously
| carry your stuff home without bags. The other was to use the
| cardboard boxes that used to contain produce, if there were any
| left over.
|
| We carried our groceries back to the hotel in a cardboard box
| that previously contained fruit.
|
| It was a minor hassle in the moment, but I also realized that's
| how it should be everywhere. There are probably already enough
| bags in the world for all the carrying that humans need to do. Of
| course bags wear out, so we need to keep producing some amount of
| bags, but not many. Most stores should simply not have any kind
| of bag whatsoever. If you don't bring something of your own, you
| should be mostly SoL.
| dharmab wrote:
| These days I keep a bin in my trunk, transfer my groceries from
| the cart into the bin, and then I carry the entire bin into my
| kitchen.
| gruez wrote:
| >Most stores should simply not have any kind of bag whatsoever.
| If you don't bring something of your own, you should be mostly
| SoL.
|
| Yeah, because driving back to your house to get a bag and then
| driving back is so much better for the environment than a using
| a few 0.1mm thin bags.
| bmicraft wrote:
| If you're there by car you can't convince me you actually
| *need* bags.
| drekk wrote:
| People on tropical islands don't really use cars. I don't
| think most of the readers on HN understand the level of
| sacrifice required from everyone to avoid the worst of what's
| coming. It's going to require a lot more from everyone than
| using reusable bags while shopping or avoiding straws/using
| metal ones.
|
| I agree these environmental laws are simply green washing.
| But if people think these generate too much resentment
| they're wholly unprepared for what the moment requires. Like
| not eating meat with every single meal every single day of
| the week. Not having two cars per family regardless of
| whether they're ICE or not. Eliminating short-haul flights
| and restricting international travel.
|
| US consumers are used to overconsuming. Correcting for that
| will feel like a punishment to most. I don't see an
| alternative besides telling people to treat it like a world
| war. "Victory gardens" and all.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| >I don't think most of the readers on HN understand the
| level of sacrifice required from everyone to avoid the
| worst of what's coming. It's going to require a lot more
| from everyone than using reusable bags while shopping or
| avoiding straws/using metal ones.
|
| To be frank, I don't think we will avoid the worst of
| what's coming. Because a lot of it isn't in control of
| consumers but from business emissions.
|
| e.g. wouldn't mind the ability to stop using my car
| tomorrow if I had reliable bus schedules that weren't
| separated by an hour per stop, but I have no faith that the
| transportation for my city will ever fix that in a timely
| matter. There's also negative inventive from stuff like
| ride-shares to want to fix that. WFH is another way to cut
| down on emissions to compute but instead companies are
| hunkering back down because they gotta justify their sunk
| cost on buildings.
|
| That's 2 of some dozen problems that could prevent the
| worst but whose cards aren't completely in the hands of the
| person. It just feels so hopeless.
| imp0cat wrote:
| Keep some large blue Ikea bags in your car instead.
| Libcat99 wrote:
| I have half a dozen of these and have never needed anything
| else.
|
| Bonus: way easier to get everything inside at home.
| latentcall wrote:
| Good point. This is why I keep reusable bags in my car for
| that exact scenario. It's helped me a ton, you should try it.
| throwitaway222 wrote:
| There are stores in the us that do the cardboard box method
| kibwen wrote:
| Yes, Aldi's does this.
| kitten_mittens_ wrote:
| When the pandemic hit in the US, and people were hoarding a
| bit, I had several times where I had to carry groceries home in
| a fruit box.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| I would be fine with this outcome (even as someone who would
| find it personally annoying), but it's not the reality we live
| in today. You'd have to actually mandate this by law.
|
| The half measures we currently have are the worst of both
| worlds. They inconvenience people _and_ increase fossil fuel
| emissions.
| beej71 wrote:
| Our Grocery Outlet does this, as does CostCo.
| Scoundreller wrote:
| Costco seems to have perfected it by rarely having enough
| boxes at the cash, so forward-thinking customers do their job
| for them by grabbing boxes from the product shelves.
| ambyra wrote:
| I always thought the plastic bags deal was not seeing the forest
| through the trees. Most food comes in heavy plastic. The food is
| consumed in a day or so, and the plastic lasts FOREVER. Forcing
| the companies to use paper or glass packaging, or having reusable
| returnable containers would have a bigger impact than banning
| those thin plastic bags.
| crtified wrote:
| The main issue there, imo, is that plastic is the main
| technology used to protect and seal food items, thereby making
| them last longer without spoiling. A good part of the world's
| food trade and economy now relies upon it. There would be mass
| starvation without it.
|
| Plastic has saved humanity insane amounts of energy over the
| short term, and has contributed to our population growth. The
| resulting environmental debt is mindbendingly massive, and I'm
| not convinced that the corporate world will _willingly_ pay it.
| It will be paid though, one way or another, because Laws of
| Physics, entropy etc.
|
| The smartest species is also the stupidest.
| ambyra wrote:
| A bring your own bag/bottle/container store would be cool.
| Everything would be shipped in bulk to the grocery store, and
| people would take what they want in their own containers.
| crtified wrote:
| Some such outlets do exist. Its also reminiscent of older
| style open-air food markets. But globally speaking, the
| short term charms of plastics clearly won the economic
| race. The same cheap, low effort, high resistance elements
| that make plastics such an environmental problem are also
| the factors which dictated its use.
| razemio wrote:
| True, but who says laws stop there in the coming years? I
| sincerely hope these things will come aswell. Banning non
| reusable plastic bags however is a good and easy start.
| ThinkBeat wrote:
| The problem at least where I live in Europe is that people
| stopped buying grocery plastic bags, which is good. But they were
| frequently re-used as garbage bags.
|
| Now people instead buy plastic garbage bag rolls.
|
| So even if the consumption of plastic shopping bags has
| decreased, the consumption of plastic garbage bags has greatly
| increased.
|
| Might well be easier to recycle the garbage bags. One could hope.
| mepiethree wrote:
| Anecdotally, people in my life used to buy plastic garbage bags
| _and_ use shopping bags as garbage bags (or dog poop bags) in
| smaller-sized garbage bins. Also anecdotally, despite the fact
| that I almost always grocery shop with reusable bags, I still
| somehow have plenty of plastic bags under my sink at any given
| time to use in my smaller trash bins. There are plenty of non-
| grocery places I get plastic bags: CVS, take out meals, Home
| Depot. These more than fill my need for small plastic garbage
| bags.
| gnicholas wrote:
| Where we live they don't give free bags at CVS or other
| stores. I think restaurants may have an exception for take
| out, but those bags often get sauce spilled all over the
| inside, making them unsuitable for saving or reuse (except
| immediately, as a trash bag).
|
| > Where I live (Silicon Valley), paper and plastic bags were
| both subject to the same treatment. In Menlo Park you can buy
| bags when you shop for $.25 each. The plastic bags at Safeway
| are much thicker (i.e., use more plastic, and are
| hypothetically reusable more times) than before. The paper
| bags are the same as before, but now you pay for them (the
| revenue goes to the store).
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| No, that type of thin plastic is not recyclable.
| sokoloff wrote:
| Thin grocery (and garbage) bags are sheet polyethylene, the
| plastic of which is just as recyclable as milk bottles. They
| are not accepted in many _curbside recycling programs_
| because the separation tech is not designed for them, not
| because the plastic itself is not recyclable. They are
| recyclable (and frequently recycled) via dedicated collection
| points. (Most of our grocery stores have them.)
| dragontamer wrote:
| Yes and no.
|
| They are recyclable. But because of their low weight, high
| amounts of contamination, and constant ability to get stuck
| in conveyor belts... Thin plastic bags are more trouble than
| they are worth.
|
| It's like Aluminum foil. Recycling plants are paid per ton of
| recycled material, and it takes lots and lots of aluminum
| foil before a ton of Aluminum is saved up.
|
| Except plastic is way harder to recycle than Aluminum
| (requires higher purities).
| PlunderBunny wrote:
| It depends of course, on where you are and what type of
| recycling schemes are available. As a general rule, "don't
| put plastic bags in with your regular recycling" is
| correct. But we have a very successful 'soft plastic'
| recycling scheme in New Zealand that results in useful
| products (I have 52 fence posts made with thousands of
| recycled milk bottles and plastic bags).
| dragontamer wrote:
| Yeah, my location also has special containers for clean
| plastic bags. But general recycling no longer takes them.
| gnicholas wrote:
| I never bought trash bags before these bans went into effect.
| Now it's one of our subscribe and saves.
|
| I wouldn't be surprised if the net effect was that we are using
| more plastic now than before, even though we use reusable bags
| most of the time when we go shopping.
| andrewstuart wrote:
| Plastic bags are banned here in Australia.
|
| I too use plastic bags as rubbish bags.
|
| I can say that despite the ban on plastic shopping bags there
| is never any shortage of plastic bags.
|
| Admittedly I use small plastic bags but it's virtually
| impossible to buy food that doesn't use plastic bags - I use
| them.
| artiii wrote:
| grocery bags are made from newly produced plastic (sametimes
| clean recycled ak highest grade, because food requirements).
| Garbage bags, on the other hand, are made from the lowest
| possible grade recycl, which can't be recycled.
| barrkel wrote:
| Littering is the problem solved by charging for or banning free
| carrier bags, not usage of plastic bags. If your rubbish goes
| to landfill, don't expect a reduction in rubbish bags as a
| component. They're very light though.
|
| IMO it's better to incinerate them. That's what Switzerland
| does. I think it largely works, as long as you have enough
| routes to take dangerous chemicals (electronics and batteries
| mostly, heavy metals) out of the the waste pipeline.
| notzane wrote:
| There's been some research showing the effect you're seeing is
| real.
|
| > We estimate that CGB [carryout grocery bag] regulations lead
| to an average increase in purchased plastics of 127 pounds per
| store per month, ranging from 30 to 135 (37-224) pounds for
| 4-gallon (8-gallon) trash bags.
|
| https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10640-022-00646-5
| BurningFrog wrote:
| This assumes avoiding plastic bags is an important goal in the
| first place.
|
| Many of us don't agree with that at all.
| belorn wrote:
| As a regular diver in the Baltic ocean, my experience is aligned
| with the finding that the ban on plastic bags and utensils did
| have a real noticeable effect. Before the ban I saw trash every
| dive. Now it is much less common, closer to 1/10 of how it was
| before.
|
| Nowadays the most common trash I see are beer cans.
| dukeofdoom wrote:
| So the solution to plastic bags, is heavier and sturdier plastic
| bags. Does anyone think this is a bit of a farce. I like the
| heavier bags, just feels bad to throw them out, since they keep
| piling up, I'll have to. My dog likes tearing them apart. I
| associate reusable bags with communism, since I literally had to
| use reusable bags living in a communist country. And I now
| associate their introduction with a parallel decline of living
| standards, and inflation in Canada. Much like I experienced in a
| communist country which my parents escaped from. This association
| is not just me, but many fellow Canadians equate the carbon tax
| with it as well. Since most likely the decline in affordability
| of life, people going hungry and cold will lead to voting people
| out that brought in these policies. Will the people that brought
| in these policies resolve to do away with democracy to keep them
| in place. It's something I'm not excited to see. So having a plan
| B to escape just like my parents did, would seem prudent at this
| point.
| oftenwrong wrote:
| I associate re-usable bags with caring about not wasting
| things. You seem to value the ability to waste things. You do
| not seem to think it's worth preventing your dog from
| destroying your bags. You do not seem to exercise care to
| actually re-use the bags, since you say they are piling up in
| your home. If the standard of living is facing such a
| precipitous decline that you are potentially planning an
| escape, why would you casually throw away useful items, and
| continue to spend money on new items when you don't actual need
| to? What would you think of a person that leaves their car
| idling at all times and complains that they are oppressed by an
| increase in gas prices?
| dukeofdoom wrote:
| The bags are my property, I worked for them. The
| collectivists fail to understand this very important part. If
| you want to re-use yours, you're free to do so. Mandating me
| to do so, is opposite of personal freedom.
|
| At this point in time, Canadians are getting taxed on taxes.
| If you fail to see that this is unsustainable, maybe you'll
| understand that for all the taxes you're paying, should you
| get sick, the government will more quickly offer to end you
| than to give you an MRI. In fact, they just passed a law that
| promises to jail for 10 years anyone that try's to dissuade
| you from letting them end you. So it has been my experience
| that the collectivists don't really care about human life, as
| much as they say they care. Collectivist utopias never are...
| So I am looking, like many fellow Canadians, for a second
| home, in case things deteriorate any further.
| oftenwrong wrote:
| Personal freedom is weighed against the freedom of others.
| That is why you cannot dispose of your waste in a water
| reservoir that supplies drinking water. The life of any
| product has an impact on shared resources that your work
| has not earned. Policies that aim to protect these shared
| resources are a logical solution for people who care about
| their country and the people in it.
| EasyMark wrote:
| The war on plastic bags (in the USA) was dumb. They are a tiny
| tiny percentage of plastic pollution and paper bags actually take
| up more space at the landfill and a LOT more energy to
| manufacture to the same strength and usability. The truth is even
| more so for canvas bags. I live where the war never happened and
| I just stuff them under the cabinet until it gets full and then I
| take them to the grocery store where they are properly recycled,
| and the store reports how that happens.
| phatfish wrote:
| Sure, if you recycle them then that makes it much better for
| the environment. The problem is most people don't recycle them.
|
| Not so sure on the energy usage, if feels like the
| manufacturing and recycling chain would be more energy
| intensive than creating something that can be reused for years.
| scoofy wrote:
| >paper bags actually take up more space at the landfill
|
| and are biodegradable
|
| >a LOT more energy to manufacture
|
| which could be done with renewables
|
| But again, the point of all this is to get people to reuse bags
| in the long run. If you just assume that people will mindlessly
| always need bags at every store they visit, you're missing the
| point. It's a simple cultural change, and it has to start
| somewhere, and it will always be imperfect, and older
| generations will always be uncomfortable with it.
| _xerces_ wrote:
| Like others here have mentioned, I reused the grocery store thin
| bags for lining small bathroom trash cans or when scooping cat
| litter. Now I need to buy special trash bags instead so no
| environmental savings. I also have a ridiculous number of the
| reusable bags as I forget to bring them when going to the store
| sometimes, or end up stopping by the store unexpectedly.
|
| One thing I never figured out was why they made the original bags
| so thin that in the end, the clerk needed to double-bag
| everything.
| dinkblam wrote:
| one thing which doesn't seem to mentioned here is that paper bags
| are not a one-to-one replacement.
|
| a plastic bag is a useful item that is used over and over again.
|
| a paper bag is an awful noisy, loud and inflexible item that is
| immediately discarded after use. even people that would be
| willing to use them more than once (i am definitely not), cannot
| do that due to how easy they get torn.
|
| so, instead of buying a handful plastic bags per year, i now have
| to buy hundreds of paper bags.
|
| even accounting for improved recyclability, is it really a net-
| benefit if the amount of required items (paper vs plastic)
| increases for a factor of around 20 - 40?
| gnicholas wrote:
| Paper bags are much heavier than plastic, which means more CO2
| emissions when you're shipping them to the stores.
| cubix wrote:
| I suspect it's more about cost savings than environmental
| concerns, but the grocery store we frequent doesn't provide bags
| at all. However, you can take boxes from the pile they have set
| aside that usually contained produce originally. So, the boxes
| are used at least twice, and then we drop them into recycling. On
| top of that, I find the boxes more convenient to load and unload
| since it only takes 2 or 3 versus handling dozens of bags.
| Obviously this won't work if you don't have a car, or perhaps a
| cart, when you go grocery shopping.
| op00to wrote:
| My boomer father in law won't shut up about reusable bags and how
| they are worse for the environment, and a bag ban is tyranny. It
| seemed to really amp up as of late.
| thrownaway561 wrote:
| means nothing when literally EVERYTHING you buy comes in plastic
| containers. people jump up and down about a victory when it is
| like taking a teaspoon from the ocean. it means nothing, it's not
| a start and makes ZERO difference in the grand scheme of things.
| the only reason for it is to impose most taxes and regulations on
| the masses.
| tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
| In addition to being counterproductive (as explained by others),
| there's another issue with these token environmental laws that
| add highly visible inconveniences with no actual benefit (e.g.
| bag or straw bans): they annoy people, leading to resentment and
| rejection of environmentalism as a whole, harming the chances of
| policies that would actually have a meaningful positive effect
| being adopted. [1] .
|
| My impression is that these laws are often popular among one
| group _because_ they annoy another, perceived as being in the
| wrong - which then leads to the second group pushing laws that
| will annoy the first, even if they don 't make sense.
|
| [1] backlash effect -
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backlash_(sociology)
| Nifty3929 wrote:
| "they annoy people, leading to resentment and rejection of
| environmentalism as a whole"
|
| I hadn't thought about it that way before, but I think you're
| exactly right. I feel this in myself. I am pro-environment, or
| at least I want to be. But when I think about the actual
| effects of all these laws and regulations it just makes me mad
| and want to ignore or fight ALL environmental laws. I have to
| use a paper straw now? It just seems to go on and on.
| latentcall wrote:
| Do people really need straws so much they get annoyed if they
| are made of a different material? You can just not use a
| straw. Or if it's life or death you have one, purchase a
| collapsible metal straw and bring it with you.
| __salt wrote:
| > You can just not use a straw. This thought process is the
| problem. Solutions must benefit all parties. Telling one
| party to go without and deal with it creates resentment.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| >Solutions must benefit all parties.
|
| but solutions never benefit all parties. Laws tend to
| tell some group what not to do, so most laws will
| inconvinience someone. You just need to figure out who
| the law and targeting (and REALLY targeting, not just
| what PR says) and then follow the money from there.
| __salt wrote:
| Less energy would be used by creating straws that are
| both convenient and good for the environment, like agave
| fiber straws.
|
| Solutions can benefit all parties in any context (and the
| best ones do), but environmental protection is unique
| because the solution must benefit all parties. This is
| because, while some will sacrifice for the sake of the
| world, some will not. Convenience compels the lazy to
| change. No amount of coercion, or threat of force will
| change that.
| p1mrx wrote:
| Perhaps it would be more useful to unban plastic straws,
| and then ban _unsolicited_ straws.
|
| It's rather tedious to take a straw out of a drink, dry
| it off, and find somewhere to put it.
| latentcall wrote:
| I can agree with this. Straws upon request makes more
| sense.
| latentcall wrote:
| Sure, but not forever. My city banned plastic bags in
| grocery stores and I was annoyed and resentful because I
| used those when I cleaned out my cats litter box. However
| I got over it.
| chasebank wrote:
| Do you really need an extra bedroom? Do you really need a
| car? Do you really need that extra pair of socks? Do you
| really need that coca-cola? Of course not. People obviously
| want it. Quite the slippery slope you're walking.
| grecy wrote:
| We are at a point in society where we can't simply keep
| doing what those before us did. We are killing the
| planet, and every plant and animal on it, including
| ourselves.
|
| Yes, life is about to get less convenient and we have to
| give up some luxuries.
|
| It doesn't matter if you don't like it, it a fact.
| chasebank wrote:
| "We are at a point in society where we can't simply keep
| doing what those before us did."
|
| Sure we can. And we will. The choices of most of the
| world's population surely disagrees with this.
|
| "Yes, life is about to get less convenient and we have to
| give up some luxuries."
|
| I don't think that's the case, but we will see.
|
| For the record, ideologically, I'm on your side.
| Realistically, I just don't see a world where the
| majority of people change.
|
| The stop using the plastic straw argument applies to
| people who don't like straws. Tell the same anti-straw
| folks to stop traveling, stop having pets, no more
| children. You see where this goes - It just doesn't work.
| grecy wrote:
| There are laws against plastic straws and plastic bags.
|
| There are laws against chemicals that are known to cause
| environmental harm.
|
| There are laws against vehicles that pollute too much.
| Soon there will be laws against cars vehicles that
| pollute at all.
|
| All we have to do is make laws, and more and more of them
| are coming.
|
| Again, it doesn't matter what an individual wants.
| JackSlateur wrote:
| Your trust in laws is fascinating
|
| For humans, laws and rules are meant to be overstepped :
| this is how our species got so far : by considering
| rules, laws and traditions, and say "well, whatever, I
| will try it my way and see how it goes"
| grecy wrote:
| And how is that working out?
|
| In recent months dozens of shops got multi-million dollar
| fines from the EPA for "deleting " diesel emission
| equipment. Now it's unheard of in the US.
|
| It works.
| Lanolderen wrote:
| We can though. There's a lot of fearmongering but the
| reality is climate change won't kill us for longer than
| we'll live.
|
| There's also a lot of gradient in the effect of
| environmental laws. As an example my family still has
| tons of plastic bags that get reused over and over again
| until they become unusable or land as a trash bag. I
| don't know the math of it all but considering we buy
| plastic trash bags anyway we might as well get them from
| shopping instead of buying them separately. I have no
| idea what the global impact has been on plastic bag
| production but it could be interesting to see, assuming
| such a statistic exists.
| grecy wrote:
| > _the reality is climate change won 't kill us for
| longer than we'll live._
|
| That depends heavily on where you live.
|
| 3.6 billion people live in areas that are at a very high
| risk from climate change.
|
| https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/climate-
| cha...
|
| > _There 's a lot of fearmongering_
|
| If you have better credentials than the WHO and leading
| climatologists around the world then I'd love to hear
| about them.
| the_doctah wrote:
| Generalizations and platitudes, you can't even argue with
| this pie in the sky nonsense.
| latentcall wrote:
| Are you comparing a car with a straw? Really? Trust me
| you will be perfectly fine without a straw! Try it
| sometime.
| chasebank wrote:
| If everything has an inherent carbon footprint, ie.
| harmful to the environment, then yes, we can compare a
| straw to a car.
|
| Have you ever gone on a vacation? I'd wager that flight
| you took is 10000x worse for the environment than
| whatever reduction in your lifetime straws. Trust me you
| will be perfectly fine without going on vacation!
| latentcall wrote:
| I really underestimated how passionate people are about
| straws. Do you have a blog per chance where you compare
| different straws and their manufacturers? Would you rate
| them on thickness, quality of plastic, how quickly liquid
| travels from beverage to mouth? Do you prefer straws
| wrapped in plastic or not? Can you describe the different
| subtle mouth feels?
| prepend wrote:
| I'm not passionate about straws. I'm just passionate
| about stupidity and critical thinking.
|
| It seems odd to me that someone would question whether
| straws are essential, but have no problem with vacations.
|
| I also am offended when people expressing any interest
| are deflected into "why don't care about this so much?"
| It's not important how passionate GP is about straws.
| Address the content of their message, not whether they
| are super interested in a topic or not.
| chasebank wrote:
| I'm not sure where I wrote I like straws. It's more of a
| "I don't like the logic regarding straw bans".
| the_doctah wrote:
| >Can you describe the different subtle mouth feels?
|
| Yes, paper feels way worse to drink out of, objectively.
| the_doctah wrote:
| Do celebrities really need private jets? No, the regular
| folk need to use shitty straws.
| Ekaros wrote:
| Isn't that private bedroom quite a big luxury, and many
| groups perfectly manage to survive living multiple
| persons per room... So why not force everyone to give up
| their private bedrooms?
| gregable wrote:
| It slips both ways though. I suspect banning incandescent
| bulbs is probably a good change, even though there were
| people who obviously wanted them.
| whartung wrote:
| I pretty much loathe paper straws. Their texture is nails
| on chalkboard to me. I hate that they get soggy. I hate
| that they collapse in anything thick like a milkshake or
| smoothie. I will more likely go without than use a paper
| (even the modern paper) straws.
|
| And I don't like going without. I like straws. I like their
| utility. I like the way they work in the car. They let me
| rate limit the beverage flow rather than something else,
| such as the ice dam at edge of the cup.
|
| I'm also a big fan of ice.
|
| The closest solution I've found are lids with small
| openings. Starbucks coffee lids are good examples, but
| they're also "strawless" cup lids with a small lid over a
| hole.
|
| They're not a replacement for straws, but they're not awful
| like paper straws are. Some leak though. Puts them lower on
| the fun scale.
|
| Not a big fan of the stainless steel ones either to be
| honest.
| msie wrote:
| I am forever haunted by the death of a woman by a metal
| straw where it impaled her in the head when she
| accidentally fell in her home.
| scoofy wrote:
| As soon as I saw people were using metal straws as a
| replacement for plastic straws, I thought... that is a
| terrible, dumb idea. Yet people still buy them. It's
| pretty nuts.
|
| There are now perfectly functional composable straws, but
| people still need to compost them.
| the_doctah wrote:
| Impaled through the eye, my god.
| prepend wrote:
| Do people really need the things they drink with straws?
|
| There's two ways I generally think of this:
|
| 1) who knows what is actually essential. I can't judge what
| others truly need and don't know of an objective board who
| can. Is art necessary? Is coke necessary? Are luxury
| vehicles necessary?
|
| 2) people choose what's needed by buying them and
| prioritizing their money toward it. So by existing and
| being purchased that's proof enough of necessity.
|
| I'm sure as hell not carrying and keeping clean a
| collapsible metal straw on the off chance that I'll want to
| drink a drink one day. It seems like the mental stress of
| that would outweigh the negative impact of a thousand
| plastic straws (not to mention the energy spent to create
| the collapsible metal straw in the first place). It's
| important to keep in mind all the tradeoffs and not to
| create negative overall effects from the aim of improving
| only environmental effects.
| thrownv7032g wrote:
| The paper straws are awful products. They taste like paper
| and disintegrate quickly even though they are still covered
| in plastic. Wood utensils in comparison were an adjustment
| but they work fine.
|
| I have been avoiding lids and straws for two decades now,
| because they are wasteful, but when I have need of a straw
| and lid it's nice if they work.
| RajT88 wrote:
| Paper straws are an improvement. Just not perfect.
|
| I cannot speak to cost, but wax, paper/cardboard performs
| well enough for just about any food related purpose. Not
| suitable for shakes? Make them thicker.
| the_doctah wrote:
| I've never met a single person who likes using a paper
| straw over a plastic one. They feel weird in your mouth,
| they get soggy, and they fall apart. I fail to see how
| adding more paper material would fix the issue.
| david422 wrote:
| > the actual effects of all these laws and regulations it
| just makes me mad and want to ignore or fight ALL
| environmental laws
|
| Oh come on. How do you even make that jump?
| subsubzero wrote:
| Also these environmental laws come from a place of non-rigorous
| fanciful thinking, ie. the paper straw push was pushed by some
| hollywood celebrity and never took into account that paper
| straws are loaded with forever chemicals, and are useless with
| shakes or drinks that take a long time to finish. The gas stove
| bans are beyond absurd, the claims are that they cause asthma
| and lung problems but I bought a few air quality meters and ran
| my gas stove at full blast with no discernible degradation
| registered on these meters. In addition going full electric
| leads to a non-redundancy in heating and cooling which pushes a
| greater strain on the electric grid and if said grid fails(see
| california) people are completly without heat or cooling.
| Lastly they push enormous costs onto individuals for miniscule
| gains.
| speakeron wrote:
| I think the problem with gas stoves is the nitrogen dioxide
| they produce. Do you have a meter for that?
| prepend wrote:
| Yes, quite clearly it's easy to measure nitrogen dioxide as
| well. A well ventilated stove has no problem with the
| nitrogen dioxide produced.
|
| So it's an example of illogic to push for banning gas
| stoves rather than incentivizing proper ventilation.
| pwnna wrote:
| Comparing gas vs electric seems incorrect. Should be
| comparing with induction instead. It is way more energy
| efficient (altho not necessarily more cost efficient). It
| produces no combustion byproduct like gas (which your air
| quality meter may or may not be able to detect), and it is
| way faster and gives you better control. It also is safer
| without flames or leaks, and less likely to burn you. It is
| the way to cook in 2024 imo.
| thexumaker wrote:
| You mean Texas lol. 30 years in SF and there's been a couple
| blackouts during the summer for a n hour or 2.
| Plasmoid wrote:
| The idea behind the gas stove ban, is that it's supposed to
| be a gas appliance ban. Most of a house's gas consumption is
| heating and hot water, but people will keep gas because of
| the stove.
|
| Gas itself has a lot of problems. Ignoring the safety
| concerns (oof!), the micro-leaks from gas pipelines is a
| major source of greenhouse gases. But we can't clean up all
| the pipes if everyone is still using gas stoves.
| peteradio wrote:
| So its subversive. Nice!
| kwhitefoot wrote:
| > the safety concerns
|
| I know a lot of people worry about gas, my grandmother
| wouldn't have it in the house. But is there any solid
| evidence that it is as dangerous as people think it is? I
| have been cooking with gas for all my adult life and I'm 68
| with no problems whatsoever. And until I left the UK in
| 1986 we used gas fired central heating and hot water, again
| with no problems. I don't know anyone personally who has
| ever had a safety problem with a gas installation.
| scoofy wrote:
| They annoy people that already don't really care, and want an
| excuse to be vocal about it. It takes effectively _zero effort_
| to keep a reusable bag around, and you don 't even have to use
| it every time to have a sizable impact.
|
| The reason why these bans are effective is because people like
| me don't want a bag anyway, and before these bans were in
| effect, I didn't have a choice. And these things do not end up
| in the trash, in part, because they are so light weight.
|
| The same thing happened when they banned smoking. Normalizing
| not using a bag unless you need one will feel normal for the
| next generation, but never feel normal for us.
|
| When your concerns about environmentalism extend only to
| "unless it's inconvenient" then you're not actually concerned
| with environment, you're concern with feeling socially shamed.
|
| Look, I have plenty of concern about faux environmentalism
| bullshit, like recycling plastic, but plastic bag bans are not
| one of them, because there are myriad alternatives that exist.
| prepend wrote:
| > It takes effectively zero effort to keep a reusable bag
| around
|
| I've found it takes lots of effort. It's a chore to keep
| track of and bring it back out to the car. I probably now
| have 10 reusable bags that I've bought because I keep
| forgetting them at home, or in the car when I wasn't
| expecting to go to the store.
|
| It's not a huge effort, but it's definitely non-zero.
|
| Obviously, I should be smarter. But I'm not, sadly.
| scoofy wrote:
| It's obviously not a habit for you, and that's fine. My
| point is that it's not _physically_ difficult to do. It 's
| just something you need to remember to do. This is what I
| mean by the next generation just being habituated to the
| process.
|
| There are plenty of these types of "chores" we accept
| because they are something we see as worthwhile. Wearing a
| seat belt, brushing our teeth, stepping outside to smoke a
| cigarette, putting on headphones to use our phone on the
| bus, not using a phone in a theater, etc., etc., etc.
|
| When this is normalize, nobody will notice, but the 20
| years of transition _will be slightly annoying_ , but my
| point is that, during that 20 years... we're not even
| materially changing our behavior. The stores have paper or
| slightly denser plastic bags for you.
|
| The thing that drives me crazy about this whole debate is
| how trivial it is. It's effectively the _least possible_
| change we can make to substantially change the culture, and
| very same people seem to claim that it 's both (1) not
| enough change to matter, and (2) so much change that it's
| harming environmentalism as a cause.
|
| The entire point of doing it this way is behavioral
| economics. If you make it slightly annoying, most people
| will eventually change their behavior. The fact that so
| many people hate such a small change _so much_ is exactly
| why I point out that the people who care so much about a
| slight behavioral change _don 't actually care about
| environmentalism_, is that most folks haven't even begun to
| gauge the level of cultural change we need to actually
| fight climate change. If you think being asked to generally
| keep a grocery bag in your car is too much to ask, just
| wait until you're "incentivized" to take an ebike to the
| grocery store... If that's something you can't stomach even
| if it destroys the climate, then you don't care about the
| climate.
| akira2501 wrote:
| > leading to resentment and rejection of environmentalism as a
| whole
|
| I think people like this because it explains why the "other
| side" doesn't just listen to their arguments and follow their
| prescriptions on how to live exactly.
|
| Meanwhile, these other people live _in_ the environment, and so
| they're obviously concerned about it at some level.
|
| My read is that "environmentalism" is used as a "bully plank"
| and people are rather tired of being manipulated for the ends
| of elites without any accountability for their policy failures
| and so generally tend to react quite negatively when it is
| naively brought into any conversation.
| barrkel wrote:
| This is just not my experience. People don't complain and
| carrier bags as street rubbish, littering everything from urban
| trees to the countryside, just _disappears_. Charging is
| enough; bans aren 't necessary, but sure, add them, no problem.
| IanCal wrote:
| Just adding a cost to plastic bags here (UK) has cut down on
| the number of plastic bags I see caught in trees or bushes by
| an incredible amount.
| LouisSayers wrote:
| In Australia, New Zealand in recent years we've moved to reduce
| plastic bags from supermarkets etc.
|
| I haven't actually heard anyone complain about it or get
| annoyed at some group of people - this whole concept of being
| annoyed at some group of e.g. environmentalists actually seems
| completely strange and alien.
|
| Yes, it takes a bit of getting used to, but now it's simply a
| habit to take a small folded up reusable bag most places when
| we head out (just incase we end up shopping), or to think ahead
| and grab some bags when we know we're going out for a shop.
|
| Really not a big deal.
| mechagodzilla wrote:
| My town did this, and I immediately went from picking up 1-2
| plastic bags from my yard every week to basically zero in the
| last 4 years. I have no idea what the net impact on carbon
| emissions or other factors was, but the reduction in visible
| trash in my neighborhood was noticeable, immediate and seemingly
| permanent.
| stainablesteel wrote:
| every time someone tries an intervention like this, it somehow
| always makes us worse off
| mNovak wrote:
| A lot of people pointing out the various studies saying that
| plastic consumption increases after a bag ban; but isn't that
| expected in the short term? Everyone has to go buy 3-4 heavy
| reusable bags for the first time (or few times as they get used
| to the idea), that's obviously going cause a spike in plastic
| consumption, above a normal year of disposable bags. But the more
| meaningful question is if 5 years later, people are still buying
| excess heavy bags for a few uses or if the behavior actually
| adapts.
| ungruntled wrote:
| I wonder what level of additional waste is now caused by these
| reusable bags that we will continue to see forever. FreshDirect
| will provide 2 heavy reusable bags each delivery I receive each
| week. They claimed to offer to pick these up but that has been
| suspended for years. They now suggest to "donate" the bags.
| Obviously these end up in the trash.
|
| The strange part of whatever law led them to this idea is that
| because these bags aren't rigid enough, products tend to be
| damaged and arrive organized like a trash pile where at least
| one thing spills all over everything else. Oh, and they still
| put frozen goods in thin plastic bags.
|
| I recall the best quality delivery for my use-case being
| products in standard takeout delivery paper bags wrapped in
| plastic to avoid leakage. I'm certain far less plastic was used
| in those cases, and the bags themselves could be easily used to
| store trash for the compactor avoiding the need for the thicker
| trash bags.
| wslh wrote:
| I use to travel around the world and the difference between
| European countries and USA is abysmal regarding trash. It turns
| obvious in a few hours. I am not an expert in garbage though but
| it is a trivial observation that anyone travelling to those two
| regions could easily observe.
|
| I just felt a "denial of service attack" on Denmark trying to
| separate the garbage in different classes that I couldn't
| perfectly distinguish without some training.
| User23 wrote:
| I'm willing to bet that willingness to ban plastics and not
| dumping plastics into the ocean in the first place are highly
| correlated.
| Nifty3929 wrote:
| A lot of skepticism in the comments, including my own.
|
| Instead, let me steelman this as having the goal of reducing
| litter, rather than reducing plastic. Viewed through that lens,
| this probably does have a beneficial impact. Even if the
| replacement bags take much more plastic to produce, are not
| recyclable, and are not reused much anyway - they are still less
| likely to blow around in the wind and accumulate on sidewalks,
| open spaces, rivers, oceans, etc.
| gusbus323 wrote:
| The US has a unique problem in that major chains like Target only
| charge ~$0.10 per reusable bag. If that price were bumped up to
| something more reasonable, like $1, you can bet more people would
| actually bring their own bags.
| causality0 wrote:
| Note the complete absence of any mention of carbon footprint in
| the article. If the facts don't make your case look good, just
| ignore them I suppose.
| latentcall wrote:
| People cannot seem to handle psychologically even the most minor
| inconveniences. Educated people too. We've built a word of
| convenience and it's telling if things went wrong suddenly a lot
| of people couldn't cope or adapt. Truly shameful.
| PlunderBunny wrote:
| Maybe I move in the wrong circles, but we banned both plastic
| shopping bags and plastic straws in New Zealand, and I don't hear
| anyone complaining about it. Everyone I know uses paper bags
| (from the online supermarket deliveries) to line their bins.
|
| It's not plastic bags and straws that make it to the landfill
| that are the problem - it's the ones that don't make it to the
| landfill. I haven't seen a plastic bag stuck in a tree for years!
| avastmick wrote:
| I have to second this. No one I know complained when it was
| introduced, and I saw no complaints aired in the media of any
| noticeable degree. We still have too much unnecessary plastic
| in packaging.
|
| My wife is Irish, and they started the removal of plastic bags
| over 20 years ago. It was carefully phased in over time. It led
| to a 90% reduction in plastic bag use [0]. They also weigh your
| trash (in Dublin, anyway) as a means of cost pressure to reduce
| waste and encourage recycling. It is stated to have reduced
| waste by 50% [1].
|
| [0] https://www.irishenvironment.com/iepedia/plastic-bag-levy/
| [1] https://www.irishtimes.com/business/economy/why-it-pays-
| to-c...
| romaniitedomum wrote:
| > They also weigh your trash (in Dublin, anyway)
|
| They weigh country-wide. In Ireland waste collection is done
| by private companies and they charge by weight. As I recall,
| they have something like subscription plans [1]. I'm Irish
| but I live in New Zealand now, and here the rubbish
| collection is paid for by your Council rates.
|
| I was still living in Ireland when the plastic ban was
| introduced. There was push-back from some companies that make
| plastic bags, unsurprisingly, but it worked really well.
|
| There was a bit of push-back here in NZ too, similar to what
| happened in Ireland. The usual grumbling, about interfering
| greenies, loss of freedoms, etc.
|
| [1] This is an example of one company's offerings:
|
| https://cportal.barnarecycling.com/signup/signup_page2.php?S.
| ..
| mfer wrote:
| When they banned single use plastic bags in New Jersey it
| increased the amount of plastic in use [1].
|
| Starbucks straw less lids use more plastic than the old lid
| ands straw. With a lot of them ending up in the trash instead
| of recycling, it may not be a net benefit.
|
| The changes being made aren't having quite the impact people
| had hoped.
|
| [1] https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/01/25/new-
| je...
| wavesounds wrote:
| The main goal isn't to reduce the amount of overall plastic
| created its to reduce the amount of plastic trash that ends
| up on the streets, beaches, rivers, etc.
| gregable wrote:
| I sometimes am not clear on what the goal is.
|
| The article seems to argue that the goal is very narrowly
| to reduce the amount of plastic bags created/consumed and
| then claims a study shows that the bans do indeed achieve
| that goal. It's hard to imagine this goal not being
| achieved, but it's too narrow.
|
| I haven't seen any study showing that total plastic trash,
| incorrectly disposed, is reduced. It could be hard to
| study, I admit. I'd love to know the amount of the
| reduction as well. My guess would be there is a reduction,
| but it is fairly small.
|
| For example, in the San Jose survey: https://web.archive.or
| g/web/20230512013405/https://www.sanjo... pre-ban creek and
| litter surveys only showed 9% single-use plastic bags and
| this dropped to 2%.
|
| I'd imagine 7% reduction is the upper bound on the impact,
| but it could be smaller than that if other litter
| increased. Maybe that's high enough to make the ban worth
| the inconvenience, I don't know what the right threshold
| should be.
|
| Broader goals could include reducing total plastic
| production, reducing fossil fuel mining, etc. I'm more
| suspicious that these goals are not being meaningfully
| affected by bag bans.
| giarc wrote:
| If that's the case, is targeting rich developed countries
| with efficient waste management and pickup the best
| approach? I live in a very clean, North American city. I
| rarely see plastic bags blowing around. We have residential
| garbage pick up, and public spaces all have public bins.
| Our landfills are, what I would assume, are well run. Does
| the plastic bag ban in my city make sense? We never had an
| issue with plastic ending up in lakes/rivers etc. Now look
| to developing nations where rivers and streams are overrun
| with plastic. Do they have plastic bag bans? Doesn't seem
| like it and seems like that is where there should be one.
| petesergeant wrote:
| If I was going to steel-man the argument, I'd suggest
| that you're adding some kind of extra economies of scale
| to production of less polluting alternatives?
|
| Also I note that mid-income countries like Thailand are
| also getting in on plastic bag reduction. The kind
| interpretation of that is that _muang thai_ has finally
| discovered its eco-consciousness, but an alternative one
| is that they're copying rich countries 'cuz it's
| fashionable, and that that effect might trickle down to
| the countries who are serious polluters
| petesergeant wrote:
| Building a wall around the Philippines would get you an
| overnight 10% reduction in ocean plastics
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/ocean-plastics
| devonkim wrote:
| Given that single use plastic bags are rather difficult to
| get recycled in so many metro areas (I remember reading a
| single digit percentage of it is even recyclable) it's not
| clear if it going into the trash instead of recycling is not
| a huge impact. But increased use of single use plastics is
| certainly not desirable IMO similar to fossil fuels unless
| they're compostable or similar types that at least can break
| down cleanly.
| coding123 wrote:
| So this whole thing is really about trash not the environment
| crtified wrote:
| The reduction in such litter is a boon in itself. However we
| can't allow it to distract from the bigger picture, for example
| with New Zealand :
|
| https://www.consumer.org.nz/articles/how-does-new-zealand-pa...
|
| " _We were the second-worst country for packaging
| recyclability. Here in clean, green Aotearoa, 57% of the
| packaging we assessed wasn't recyclable in practice. That's not
| too bad when compared to Brazil (92%), but we have a lot of
| room for improvement. Especially when our Aussie cousins beat
| us by a mile with just 14% of packaging not being recyclable._
| "
|
| A big part of the problem is the commercial conflict of
| interest, which among other things means that robust data isn't
| available. For example, if we had year-on-year graphs showing
| domestic plastic production, consumption, sales, in different
| regions and industries, for different purposes, we could start
| to build a true big picture. Instead, the populace is reduced
| to arbitrarily celebrating visible wins, without really knowing
| whether we're winning or not.
| switch007 wrote:
| > However we can't allow it to distract from the bigger
| pictur
|
| I sometimes wonder if that's the real agenda
|
| Like recycling. Keeping us busy sorting things in to
| different bins. Without thinking about the absolute torrent
| of crap people order on a daily or weekly basis. But it's ok
| because the cardboard and plastic packaging is going in a
| magical bin (which often isn't that magical...)
| morepork wrote:
| There is too much of a focus on recycling, when reducing
| the amount of stuff we consume would be far more
| beneficial.
|
| When I was at school they used to talk about the 4 Rs,
| reduce, renew, reuse, recycle (I'm sure different
| variations exist). With recycling being essentially a last
| resort as it's so difficult and inefficient. But now it
| seems there is barely any mention of the first 3.
| OJFord wrote:
| Fwiw I haven't seen a plastic bag stuck in a tree for years
| either. I live in the UK where they're legal but there's a
| (mandated) 10p or something fee for them. (Personally I have a
| few of the slightly more expensive but much less disposable
| ones that I can reuse indefinitely.)
|
| Weirdly I did see cassette tape stuck in a tree recently
| though!
| kylehotchkiss wrote:
| Now my target bags use 5x the amount of plastic and cost me $.10
| before I put them in the bin. If anything it seems like waste is
| increasing from them. Why can't somebody make a paper bag with a
| handle that doesn't rip in the parking lot?
| orf wrote:
| Why don't you just reuse them instead of putting them in the
| bin?
|
| It seems like the waste is coming from you.
| mattlondon wrote:
| What are you supposed to do? Carry around bags with you all
| day in case you happen to go to the store?
|
| If it is a planned visit sure, but if you are just out and
| about you don't want to be carrying around spare bags in your
| jeans pocket _just in case_.
| orf wrote:
| Do you usually pop into target because you're out and
| about, walking around with no access to a vehicle in which
| you might keep bags? And then you purchase enough stuff
| that you require a large plastic bag for?
|
| And this happens often enough for you to be throwing away
| large quantities of these bags, and rather than reflect on
| your habits and adapt, you say something else is causing
| the waste?
| 9935c101ab17a66 wrote:
| Just leave them in your car? Most people drive to stores,
| especially in the US.
|
| I also almost always have a backpack with me when I'm out
| and about, I just leave some cloth backpacks bags in it.
|
| Realistically, how much stuff are you buying on trips to
| the store on a whim?
| Johnny555 wrote:
| The vast majority of Target stores are not urban stores,
| they are big suburban stores where few people visit without
| a car.
|
| But even in the city, I almost always have a small backpack
| with me, and in one of the pockets I have a very compact
| fold-up shopping bag that I use when I stop at the store on
| the way home.
| mustacheemperor wrote:
| I actually essentially do that, I have a reusable bag that
| folds up into itself with a zipper into a package about the
| size of a wallet. Fits well in a purse or jacket pocket and
| is more pleasant to carry when full than a plastic bag
| anyhow.
|
| So really, there's not even a small sacrifice involved for
| me, just a little bit of planning, to avoid making that
| waste.
|
| And isn't this kind of ingenious gadget based solution much
| more in the hacker spirit than throwing up our hands and
| saying, give me back the old traditional way regardless of
| the flaws?
| jolmg wrote:
| Same. My bag's the size of half a wallet when folded, so
| it's not really a bother to carry a couple, let alone
| one. I tend to keep at least a couple in my car's glove
| box as well.
|
| I'm not sure my plastic usage has decreased though, since
| I used to recycle the thin plastic bags to line my trash
| bins. Now I buy oversized white plastic trash bags to
| line my bins. I just can't wrap my head around e.g.
| having a bathroom trash bin without a bag protecting it.
| It feels incredibly gross, though I do know one family
| that does that. I guess/hope they wash their bins very
| regularly.
| prepend wrote:
| That's cool that you do that.
|
| I don't like carrying things that I rarely use and try to
| minimize stuff I carry. And that's basically just a phone
| and my clothes.
|
| Even if you carry a bag, I frequently find that I need
| two or three or more.
|
| I think a better solution is to just have decomposable
| plastic bags and solve the issue that way.
| DoctorOW wrote:
| I'm a little surprised you don't bring a wallet or money
| into a store. I'm not being pedantic, but folded it's
| around the same size. A good reusable bag carries about
| what two to three plastic bags do. Plus, you only have to
| carry a bag when you're actually going into the store,
| anywhere else you can keep it in your vehicle.
| mattlondon wrote:
| Edit: stores outside of the US are accessible without a
| car. It is _very common_ for people to go to local stores
| during lunch breaks or on their way home from work on
| public transport etc.
|
| I personally don't have space in my jeans pockets after a
| wallet and the ridiculous size of modern phones to then
| also pack in 2 or 3 reusable bags too.
|
| Sure if you drive to a store, keep some bags there. I do
| this a lot but I am not going to carry bags around with me
| on the off-chance I _might_ go to a shop that day.
| prmoustache wrote:
| The answer is foldable shopping bags. Any intelligent
| person that regularly go to stores during lunch breaks or
| when commuting is either always carrying a backpack or a
| small foldable shopping bag. There are many folding bag
| designs that fit into your pants backpocket.
|
| I have no car and I very rarely leave home with either a
| foldable bag, a backpack, a drawstring bag and when I
| don't have one of those that is usually because I am
| using my bicycle which is equipped with a basket and
| panniers on the rear rack, or my motorbike with its top
| case.
| prepend wrote:
| > Any intelligent person that regularly go to stores
| during lunch breaks or when commuting is either always
| carrying a backpack or a small foldable shopping bag
|
| The problem is all the non-intelligent people, like me,
| who don't carry this. I don't carry a backpack around on
| my lunch break (or really anywhere other than when I'm
| hiking).
| prmoustache wrote:
| It doesn't have to be a backpack. A foldable shopping bag
| fit in the pockets of your pants. If this is something
| you do regularly, you would learn at the second occurence
| to have any kind of bag ready at your place of work.
| rmccue wrote:
| I have a foldable shopping bag which is smaller than my
| wallet, you don't need a full backpack. If I think I
| might want to pop into the shops while out, I'll chuck it
| in my pocket.
|
| Sure, if you want to do a big family shop then it's a bit
| different, but that's more of an event anyway.
| adrr wrote:
| Most americans drive cars. You can easily keep them in your
| cars. How do europeans do it with higher public
| transportation utilization?
| bmoxb wrote:
| Most people I know tend to go about their business with
| some sort of bag on them.
| prmoustache wrote:
| Euro here.
|
| I rarely get out of the house without some kind of bag
| and when I do that's because I take a bicycle which is
| equipped with a basket and panniers.
| razemio wrote:
| Reusable bags aren't an option for you? We have several of them
| and just put them in the trunk. If I forget to bring one (which
| happens 1-4 times a year) I buy a new one for 2EUR, replacing
| an almost broken one.
| kibwen wrote:
| The amount of learned helplessness in this thread is
| astounding. I bought a pair of collapsible reusable bags
| years ago for $5. I use them every week and they're as good
| as new. The stronger construction means that each one is
| replacing at least three disposable plastic bags with every
| trip. You don't need disposable bags. And yes, I have a cat,
| and disposable bags are shite for litter, because they
| _always_ , _always_ have holes.
| mattlondon wrote:
| They started as PS0.05 here in the UK. Now a few years later it
| is PS1 for a plastic bag from Waitrose. Outrageous.
|
| Even worse are the places that offer only paper bags, but
| charge you for them because they can now. 30p for a paper bag
| from Boots makes no sense when the _whole point_ of the bag
| levy was to stop people using plastic ones.
| morepork wrote:
| Maybe they should have a deposit that gets refunded if you
| return it. Say it cost $1 per bag, but you could get it
| refunded if returned on your next trip you get most of the
| convenience with little hassle.
| msie wrote:
| Downtown, on a rainy day, I've witnessed the occasional disaster
| with someone taking home their fashion purchase in a paper bag
| only to have it disintegrate while crossing the road.
| razemio wrote:
| Wow, for an HN comments section, this feels weird. How can people
| be so annoyed of a plastic straw / bag ban? It is a minor
| inconvenience. Yes, those environmental rules continue to ban
| stuff we liked, and I get it, but it is not like we have much of
| a choice? This stuff is everywhere, including inside our bodies.
| Let's try to reduce it at least a little.
| adrr wrote:
| Be interesting to see a poll that included where the person is
| from. I bet 95%+ of all the negative opinions are from the US.
| Europe, Asia, etc don't care about the bans. Its just tribalism
| in the US.
| kibwen wrote:
| Nobody would care, except that conservative politicians latched
| onto it as fuel for the culture war machine. It's an emotional
| response based on imagined grievance and retroactively
| justified via motivated reasoning.
| myself248 wrote:
| I've been using cloth bags for decades, but in 2020 I switched to
| grocery pickup rather than going into the store myself. This
| forces the use of plastic bags -- no amount of pleading will
| allow any other option.
|
| It's a giant step backwards.
| userbinator wrote:
| The biggest problem with these bans is that "single use" bags
| almost never are. Everyone I know reuses them for various things,
| and not just as bags.
|
| _The case against plastic bags is straightforward. Plastic
| pollution kills at least 100,000 marine mammals and 1 million
| seabirds every year and entanglement in plastic and other types
| of litter kills roughly 1,000 turtles per year._
|
| That's something for littering laws to deal with.
| manmal wrote:
| Every country has littering laws, and they don't work.
| dotancohen wrote:
| You mean that they are not effectively enforced.
| rabuse wrote:
| How would you enforce them?
| tptacek wrote:
| Yes. You can find a bunch of estimates for how many times you
| have to reuse a canvas bag for the environmental cost of its
| production to net out. You generally have a choice between
| plastics, paper, and fabric, and fabric seems to be the worst
| of all the options, and the one the plastic ban encourages.
|
| I think I like the approach I see in Chicagoland, which is just
| to charge for the plastic bags.
|
| (We keep all our plastic bags, but then, we have two dogs).
| chasil wrote:
| Tyvek bags get sold commonly in my area, and Tyvek does not
| survive a standard washing machine cycle.
|
| A canvas bag used for groceries should be washed between each
| use.
| gnicholas wrote:
| I wonder what the environmental impact of washing a bag 100
| times is, compared to 100 single-use plastic bags (which
| may be reused as trash bags).
| loeg wrote:
| I can't imagine washing a grocery bag between every use.
| Why?
| chasil wrote:
| Salmonella are endemic to chicken. E. Coli have also been
| found in reusable bags. Fungus and yeasts are also a
| problem.
|
| You don't want these on your salad greens, fruits, or
| vegetables.
|
| Reusing the bags without washing risks exposure to
| pathogens.
|
| https://polymerinnovationblog.com/reusable-grocery-bags-
| may-...
| littlestymaar wrote:
| Somewhere else in this discussion you posted a study
| financed by a plastic industry lobby, and now from a
| plastic chemistry blog, don't you see a pattern?
| chasil wrote:
| Are these references good enough?
|
| https://www.health.ny.gov/publications/2827/
|
| https://www.huffpost.com/entry/plastic-bag-ban_n_2641430
|
| "The study, released in August, found a spike in San
| Francisco hospital emergency room treatment due to E.
| coli infections and a 46 percent increase in deaths from
| foodborne illness in the three months after the bag ban
| went into effect in 2007."
| userbinator wrote:
| Ironically, a lot of "fabric" bags are just woven plastic,
| which is worse than blown film plastic in not being
| waterproof and also readily absorbing dirt. And for those who
| are scared of microplastics, they certainly shed fibers.
| ezzaf wrote:
| They may get reused, but the data shows that:
|
| * Sales of bin liners (for example) do not significantly
| increase when single use plastic bags are banned
|
| * Plastic bag litter is significantly reduced.
|
| If you want less litter, banning single use plastic bags is a
| great way to achieve that
|
| Sources https://www.abc.net.au/news/specials/curious-
| canberra/2017-0...
| https://www.parliament.act.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/000...
| Nition wrote:
| Personally I can say I switched to just not lining the bin
| after the plastic bag ban. I have a separate compost bin for
| food scraps so the main bin mostly doesn't get too dirty, and
| if it does get some liquid or whatever on it, a quick rinse
| with the hose fixes that.
| gnicholas wrote:
| The evidence regarding sales of bin liners is mixed:
|
| > _The study found California communities with bag policies
| saw sales of 4-gallon trash bags increase by 55% to 75%, and
| sales of 8-gallon trash bags increase 87% to 110%. These
| results echo earlier studies that also showed increases in
| sales of smaller plastic trash bags.
|
| But while sales of small garbage bags jumped after policies
| were implemented, sales of larger 13-gallon trash bags -- the
| size often found in kitchen trash cans -- remained relatively
| unchanged._ [1]
|
| 1: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/03/220329142327
| .h....
| chasil wrote:
| Another major problem is that bag bans have been found in
| studies to result in bacteriological infection spikes.
|
| https://www.huffpost.com/entry/plastic-bag-ban_n_2641430
|
| For myself, I (re)use these as trash bags, so I hope the ban
| never reaches my community. My grocery store also has a used
| bag deposit.
| littlestymaar wrote:
| > authors received monetary support from the American
| Chemistry Council, a trade group representing the interests
| of plastic bag manufacturers.
|
| End of the joke.
| littlestymaar wrote:
| > That's something for littering laws to deal with.
|
| How are littering laws supposed to prevent plastic bags from
| flying away from landfills?
| prmoustache wrote:
| What needs to be banned is the packaging of most things we buy in
| stores.
|
| We don't need to have pastas, cereals, coffee beans, etc already
| stored in tiny small plastic bags. We can go to the shops with
| our own containers and get them filled. The worse are the shops
| that sell vegetables in packaging? why oh why do they do that?
| Your tomatoes don't have to be separated from the celery or the
| leek, they can be carried happily together in your own bag.
| RajT88 wrote:
| If as a society we can move away from plastics, the world will be
| better for it.
|
| They are making more and more engine parts out of plastics which
| is going to drastically reduce the useful lifetime of cars.
|
| https://www.assemblymag.com/articles/86440-plastics-under-th...
|
| Between that and the subscription shenanigans, touchscreens for
| everything, and data spying I am not sure I ever want to buy a
| new car again.
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