Battling the Love Affair of Plastic Bags
A plastic bag may be convenient for a minute or two when there is a need to carry something out of the store, but for the rest of the life of the bag (which is a long time) it is not just inconvenient, it is ugly, toxic and life-threatening.
Did You Know?
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Single-use plastic bags use up natural resources and energy. Plastic bags are made from polyethylene, which comes from petroleum, a nonrenewable resource. During manufacturing, both paper and plastic bags emit global warming gases, create water pollution and use raw materials and energy.
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Plastic bags are indestructible. Plastic bags take between 20 and 1,000 years to break down in the environment. Even when they do break down, they are not really gone. Plastic bags do not biodegrade. They break apart into even smaller pieces, eventually forming "plastic dust." No matter their size, plastic bits are not digestible by any creature on land, in the air or in the sea. We are literally choking the planet with products, which cannot re-enter the life cycle.
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Plastic bags and packaging kill marine life. Plastic bags (which can resemble jellyfish or sponges) are mistaken for food or prey by seabirds, marine mammals, fish and sea turtles. More than one million birds, more than 100,000 whales, seals and turtles, and countless fish worldwide are killed by plastic rubbish every year. These deaths occur through entanglement, suffocation, and starvation by ingestion of plastics in our waterways.
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Plastic is getting into the food chain. Even the finest particles of plastic represent a threat to creatures at the lowest level of the food chain in the marine environment, the filter-feeders. Then, toxins in filter-feeders are passed up the food chain to fish and other marine animals, which humans then consume.
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Plastic could over-run our planet if we don't stop. Estimates run as high as one million pieces of plastic per square kilometer floating in areas of the Pacific Ocean.
Facts
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A million plastic bags are used every minute worldwide and the number is rising.
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The average family accumulates 60 plastic bags in only four trips to the grocery store.
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Americans throw away approximately 100 billion polyethylene bags per year.
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Only 1-3% of plastic bags are recycled worldwide.
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Phthalates are chemicals used in many plastics to make them soft or flexible, such as plastic bags. They have been banned in many European countries and Canada and will be banned in the U.S in many children's products by 2014 because of the potential health risks.
Successful Initiatives
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Ireland - In 2001, Ireland implemented a plastic tax, the first of its kind. This route acknowledges that people will still occasionally use plastic bags. Since 2002, plastic bag consumption has decreased by an estimated 90 percent.
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Washington D.C. - A five-cent levy on plastic bags back in January 2010, resulted in a decrease in plastic bag consumption from 22.5 million to 3 million bags in the first month alone.
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China - The "ban on free plastic bags," which was introduced in 2008 resulted in a reduction by two thirds.
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Wales - Since October 1, 2011, a 5-pence charge has been enforced on all plastic shopping bags.
References
Reuse It. (2011). Facts about the Plastic Bag Pandemic.
Environmentalism. (2007). Say no to plastic bags. The shocking facts about polyethylene bags.
Zero Waste San Diego. (2011). Plastic bag reduction strategies.
