Not so beautiful, considering that Americans use 100 billion of them each year.I recently read a news story about how San Francisco is considering a ban of plastic bags. The city estimates that it spends $8 million a year cleaning up bags blown into telephone wires and trees, and that more than a million sea birds and 100,000 marine animals suffocate from plastic litter each year.
Then I picked up a copy of Good Magazine at my local bookstore, and saw this complete article that says that the mayor of San Francisco signed the bill into law on the eve of Earth Day, and that it goes into effect in October.
At our house, we’ve bought several reusable nylon bags from a local store called Green Living that we are using for grocery shopping now instead of getting grocery store bags. The trick is to remember to bring them along when you go someplace!
The Green Guide site says that you can potentially recycle most plastic bags, because they are made of #2 or #3 polyethylene. But check with your municipality to see if the do it. If not, many big stores like Wal-Mart and grocery stores recycle them and have bins where you can take them back.
Paper or plastic? It’s hardly a question anymore—many stores don’t seem even to offer paper bags. In some ways, that’s a good thing: compared with paper bags, plastic bags use less energy, take up less space, and create less air and water pollution. But the familiar complaints about plastic hold for plastic bags as well: fossil fuels in their manufacture, non-biodegradable when disposed of (not that anything biodegrades in most landfills); those bags that don’t end up in landfills can choke animals or clog sewers. Yet as the world manufactures 450 trillion bags a year—shouldn’t we be asking whether the bag is reusable or recycled?
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In the 1990s, I purchased reusable bags to go grocery shopping. I added more as time went on. I used them not only for grocery shopping, but for kids toys when going some place, wet bathing suits at the beach,etc.
Just in grocery usage along, over ten years I estimated that my family alone saved 52,000 plastic bags from entering the waste stream. This, I feel is a remarkably positive impact on the environment. It also saved my favorite grocery store money.
If 10, 20 or 100 other families did the same, think of the impact that would make!
I now have approximately 15 reusable bags that are utilized weekly.
Please join me in getting one or making one. They don’t have to be fancy,have great logos on them or cost a lot. In fact, I made one out of a potato sack!
I cut the top end of the sack off, putting duct tape around the edge. I made handles from duct tape. I now have a very strong, very reusable bag! (and considered quite green geek chic!)
Thanks for the comment!
Hopefully some others will be inspired to go plastic bag free, or at least use fewer of them.
Anyone else out there use their own bags instead of plastic or have a similar story?