plastic bag ban

Use reusable canvas bags, and lobby locally for a single-use plastic bag ban (as there is for 25 percent of the world's population).

Do we need a plastic bag ban? The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind.

RODALE NEWS, EMMAUS, PA—Not even the sun-loving, environmentally conscious, forward-thinking state of California could overcome the plastics industry lobby and ban plastic bags in the Golden State, even though the "urban tumbleweeds" cost billions of bucks to clean up. Last fall, the California legislation shot down what would have been the first statewide ban of single-use plastic bags in the U.S. by a vote of 20 to 14, leaving it up to individuals to do their best to try and live plastic-free.

Don’t live in California? Doesn't matter. Our plastic bag addiction is likely leaving traces in your bloodstream. "The plastic bags do break into smaller bits in the ocean, and have been found in fish stomachs; larger marine animals eat whole bags because they think they are jellyfish," says environmental attorney, Lisa Kaas Boyle, cofounder of the Plastic Pollution Coalition. The most likely human health implication of the bags, she says, is from eating fish that have ingested the plastic confetti that the bags become as they degrade. "The ocean is becoming a sea of plastic fragments, and we are at the top of the food chain that feeds off that sea of plastic," she notes.

Sound like an extreme claim? Heck, even the President's Cancer Panel suggests plastic is causing health problems.

THE DETAILS: Boyle says the major force opposing the bill was the American Chemistry Council, a trade association that represents, among other chemical companies, the manufacturers of petrochemicals and products made from petroleum, such as plastic bags. "America, as a whole is behind the curve on this issue, as more than 40 jurisdictions worldwide have already banned the single-use plastic bag, including China and Mexico City," says Boyle. "The jurisdictions that have banned the single-use plastic bag amount to 25 percent of the world population."

The typical grocery bag is made from polyethylene, a byproduct of petroleum and natural gas. Extracting these fossil fuels threatens our national water supply and, as we've seen in the Gulf oil disaster, our food supply and the livelihood of millions of people. According to the Plastic Pollution Coalition, the energy used to make about nine plastic bags is equivalent to the energy it takes to drive a car more than half a mile. The group also points out that it costs about three to five cents to create a plastic bag, which retailers absorb by raising prices. And how's this for impractical? Researchers have found that when you add up cleanup costs, it comes out to about 17 cents a bag, meaning the average taxpayers pays about $88 extra a year to clean up plastic pollution.

California resident Beth Terry, author of the popular blog, Fake Plastic Fish, which chronicles her low-plastic lifestyle, says some of the claims made in urging against the plastic bag ban were downright bogus.

"For example, the claim that the bag ban would have reduced manufacturing jobs is an outright lie," she says. "I spoke with a California manufacturer of heavy-gauge plastic bags [not those affected by the ban], who said that there are virtually no plastic T-shirt bags [the kind targeted by the bill] produced in California," she explains.

"Another lie is that buying reusable bags is a hardship for low-income people," Terry adds. "First of all, the bill provided for free reusable bags for low-income people. And second, the cost of 'free' plastic bags is simply passed on to the consumer in the first place."