[SustainableTompkins] NYTimes Shopping Bag Editorial

[Elan Shapiro]

A BAG PROBLEM BLOSSOMS
Published: December 3, 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/03/opinion/03mon4.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

Now that the leaves have finally fallen, a new decoration becomes 
more visible on the nation's many deciduous trees: those plastic bags 
that float high into tree limbs and flutter noisily with each autumn 
breeze. Despite this unappealing vision, a ban of all plastic bags 
would be hard to champion, although the earth would be a greener and 
healthier place without them. What this unsightly airborne litter 
does offer is an opportunity for industry and consumers to think a 
lot harder about how much such convenience is costing the planet.

Plastic bags are as much or more trouble than they are useful. Up to 
100 billion are used each year in this country, and they make 
bringing groceries home (or even protecting a newspaper from rain) so 
easy. But they also choke wildlife, create litter and overload dumps 
for generations to come. It also takes 12 million barrels of oil to 
make a year's supply.

The plastic bag, like the plastic water bottle, has plagued 
environmentalists for years but has only recently worried consumers. 
It may be that the fear of global warming is now so, well, global 
that people are trying to do their bit by subtracting from the 
earth's garbage load.

Whatever the cause, lawmakers across the country are proposing bans 
on plastic bags or ordering up studies. The most dramatic action has 
come in San Francisco, where a voluntary recycling program for 
plastic bags turned out to be a dud (less than 5 percent were 
recycled). So the city banned plastic bags in large grocery stores 
last month and in large pharmacies by April. It may take some time to 
figure out whether this effort really works. At best, the industry 
could find a way to make better bags that only last for a while.

Already the market is responding to this public worry. Some stores 
are giving discounts or rewards for shoppers who bring their own 
bags. Others charge for each bag a customer uses. Many stores provide 
recycling bins for their plastic bags, although in most cases they 
are about as easy to spot as the discount cereals.

The Natural Resources Defense Council recommends neither paper nor 
plastic. Plastic pollutes and floats toward the nearest naked branch, 
but 10 billion paper bags each year use about 14 million trees. The 
council suggests that if you can't bring your own bag, the best 
choice is one you will, for sure, either reuse or recycle.


For info on local Shopping Bag activism,  contact:
Tom Shelley
118 E. Court St.
Ithaca, NY 14850
607 342-0864
tjs1 at cornell.edu
http://www.myspace.com/99319958

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"We must be the change we want to see in the world"
	          Mohandas Gandhi