Pandemic deals blow to plastic bag bans, plastic reduction

[d4]

Pandemic deals blow to plastic bag bans, plastic reduction

In a matter of days, hard-won bans to reduce the use of plastics — and particularly plastic shopping sacks — across the U.S. have come under fire amid worries about the virus clinging to reusable bags, cups and straws.

Governors in Massachusetts and Illinois have banned or strongly discouraged the use of reusable grocery bags. Oregon suspended its brand-new ban on plastic bags this week, and cities from Bellingham, Washington, to Albuquerque, New Mexico, have announced a hiatus on plastic bag bans as the coronavirus rages.

The plastics industry has seized the moment and is lobbying hard to overturn bans on single-use plastics by arguing disposable plastics are the safest option amid the crisis. California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, New York, Oregon and Vermont have statewide bans on plastic bags, and Oregon and California have laws limiting the use of plastic straws.

New York’s statewide plastic bag ban is on hold because of a lawsuit.

https://apnews.com/b58cd897fb1275d8a4bdc...tification

[SteveG]

Hurray...I'm getting my garbage bags back!

[DinerDave]

Part of the issue here, is Mass has the plastic ban, my town also has a styrofoam ban, by the way. Anyway the paper bag equivalents cost about 3 times as much as the plastic. I believe Gov. Baker's rationalization for relaxing this is he knows the retailers, particularly the Mom and Pops will suffer big time financially from this shut down. A small help, but just one thing he did to say, Hey, I feel your pain. As it turned out, I have a case of 1,000 plastic bags that were tucked in the storage shed, I forgot to toss them. So now, I have 1,000 free bags, kind of, as they were paid for last year.
Every little bit helps.

Dave

[davester]

All the stores in the SF bay area use paper bags if you don't bring your own. I can't remember when I last saw a disposable plastic bag (except for the produce department).

[N-OS X-tasy!]

The stores where I live in SoCal have temporarily banned the use of reusable bags for shopping — stores are once again bagging groceries with previously-banned plastic bags. No, the irony was not lost on me.

This is an excellent example of how deciding what the "right" behavior is is completely subjective.

[Markintosh]

That same goes for reusable cups and "BYO" containers for to go foods. Its taken years to get these things to become the norm...and getting it back to the norm will likely be impossible. Even though the COVID-19 pandemic had nothing to do with any of these things.

Can we instead make some laws that make it easier to take time off of work or school when youre sick?

[M A V I C]

davester wrote:
All the stores in the SF bay area use paper bags if you don't bring your own. I can't remember when I last saw a disposable plastic bag (except for the produce department).

Yeah, I'm not sure why a ban on reusable bags means plastic bags are coming back.

[Thrift Store Scott]

M A V I C wrote:
[quote=davester]
All the stores in the SF bay area use paper bags if you don't bring your own. I can't remember when I last saw a disposable plastic bag (except for the produce department).

Yeah, I'm not sure why a ban on reusable bags means plastic bags are coming back.
Plastic bags were so vastly superior to paper bags for groceries, especially anything wet or heavy, that the plants that made paper bags shut down years ago and the paper bag industry, while still in existence, doesn't have anywhere near the capacity it would need to compete with plastic in any meaningful way.

Union Camp had a paper mill near Savannah that made brown paper grocery bags which had been in operation for many, many years, possibly since the 1920s or earlier. It was wildly out of compliance with environmental regulations, but Union Camp had enough compliance "bonus points" from other squeaky-clean facilities to offset the Savannah plant and keep it open. When sales of product from that plant dipped below a certain level in the mid-90s, Union Camp closed it down entirely.

[Acer]

Civilization advanced pretty far without plastic bags. My entire childhood we somehow managed to get heavy and wet (I assume you mean frozen things that pick up condensation) items home in paper. What's lost is the skill to pack a paper bag properly.

[Don C]

Last trip to Kroger, I reused the plastic bags from a prior trip. With a week or more between trips, I "should" be safe. Sure hope so.