Position Papers
PLASTIC BAG BANS
In some countries governments have been urged to ban plastic bags altogether, but an attempt to do so in Seattle USA has recently been rejected by its citizens.1 A similar attempt by the City of Manhattan Beach, California, has been blocked by the Courts.
Q. Is it a good idea to ban plastic carrier-bags?
A. No.
Scientists and environmentalists have attacked a global campaign to ban plastic bags which they say is based on flawed science and exaggerated claims.2
The Times of London 8th March 2008 stated as follows in an editorial:
"There is a danger that the green herd, in pursuit of a good cause, stumbles into misguided campaigns.... Analysis without facts is guesswork. Sloppy analysis of bad science is worse. Poor interpretation of good science wastes time and impedes the fight against obnoxious behavior. There is no place for bad science, or weak analysis, in the search for credible answers to difficult questions...
Many of those who have demonized plastic bags have enlisted scientific study to their cause. By exaggerating a grain of truth into a larger falsehood they spreadmisinformation, and abuse the trust of their unwitting audiences."
According to the UK Dept. for the Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs (The Guardian, 3 October 2007) "We don't think a ban or levy is the right way to go. In Ireland, people just bought more bin liners to replace free carrier bags, so the volume of waste stayed the same".
Because so many plastic bags are re-used for domestic waste disposal, the following increase in bin liners and refuse sacks occurred after the tax in Ireland:
- Tesco - 77% increase in pedal bin liner sales
- SuperQuinn - 84% increase in nappy disposable bag sales
- SuperValue/Centra - 75% increase in swing bin liner sales
(Evidence to Scottish Parliament, Environment and Rural Development Committee Hearings 2005).
Plastic carrier bags are a wonder of modern technology. They can be made very thin, with minimal raw material, but are still strong enough to carry a full load of heavy shopping. No other shopping container can carry 2,500 times its own weight and stay strong when wet. A typical plastic carrier bag uses 70% less plastic today than 20 years ago. No other industry has a better track record in material reduction.
Plastic bags will protect the goods from dirt and rain, they are hygeinic and can be made in an almost unlimited number of colours and designs. Despite all these attributes they are very inexpensive, and are by far the most cost-effective and functional solution available.
The bags can also be re-used many times over for shopping, and are compact enough to be put in a pocket or handbag. They are also put to many other uses in the home, and for other uses such as clearing dog-waste from the streets, and most of them will eventually serve as a bin-liner to safely collect and dispose of household waste.
The case against them is based on a number of fallacies:
Q. Plastic is made from oil or natural gas - is this not a finite resource which should be conserved?
A. Plastics are currently made from naphtha or ethane, which is a by-product of oil or natural gas. This by-product arises because the world needs fuels, and would arise whether or not the by-product were used to make plastic goods. So, nobody is extracting or importing extra oil and gas to make plastic. Until other fuels have been developed, it makes good environmental sense to use the by-product, instead of using scarce agricultural resources and water to make paper or cloth bags or vegetable-based plastic.
Q. But the landfills are filling up, and we need to reduce the amount of plastic bags going to landfill.
A. Plastic shopping bags occupy a tiny proportion of the space in landfill.
"0.2% of the average household dustbin is plastic carrier bags ... hence a tax on plastic carrier bags alone would be unlikely to have any significant impact on volumes of waste" (Plastic Bag Tax Assessment, HM Treasury, UK, December 2002).
The fraction of landfill represented by plastic shopping bags is 0.05%. This is based on domestic waste being 17% of landfill and plastic bags being 0.2% of the average dustbin. (Packaging and Films Association 2007).
A far greater impact on landfill space would be made by diverting away from landfill bricks, concrete, wood, glass and other building materials and other items such as household appliances, which occupy much more space.
Q. But Plastic bags are getting into the open environment, where they will lie or float around for decades, killing wildlife and disfiguring the environment.
A. Plastic bags are so useful that for the forseeable future millions of them will be used every day all around the world. People should be educated not to litter but in no country will it be possible to collect and dispose responsibly of all the plastic. So all short-life plastic goods should be made with a technology which makes them self-destruct within a short time after their useful life if they get into the open environment ( see www.biodeg.org).
Q. Surely long-term re-usable shopping bags are the answer?
A. Certainly not.
They are much thicker and more expensive, and a large number of them would be required for the weekly shopping of an average family.30,000 jute or cotton bags can be packed into a 20-foot container, but the same container will accommodate 2.5 million plastic carrier-bags. Therefore, to transport the same number of jute or cotton bags 80x more ships and trucks would be required than for plastic bags, using 80x more fuel, using 80x more road space and emitting 80x more CO2.
Cloth bags are not hygienic3 if a tomato is squashed or milk is spilled. Research by Guelph Chemical Laboratories in Canada in 2008 Microbiological Study of Reusable Grocery Bags4 has shown that "re-usable grocery bags can become an active microbial habitat and a breeding-ground for bacteria, yeast, mold, and coliforms. .... The unacceptable presence of coliforms - ie intestinal bacteria, in some of the bags tested, suggests that forms of E.Coli associated with severe disease could be present in a small but significant proportion of the bags."
Similar research has been carried out with similar conclusions at the University of Arizona5 who found that consumers almost never wash re-usable bags.
Whilst sometimes called "Bags for Life" they have a limited life, depending on the treatment they receive, and become a very durable form of litter when discarded.Shoppers do not always go to the shop from home, where the re-usable bags would normally be kept, and consumers are unlikely to have a re-usable bag with them when buying on impulse items such as clothing, groceries, CDs, magazines, stationery etc. Research conducted for the Scottish Executive6 carrier bag case studies showed that 92 per cent of people think re-using carrier bags is good for the environment but 59 per cent forget their re-usable bags and have to take new ones at the checkout!
As durable bags are a cost to the consumer and carrier-bags are a cost to the supermarket, one can easily understand why supermarkets are in favour of reducing the number of carrier bags and increasing the number of durable bags However, for those who believe in long-term re-usable bags, they can be made from washable extended-life oxo-biodegradable plastic which will last for 3-5 years before they will harmlessly self-destruct, leaving no harmful residues.
Q. Isn't it better to use paper bags?
A. No.
"There have been unforeseen consequences in the Irish Experience ... increase in the use of paper bags which are actually worse for the environment ..." ... Ben Bradshaw, UK Environment Minister - 4 August 2006
The process of making paper bags causes 70% more atmospheric pollution than plastic bags. Paper bags use 300% more energy to produce, and the process uses huge amounts of water and creates very unpleasant organic waste. When they degrade paper bags emit carbon dioxide, and will emit methane in anaerobic conditions.
A stack of 1,000 new plastic carrier bags would be around 2 inches high, but a stack of 1,000 new paper grocery bags could be around 2 feet high. It would take at least seven times the number of trucks to deliver the same number of bags, creating seven times more transport pollution and road congestion.Also, because paper bags are not as strong as plastic, people may use two or three bags inside each other. Paper bags cannot normally be re-used, and will disintegrate if wet.
In summary therefore it is not a good idea to ban plastic bags - it is a very bad idea
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1. http://www.businessinsider.com/seattle-rejects-its-plastic-bag-tax-2009-8
2. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article3508263.ece
3. www.cpia.ca/epic/media/default.php?ID=2054
4. www.cpia.ca/files/files/A_Microbiological_Study_of_Reusable_Grocery_Bags_May20_09.pdf5