By Alexandra Nicolas
news@joplinglobe.com
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Paper or plastic?
For many local consumers, it’s a question of convenience versus environmental responsibility.
“I just don’t like having (plastic bags) lying around,” Joplin resident Andrea Svec said Monday. “If I get them, I always try to reuse them, but they still end up in the trash.”
Svec said she has been carrying her own reusable grocery bags for a year, and that she tries to avoid grocery store plastic bags when she can.
Since San Francisco in 2007 banned plastic grocery bags, cities and counties across the country have adopted similar restrictions. Many maritime communities have adopted bag bans to protect marine life, and cities inland have adopted them, too.
Now, California is poised to become the first state to ban the so-called “urban tumbleweeds” entirely, which could pave the way for similar regulation elsewhere. The ban has made it through the California State Assembly, and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has indicated he’ll sign the bill if it passes the state Senate.
Though at least 24 states have examined plastic bag legislation, so far none have gotten as far as California’s proposed ban. Missouri has no statewide restrictions. For now, in Missouri, the future of plastic bags will be dictated by consumer preference.
Dan Shaul, state director of the Missouri Grocers Association, said the group would like to see bags that balance environmental and economic issues and “meet the needs of the consumer.” He warned that any kind of bag-banning regulations need to be examined closely for possible unexpected side effects.
“The devil’s in the details,” he said. “We can put a ban on stuff, but it isn’t really going to solve the problem.”
Reusable bags
California’s bill allows for the use of paper bags, but it would charge consumers 5 cents per bag with the goal of encouraging customers to begin using their own reusable bags. The California Grocers Association prefers the statewide measure to a patchwork of local regulations.
The plastics industry has been lobbying against the ban. So has the paper industry. Although paper bags stand to gain market share, manufacturers don’t like the bill’s requirement that the bags be made from 40 percent recycled material.
The American Chemistry Council, which represents a variety of industries including plastics manufacturers, has denounced the legislation as a $1 billion bag tax. The industry also is preparing to fight legislation in Oregon, where legislators plan to introduce a plastic bag ban next year.
“If California passes this bill,” said Patrick Rita, spokesman for the Renewable Bag Council, a paper industry group, “we’re going to see a real opening up of floodgates on copycat legislation.”
Joplin consumer Greg Emory said he uses primarily the plastic bags he’s given when he shops at Wal-Mart and Price Cutter, then returns them to Wal-Mart’s in-house recycling program on each trip.
“But I see a lot more people at Wal-Mart with (reusable bags),” he said.
Suzanne Nelson, owner of Suzanne’s Natural Foods, said she favors reusable bags for both her own shopping and for her business, but she provides paper bags for customers.
“We ordered 1,000 shopping totes that we’re giving to members of our loyalty rewards program,” she said.
Nelson said using a reusable bag is just a matter of getting into the habit of carrying one.
“I keep mine hanging on my doorknob, and I always have a bunch of them in the floorboard of my car,” she said. “It’s just sort of a new thing. People need to start learning to create a new habit of not getting a bag when they go someplace but taking a bag with them.”
The McClatchy-Tribune News Service contributed to this report.
Long-term impact
Although paper bags make up only 15 percent of the grocery bags used nationwide, they occupy more landfill space than plastic bags. According to a 2008 study by the California Integrated Waste Management Board, plastic bags made up 0.3 percent of the state’s disposed waste stream, compared with 0.4 percent for paper bags.
On the other hand, plastic bags may linger in landfills for up to 1,000 years, while paper bags break down in landfills in about a month.
Much of the focus on plastic bags has come from their tendency to end up stuck in trees, along roadsides, in rivers and in the ocean. In Washington, D.C., the city’s environment department studied litter in the Anacostia River and determined that about 25 percent of the trash pieces greater than 1 square inch in size were plastic bags.
Source: McClatchy-Tribune News Service
