According to the Arlington, Virginia-based American Plastics Council - Plastic bags
are so cheap to produce and store that they have captured at least 80 percent of
the grocery and convenience store market since they were introduced a quarter century
ago.
As a result, the totes are everywhere. They sit balled up and stuffed into the one
that hangs from the pantry door. They line bathroom trash bins. They carry clothes
to the gym. They clutter landfills. They flap from trees. They float in the breeze.
They clog roadside drains. They drift on the high seas. They fill sea turtle bellies.
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According to the data released by the United States Environmental Protection Agency
in 2001 on U.S. plastic bag, sack, and wrap consumption, somewhere between 500 billion
and a trillion plastic bags are consumed worldwide each year. Of those, millions
end up in the litter stream outside of landfills—estimates range from less than
one to three percent of the bags. Millions of the plastic bags end up as litter.
Once in the environment, it takes months to hundreds of years for plastic bags to
breakdown. As they decompose, tiny toxic bits seep into soils, lakes, rivers, and
the oceans.
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Plastic bag litter has become such an environmental nuisance and eyesore that Ireland,
Taiwan, South Africa, Australia, and Bangladesh have heavily taxed the totes or
banned their use outright. Several other regions, including England and some U.S.
cities, are considering similar actions.
Tony Lowes, director of Friends of the Irish Environment in County Cork, said the
15 cent (about 20 cents U.S.) tax on plastic bags introduced there in March 2002
has resulted in a 95 percent reduction in their use. "It's been an extraordinary
success," he said.
According to Lowes, just about everyone in Ireland carries around a reusable bag
and the plastic bags that once blighted the verdant Irish countryside are now merely
an occasional eyesore. Cobb believes a similar tax in the U.S. would have a similar
effect on reducing consumption.
In conclusions, carrying your own recyclable bags is the best way to ensure a habitable
earth for generations to come.
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