The Environment
Plastic bags facts:
- Plastic bags are made of petrochemicals (propane and butane), a non-renewable resource
- Plastic bags don’t biodegrade, they photo-degrade, breaking down into smaller and smaller toxic pieces which can contaminate soil and waterways.
- They stay in the environment for hundred of years.
- It’s worth remembering plastic bags have only been around since 70’s
- 1957 – First plastic sandwich bag is made.
- 1966 – Between 25 and 30% of packaging for bread is plastic.
- 1969 – New York City begins collecting the garbage in plastic bags.
- 1974 – Retail giants Sears and J.C Penny switch to plastic shopping bags.
- 1996 – Over 80% of all bags used are plastic.
- 2000 and onwards governments are banning plastic shopping bags.
- Since 1970, plastic has been responsible for doubling automobile fuel economy.
- They represent a hazard to wildlife
- More than a million seabirds and 100,000 marine mammals and sea turtles die every year from mistakenly eating or getting entangled in plastic.
- Aquatic life can be threatened through entanglement, suffocation and ingestion.
- Dolphins were playing with a plastic bag as if it was an underwater football but later they were washed up on beach as bags covered their blow holes (Rebecca Hosking).
- In 1998, a leatherback turtle, a species on the IUCN’s endangered Red List, was found dead in Galloway with 57kg of plastic bags obstructing its innards.
- In 2002, the Marine Conservation Society reported that a dead Minke whale that has washed up on the coast of Normandy was found to have had 800kg of plastic bags and packaging inside its stomach (Including two UK supermarket bags).
- After an animal is killed by plastic bags, its body decomposes and the plastic is released back into the environment where it can ill again.
- Plastic bags wrap themselves around living coral and quickly kill them. The Great Barrier Reef is being threatened by little white bags of death.
- They can as well cause damage to people
- DEHP has been shown to decrease sperm levels and even act as a neurotoxin.
- One of the key ingredients in manufacturing plastic bags is vinyl chloride. Vinyl chloride is a proven carcinogenic (cancer) and may also cause liver, kidney and brain damage.
- Vinyl chloride depresses the central nervous system. These include headache, dizziness and loss of coordination and in severe cases may progress to hallucination, unconsciousness and death by respiratory failure.
- After Wangari Maathai, Kenya’s Noble laureate, recently discovered that the plastic bag litter creates breeding areas of malaria, Kenyan government has taken action to deal with the issue.
- Plastic bags are a visual pollution
- Plastic stays in the environment for between 500 and 1,000 years. Every plastic item that was ever made is still in existence. Some of it starts to break down – maybe into tiny pieces but they are still there.
- Once aloft, stray bags cartwheel down city streets, alight in trees, billow from fences like flags, clog storm drains, wash into rivers and bays and even end up into the ocean washed out to sea.
- The petroleum-based plastics take decade to beak down and they float on the oceans. In 1993 – 1994 a study of the seafloor in North-western Mediterranean reported that 77% of the debris was plastics and of this, 92.8% were plastic bags.
- There are approximately 46,000 pieces of plastic floating in each square mile of our oceans.
- In China, they are covering the streets and are know as white pollution.
- Plastic bags are a real pollution
- Plastic bags photo-degrade – breaking down into smaller and smaller toxic bits contaminated soil and waterways and entering the food web when animals accidentally ingest.
- The whole process of making plastic bags requires only electricity and 50% of that electricity is generated by nuclear fission – a radioactive waste. So far this radioactive waste is being safely disposed of in deep underground caves and in deep sea trenches where the nuclear waste is subducted into earth’s mantle and incinerated.
- Their production and disposal adds CO2 emissions.
- They clog roadside drains, which could cause the flooding of the street at heavy rainfalls.
- This blocks the rain water getting percolated into land and instead makes to run on the surface of land causing erosion of soil, carrying various pollutants to nearby water bodies resulting in pollution of water. Erosion of soil in hilly areas makes the roots of trees exposed thereby threes loose their strength to survive. Further erosion of soil causes washing off vegetation nutrients available in the soil.
- If plastic bags are burnt, they emit hazardous gases causing air pollution.
- Plastic defies any kind of attempt at disposal – be it through recycling, burning or landfilling.
- Plastic bags can take 1,000 years to decompose compared to paper bags which take about a month to decompose.
- It is estimated that one million are used every minute
- Their average working life is just 12 minutes.
- Every year each person on the planet will consume 300 of them.
- Stores give out over a billion plastic bags per day to customers all over the world.
- Americans throw away some 100 billion plastic bags a year, its equivalent to dumping nearly 12 million barrels of oil a year.
- Taiwan consumes 20 billion bags per year – 900 per person.
- Over 13 billion plastic bags are used in UK every year and 8 billion end up in landfill.
- 7 billion plastic bags are given free every year in France – 225 bags per second however French have reduced their consumption by 61% since 2003.
- Around the world over 200,000 plastic bags are dumped in landfills every hour
- They release toxins into the groundwater from landfill sites while they are breaking down.
- Get into the food chain through animals that ingest small particles of plastic.
- Modern landfills are designed so that nothing in them breakdowns – mean preserving the poison forever.
- Only 1% of plastic bags are recycled worldwide
- Current research demonstrates that the recycling rate for plastic bags is very low. Research in 2000 shows that 20% of paper bags were recycled while 1% of plastic bags were recycled.
- Plastic bags can only be recycled into other plastic bags, however this is rarely the case.
- When a ton of plastic bags is reused or recycled, the energy equivalent of 11 barrels of oil is saved.
- If plastic bags are burnt, they emit hazardous gases and release a host of poisonous chemicals into the air, including dioxin, the most toxic substance known to science thus air pollution.
- Only 1 in every 200 bags is recycled.
- Please note that not all plastic bags can be recycled and many stores that collect them, simply send them to the landfill for lack of another alternative.
- Plastic bags in the world
- According to David Barnes (Marine Scientist) plastic bags have gone from being rare in the late 80s and early 90s to being almost everywhere from Spitsbergen 78° [latitude] to Falklands 51° [latitude].
- In 1995, the French Supermarkets E.Leclerc stopped distributing free plastic bags.
- India Mumbai banned plastic bags in 2000.
- Bangladesh imposed an outright ban on all thinner plastic bags in the capital of Dhaka in 2002.
- Republic of Ireland passed a law in 2002, charging shoppers for every plastic bag.
- Himalayan State made thinner bags illegal in 2003.
- Taiwan banned free light-weight plastic bags in 2003.
- South Africa, in 2003 set the pace by banning thinner plastic bags as well as imposing levies on thicker ones.
- Tasmania banned plastic shopping bags in 2003.
- Eritrea, Rwanda and Somalia banned plastic bags in 2005.
- New Zealand declared itself plastic shopping bag free in 2006.
- Tanzania & Zanzibar banned the import and use of plastic shopping bags in 2006.
- Kenya & Uganda banned in 2007 thinner bags and imposed levies on thicker ones.
- San Francisco became the first American city to ban plastic bags from large supermarkets and pharmacies in 2007.
- Belgium imposed a tax on free plastic bags in 2007.
- Modbury became the first town in Britain to outlaw plastic bags in 2007. However Britain not only uses more plastic bags than any other nation in Europe, but is the only EU country where such bags are free.
- Australia initiated actions for the end of 2008.
- China announced the ban in January 2008.
- In Germany and Holland, supermarkets already charge for plastic bags.
- Spain is planning to halve the consumption of plastic bags by 2009.
- France: A nationwide ban is scheduled to take effect in 2010.
- Italy imposed a levy on plastic bags a decade ago but an outright ban in due to be introduced by 2010.
Your alternatives to the plastic bags:
The battle lines in the war on the plastic bag have been clearly drawn. But what are the alternatives when you have a week’s grocery to get home?
Paper bags:
Paper bags are strong and recyclable and from sustainable resources. If well packed single grocery size paper bag can hold the same volume of up to 4 plastics bags.
Fabric bags:
Sold by a lot of big brands now, jute, cotton, woven pp and non-woven pp bags are more likely to be the most popular in the future. Fabric bags fold easily in a handbag or pocket so you never forget to take it with you.
Re-usable Woven PP or Non-Woven PP bags:
Re-usable Woven PP or Non-Woven PP bag are also another alternative to plastic shopping bags. They are strong and durable and can be used as a walking advert time and time again.
Sign the petition to introduce a tax on plastic carrier bags.
