
Plastic Bags to Be Banned in New York - pseudolus
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/28/nyregion/plastic-bag-ban-.html
======
mLuby
Anecdotally, the SF 10¢ bag fee has 1) caused me to skip bags for small
numbers of items I can carry, and 2) retain this behavior even outside SF
where bags are free and given by default.

Took a little while to get used to but I think the program was successful in
terms of behavior modification.

~~~
ilikehurdles
Similarly here. Used to always get disposable bags before Austin banned them.
I’ve moved around a bunch since and continue to bring my reusable bags with me
everywhere.

------
Wowfunhappy
I reuse every single plastic bag. I live in a tiny studio in Manhattan and
they serve as small, free garbage bags.

Without plastic bags, I'll have to buy garbage bags (which are too large).
I'll also have to carry around a reusable bag when I go shopping—which
prevents me from going shopping on a whim, since I can't keep bags in the
trunk of my nonexistent car—or use the paper bags which are still allowed.
Ironically, this will cause me to be _more_ wasteful, since I can't reuse
paper bags!

They should just charge 10 cents per plastic bag. Heck, charge 20 cents.
Lawmakers seem to have rejected this as a "tax on the poor", but is taking
away the option from _everybody_ any better?

~~~
mattnewton
What’s wrong with paper bags for your use case?

~~~
Wowfunhappy
I can't use them as garbage bags because they can't hold anything even
slightly wet, like food scraps.

~~~
seltzered_
For food scraps, get a bag-free composting bin. I use one that uses one big
silicone reversible thing that inverts to push food out and can be thrown in
the dishwasher: [https://www.amazon.com/Polder-Composter-Flexible-silicone-
em...](https://www.amazon.com/Polder-Composter-Flexible-silicone-emptying-
cleaning/dp/B0775MPRML/)

For other things (kids/pets/etc.), purchase biodegradeable bags. There was a
recent article on this subject: [https://theconversation.com/plastic-bag-bans-
can-backfire-if...](https://theconversation.com/plastic-bag-bans-can-backfire-
if-consumers-just-use-other-plastics-
instead-110571?mc_cid=3e3bfe8208&mc_eid=07419f81f0)

"Who were the people who reused plastic carryout bags pre-ban, and presumably
bore the burden of buying trash bags post-ban? I found that bag reuse was
higher for people who purchased pet items and baby items – in other words, who
needed to collect and dispose of excrement. In 2017, nearly 6 percent of U.S.
households had a child under 5 years old, 44 percent owned a dog, and 35
percent owned a cat." My take on this is that if you express the interest in
having a child or a pet, you can afford the burden of buying biodegradable
bags to handle waste. Perhaps there could be some assistance program for some
low-income affected segment (i.e. adding biodegradable bags to a WIC-friendly
item list).

~~~
Wowfunhappy
Sigh, I know I should be composting, but it's difficult. It's not offered in
my area, and I don't want the smell in my tiny apartment.

> My take on this is that if you express the interest in having a child or a
> pet, you can afford the burden of buying biodegradable bags to handle waste.

If the law said that stores were allowed to give out biodegradable plastic
bags (maybe at some small surcharge?) I'd be fine with that. Doubly so if the
law actually suggested or incentivized switching to these types of bags. As
far as I'm aware this isn't what's happening.

The numbers in that article were pretty striking to me, btw:

> A shopper would need to reuse a cotton carryout bag 131 times to reduce its
> global warming potential [...] below that of plastic carryout bags.

> To have less impact on the climate than plastic carryout bags also reused as
> trash bags, consumers would need to use the cotton bag 327 times.

~~~
seltzered_
>Sigh, I know I should be composting, but it's difficult. It's not oferred in
my area, and I don't want the smell in my tiny apartment.

Even if composting isn't offered, you could still 'fake' compost (i.e. use a
composting bin anyway to reduce the need for plastig bags, but toss the food
scraps in the main trash bin outside) I live in a small apartment and cook
most my meals and haven't noticed much smell. You may need to double check
your local rules, but last I checked mine there was no requirement by the
waste-handling authority for apartment tenants to put their waste into
separate bags.

>The numbers in that article were pretty striking to me, btw

Yes, wish the article did a better job of measuring it in years or months
though it gets very subjective. Assuming you grab groceries weekly, the par is
reached within a bit over two years. That doesn't seem too bad.

The comparison of trash bags to reuising a cotton bag 327 times doesn't make
sense as that's not generally something one would do. I interpret that as
saying that you can retire a cotton shopping bag, assuming shopping weekly
with it, after a bit over ~6 years.

~~~
Wowfunhappy
> The comparison of trash bags to reuising a cotton bag 327 times doesn't make
> sense as that's not generally something one would do.

They're saying: "Compared to plastic shopping bags which are also reused as
trash bags, you'd have to reuse a shopping bag (just for shopping) 327 times
before there's any carbon reduction."

------
hn_throwaway_99
FWIW they did this in Austin, TX (before, as usual, it was overturned by the
state lege a couple years later) and IMO in was a really big success. There
used to be a ton of plastic bag litter downtown, especially along the creeks
that empty into the river that runs through downtown Austin, and after the bag
ban there was a huge visible reduction in this litter.

~~~
otakucode
How did they handle the fact that transport of paper bags has a significantly
higher energy cost?

~~~
Swenrekcah
If that’s true then it is a solvable problem, use green energy. How to get
people to do so? Carbon taxes for example, and other means.

~~~
otakucode
They developed a new transportation system in Austin running on renewable
energy? I didn't suggest, and wouldn't, that the problem wasn't solvable. It's
simply not a foregone conclusion that paper bags are 100% upside with no
drawbacks. Their increased weight has to be paid for. This may be an
acceptable cost, but one can't simply wish it didn't exist. It's disappointing
that I asked a very straightforward question about what Austin did in support
of their effort and got such an answer.

~~~
Swenrekcah
Problems can be solved incrementally and/or converted to other types of
problems. In this case it would be converting destroying the environment with
plastics pollution to destroying it with climate change. But its imho easier
to switch energy source than fishing microplastics out of the ocean.

It’s dissapointing that you take this as an attack.

~~~
otakucode
I am aware that problems can be solved incrementally. I haven't the slightest
idea what any of this has to do with what Austin, Texas actually did which was
the question asked.

------
abhinai
Could cities be served better if instead of completely banning plastics, they
put a huge tax on most kinds of plastics and used the proceeds to cleanup the
environment?

The simple logic here is it would force everyone to use plastics only where
they are absolutely necessary and avoid the unforeseen problems that usually
accompany complete bans.

~~~
julien_c
You can sell reusable plastic bags so if absolutely necessary you can always
buy them.

~~~
michaelbuckbee
Our local Aldi's is like this - they don't provide free disposable plastic
bags, but if you forget to bring canvas ones you can buy thicker reusable ones
for $1 a piece.

------
PrimalDual
I find there is a worrying lack of thorough quantitative analysis with these
types of bans and attempts to internalize externalities. This law is a
statement by lawmakers predicated on the cost of single use plastic bags and
even paper bags to be greater than the efficiencies they introduce to society
at large. It seems to me that such a statement is extremely hard to quantify.
Furthermore this may also be a regressive tax where poor people
disproportionately benefit from the benefits provided by single use plastic
bags and the rich pay more of the consequences. This is without even taking
into account the unintended consequences of such laws. Another poster even
mentioned the health hazards that could be introduced.

~~~
ricardobeat
The “efficiency” cost is being absorbed by other communities:
[https://www.riverkeeper.org/blogs/docket/plastic-
pollution-d...](https://www.riverkeeper.org/blogs/docket/plastic-pollution-
data-sweep-2018/)

Many European cities have done fine without single-use plastic bags for years.
The cost of a reusable bag is still negligible and should have no impact on
purchasing power.

Finally, there is a ton of data on the impact of plastic pollution in local
rivers, sea life and other ecosystems. What other data are you looking for?

~~~
balfirevic
How do plastic bags end up in the river? Do people just throw these things on
the ground or into the river?

I wish anti-littering laws could effectively be enforced, but I realize it's
tough to do.

~~~
llukas
Who cares how those bags end up there?

To figure it out and then properly enforce you'd need spend resources that
could be better used elsewhere.

~~~
gubbrora
If we know how they end up there it will help understand how well solutions
will work obviously. Are people flushing them down the toilet? Does the wind
catch the bag before anyone can react? Do people throw them on the ground
because their pockets are full and there is no trash bin for miles?

~~~
ricardobeat
Hint: they don't disappear after use.

~~~
balfirevic
The sarcasm doesn't explain how they end up in the environment instead of
being buried in the landfill or burned at the garbage-burning facility.

~~~
dTal
The minutiae doesn't matter. Every bag that _doesn 't_ end up in a landfill or
incinerated, will end up causing trouble in the environment. You _know_ the
disposal rate won't be 100%. Why worry about the specifics?

~~~
gubbrora
Is the disposal rate of garbage bags 100%? Should we also ban them?

~~~
dTal
I imagine it's much higher, at least 5 nines, mostly because they tend to go
straight from their rolls to containing garbage. They also don't blow away so
easily.

However we probably should stop using them. Merely banning will just be met
with confusion, since they're an integral part of the waste disposal system.
But in my experience, and the experience of others in this thread, a good food
waste + recycling system virtually eliminates all solid waste, and therefore
the need for garbage bags. All solid waste, that is, apart from plastic
packaging. Probably we should get rid of that too.

------
elchief
Prepare for a hepatitis outbreak...

"Some health officials speculate that one trigger of the outbreak might have
been the state’s plastic bag ban, which went into effect in November. What had
once been a practice of last resort — defecating in a plastic bag and tossing
it in the trash — is no longer an option"

[https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/outbreak-waiting-
happen-...](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/outbreak-waiting-happen-
hepatitis-marches-san-diegos-homeless-community)

~~~
tmp192489
New York has much stricter laws around getting homeless into shelters than
California does.

~~~
synaesthesisx
California could clearly benefit from this. Housing here is treated as a
luxury rather than a right. There are plenty on the streets that should
arguably be in institutional care.

~~~
JasonFruit
It's regrettable that there are people living on the streets, but whose
housing in particular do they have a right to? Or to whose labor to provide
them with housing? Is it more just to provide them with housing by coercion,
or to make laws and regulations in such a way as to encourage and reward
charitable activity? Or is there another way that doesn't require an implicit
gun at the givers' heads?

~~~
devit
Banning childbirth or immigration if a fully owned home is not owned by the
new person.

~~~
dane-pgp
> owned by the new person

You think that unborn children should be required to legally own property
before they are allowed to be delivered?

I've heard of "pulling yourself up by your bootstraps" but this is a new level
of absurdity.

~~~
devit
Yeah, as in parents should commit to donating them a home pre-birth, along
with insurance on it and they should not be allowed to sell unless they own
another home

Then no one will ever be homeless.

That's the only non-state solution that guarantees this outcome (well, barring
major catastrophes that destroy the home and cause the insurance to not be
effective at replacing it).

------
marcell
The ban in California has backfired, in my opinion. Many stores, including
major chains like Safeway, still give out plastic bags. However, they are very
thick plastic that they call "reusable" to get around the law banning "single-
use" plastic bags. It obviously goes against the intent of the law.

~~~
tdeck
I think it's met the intended goal of less plastic litter. I live in SF and
hardly ever see a plastic bag lying on the sidewalk or blowing around. It's
pretty typical to see people bring their own bags to the store which hardly
anyone did in Pennsylvania where I grew up. Also, the reusable plastic bags
are heavier and less likely to blow out of trash cans.

~~~
ggreer
> I live in SF and hardly ever see a plastic bag lying on the sidewalk or
> blowing around.

I haven’t noticed any difference. SF still has tons of litter. Less of it is
plastic bags, but that wasn’t much of the volume of litter anyway.

If we’re going to tax things based on their negative externalities, how about
starting with hypodermic needles? The SF DPW picks up over 13,000 used needles
per month.[1] They’re often left in parks where dogs and children investigate
them and risk contracting hepatitis or HIV.

If a plastic bag ban is worth it for the visual improvement, then restrictions
or taxes on needles should be a slam dunk.

1\. [http://www.ktvu.com/news/discarded-dirty-needles-on-sf-
sidew...](http://www.ktvu.com/news/discarded-dirty-needles-on-sf-sidewalks-
symptomatic-of-americas-opioid-epidemic)

~~~
richk449
> I haven’t noticed any difference. SF still has tons of litter. Less of it is
> plastic bags ...

Sounds like you have noticed a difference?

Unless you are suggesting that there is some "conservation of litter"
principle that ensure that the total amount of litter is fixed, so reducing
one kind of litter causes other kinds to increase?

As for your needles argument, would a tax on needles really reduce the total
externalities? Sure, it would result in less needles being bought, but that
may result in move people sharing needles and transmitting diseases resulting
in a much more significant cost. Something should be done about the needles,
but it is not clear (a) that taxing them is a good idea, and (b) what this has
to do with plastic bags.

------
ClassyJacket
They've been out of use at the major supermarkets in Melbourne since last
year. I support the change.

However, I find the "bring your reusable bag" system unworkable for the
following reason: I don't always know I'm going to go to the supermarket in
advance, and don't always go straight from home. Sometimes I'd like to go on
the way home from work, but I can't, because my bags are at home.

Can anyone explain why we don't simply have a system where you borrow reusable
bags for a refundable deposit, then bring them back all at once when you're
ready? I want to just pay 50c for each bag I borrow, let them pile up at home
until I have 10 or 20, then bring them all back and get my money back - maybe
minus 10 cents to run the system. This was we reuse bags, but I don't have to
bring them with me, which is just impractical sometimes. This seems obvious to
me, but I haven't seen it anywhere. Obviously, people would be free to still
bring their own bags if they prefer.

~~~
dTal
That's an interesting idea, but I'm not sure the problem it solves is worth
the implementation cost. It's really trivially easy to bring a reusable bag
with you when you go to work, on the off-chance you might go shopping. We're
talking a couple cubic inches of volume and a few dozens of grams of weight.

------
tootie
There doesn't seem to be a clear concensus on how well these bans work. The
clearest win seems to be a decrease in ocean plastic and street litter. But
the advantage in terms of landfill or carbon emissions seem to be a wash at
best and a net loss at worst.

~~~
pseudolus
I'd accept even a very slight net loss to be rid of the never-ending sight of
plastic bags littering sidewalks, roads and parks. Call it a step towards
eradicating an aesthetic externality for which industry has failed to come up
with a viable solution.

~~~
JamilD
Exactly. The main downside to plastic bags is not the carbon emissions or
landfill contributions, it’s just what the OP said: ocean plastic and street
litter. Each factor _isn’t_ equally weighted.

------
blondie9x
Why did they forget Washington which has also banned single use plastic bags
earlier this month?

[https://www.usnews.com/news/best-
states/washington/articles/...](https://www.usnews.com/news/best-
states/washington/articles/2019-03-06/plastic-bag-ban-passes-washington-
senate)

------
dmode
I used to be a little pissy when first SF and then CA banned single use
plastic, but now cannot imagine life with plastic bags for groceries. I have a
few reusable bags and use them for 90% of my grocery shopping. I keep them in
my car. In the rare situations I don’t have my bag, I can always pay 10cents
and get the paper bag. Such a no brainer.

------
ck425
In Scotland instead of banning then they added a 5p charge. It seems to have
worked reasonably well though I've not seen any actual figures on usage.

~~~
dehrmann
The fact that this works is so irrational. I just spent $40 on groceries (and
got $1.20 cash back). What's 10 cents for a bag?

~~~
jononor
It makes you actually think and opt-in, instead of go with the default.

------
wpskidd
Has anyone recently and earnestly looked into degradable plastic bags? I’m
really surprised that an acceptable substitute has not been adopted. It seems
like the utility of plastic bags along with the substantial environmental
costs would create a great market opportunity.

~~~
samcat116
I think that one possible reason this idea hasn't taken off is that banning
plastic bags means retailers can sell their own reusable bags. Often if I go
to the grocery store and forget my bags, I'll just buy a new once since
they're like $1.50 at the register. Sure I could just pay the $0.10 for a
paper bag, but for some reason I often don't. So now I have like 10 reusable
bags in my pantry.

------
jimmaswell
It's such a shame, upstate NY is such a nice place but the state legislature
(often catering to NYC) is a persistent thorn in our side. Most I know up here
would eagerly vote to secede from Long Island given the option.

~~~
nichos
I live in North Florida and feel the same way about central and South Florida
(Florida man anyone?) I think the State of Jefferson in California also feels
the same way. Local government should decide these things, not state
government.

------
andrewstuart
Progress will be when single use plastic bottles and packaging is banned.

~~~
clydethefrog
The EU parliament just approved a ban on some single use plastic packaging.
Let's hope it will become more strict and widespread the coming years.

[https://edition.cnn.com/2019/03/28/europe/eu-single-use-
plas...](https://edition.cnn.com/2019/03/28/europe/eu-single-use-plastics-ban-
intl-scli/index.html)

------
crazygringo
Does _everyone else_ plan their grocery shopping in advance?!?!

I don't have a family. I work non-regular hours and in non-regular locations.
I live in New York City.

I can't plan when I go grocery shopping. It's always when I'm coming home
from... somewhere... and I have a free half-hour, and I'm lucky enough for it
to be before all the grocery stores have closed... but I simply don't have a
way to carry reusable bags with me all the time. And when I get a chance to
shop it's usually ~3 bags' worth.

What exactly are people like me with non-predictable schedules and no car to
keep reusable bags in supposed to do? This is a genuinely serious question.

Reusable bags are great for people with cars. I don't get how it fits NYC
though.

Plus, I re-use every single bag for trash anyways. So now I'll have to buy
trash bags, which are always much thicker than grocery bags, i.e. far more
plastic. :( This will be inconvenient AND much worse for the environment in
terms of plastic used. Literally lose-lose.

For most of the country with cars, I get it. But here in NYC, I'm not getting
it. Especially since pollution/littering from plastic bags doesn't seem to be
a problem here locally.

I'm really not trying to be difficult here. And I already do my best to live
environmentally responsibly -- public transport and shared bicycles
(Citibike), small apartment, responsible consumption, I recycle everything I
can. But this just isn't thought-out.

~~~
flukus
IME these discussions are almost always driven by people that drive to the
grocery store once a week to do their shopping and can't imagine life any
other way. Then they can get on their high horse against people like us with
much lower carbon footprints. Like you I don't know ahead of time whether I'm
going to go shopping until I do and my plastic shopping bags become rubbish
bags on a nearly 1 to 1 scale.

Things like this are usually just feel good measures all around, in the
western world most of these bags will end up at rubbish sites and there are a
million other sources of plastic waste that get left unaddressed. When they
introduced laws against single use plastics here the number of bags used
dropped 80%, but the 10c "reusable" ones have a lot more plastic, making it a
net wash. And even then when you buy fresh veggies like potatoes and carrots
they'll be bundled into a single use bag, either by the shop themselves or the
customer.

They're are tonnes of ways to cut down plastic and other waste but everyone is
preoccupied with this one convenient and hard to avoid use.

~~~
jogjayr
> when you buy fresh veggies like potatoes and carrots they'll be bundled into
> a single use bag

Simple - don't bag produce like potatoes or carrots if you're buying them
loose. You can put them directly in your shopping cart/basket and transfer to
your grocery bag after checking out. The only produce I bag is leafy greens
and stuffy like green beans/okra (many small units hard to keep together).

------
mancerayder
That's great, and I support it. It took a change in legislature for this to be
possible.

You know what else is really missing - much harder than a plastic bag ban -
enforcing a litter tossing ban. There's a --yes, I will say it-- culture in
NYC of people tossing litter on the ground. A lot of this litter is plastic -
bottles and then you have the disgusting candy and chip/junk food wrappers.

Unfortunately that is much harder, because there's no political appetitite in
NYC now for punishing anyone for any crime that isn't a major violent crime.
Almost all other crimes are to be ignored, because we're told, criminal
justice reform of not enforcing "quality of life crimes" (and this is always
said in quotation marks) is a path forward to redressing unequal and unfair
enforcement. [edit: grammar]

So where do we stand, NYC, with our litter all over the street and sidewalk in
both rich and poor neighborhoods, on subway platforms, inside subway cars and
on the tracks (where they're responsible for a certain percentage of fires)?

I'll be glad to not see those damned plastic bags flying around in a spiral in
the air and getting stuck in branches, but what about all the rest?

~~~
dTal
I wonder what it would take to eliminate all plastic bottles and candy
wrappers at the source. I'm sure such a suggestion would be met with
incredulity, but we survived half the 20th century without them - paper
cartons and wrappers worked just fine. Look at the noisy reactions to the
plastic bag ban - and yet nearly everyone who lives in such area now says it's
great and they prefer it. Can it be done?

------
dragosmocrii
I've been using reusable material bags for grocery shopping for over a year.
Nothing hard about it, just remember to take the bags back to the trunk.
However, I am still using plastic bags for things like loose produce, or meat
containers that I don't want to touch other things in my bag, so I don't know
the alternatives if plastic bags go. Most of these plastic bags will be clean
when empty, so I'll recycle them, and hope they will be recycled. As a
millennial, I didn't know what it was like to live in a world without plastic,
but reading
[https://www.onebrownplanet.com/life_before_plastic/](https://www.onebrownplanet.com/life_before_plastic/)
surely left me fascinated. Just half a century ago, people used to buy food
wrapped in paper, and swap empty milk glass bottles for full ones. Although
food was way harder to preserve, I bet it used to be way more healthy and
preservatives free.

I'd love to hear more if anyone comes from that era, or knows stories about
those times.

~~~
bluntfang
why do you need to use a plastic bag for loose produce?

~~~
dragosmocrii
For example, loose legumes (ie tomatoes) that need to be weighed. Can't think
of an alternative to plastic bags

~~~
bluntfang
...don't use a bag? i can't see an alternative for things like snap peas,
where the item count is very high and the items are small, but tomatoes don't
need to be put into a bag.

and if you're worried about the germs it gets when put on the belt or when the
cashier handles it or in your cart...well trigger warning: your food travels
from a farm to the grocery store and is handled by at least 10 people before
it gets put on the shelf.

------
systematical
Since stopping use of plastic bags I've found that loading and unloading the
car is easier. I put items that I am not worried about getting damaged (cans,
milk etc) in my 50 Liter back pack. Everything else generally fits in just two
reusable bags that I bought from Amazon. I also have a set of re-usable bags
for vegetables.

I'ts way easier bringing a backpack plus two bags in from the car.

~~~
megous
I also use a backpack, since forever. Especially good if you don't have a car
and need to walk the stuff home. These things last years of daily use - much
much more, than even a reusable plastic bag can.

~~~
systematical
Right and it's great for travel too. I love it.

------
johnchristopher
Now all that reminds me we got a plastic ban as well in Belgium a year or two
ago. It had been coming for some years. After a month or two of sporadic
comments in the media I noticed that somehow we now still have plastic bag in
stores. For 5ç or something. Some are made of recycled material or
environmental friendly. But we still have plastic bag. Meanwhile I have this
americana picture of brown paper bags everywhere.

So maybe in a year NY'll be back somehow to some kind of plastic bag and
that'll be it.

~~~
amyjess
My guess is stores will give out extra-thick plastic bags and call them
"reusable", which is what CVS and 7/11 did during the short time Dallas had a
single-use plastic bag fee, and what someone else in this thread says Safeway
does in CA right now.

------
newnewpdro
I wish CA would ban them store-wide, the bags used in produce departments are
incredibly wasteful and you'll often have a customer using multiple of those
for every bag worth of groceries they purchase.

Either ban them or require they be quickly biodegradable.

------
arminiusreturns
I personally think the UK model is the better model, where in most places you
pay ~10c for each bag. That would allow us who prefer plastic to keep it (I
for example use them as doggie poop bags) while encouraging reusable or paper.

------
King-Aaron
I love the outrage and fear in a lot of the higher rated comments on this
subject... There are numerous places around the world that have already banned
single-use plastic bags and things are going fine.

~~~
apricot13
not really, people are just buying the slightly pricier 'bags for life' at the
same rate and dumping them in the same way as a the older 'thin' plastic bags.
Now we just have bigger thicker tree jellyfish that took more oil to produce.

------
m0zg
I've read that 90+% of plastic pollution comes from Asia and Africa. This is
dumb, "feel good" politics and nothing else. I put all my grocery store bags
into another grocery store bag and take them back to the store when the bag
gets full, and I've been doing this for at least the last decade. The store
recycles the bags.

~~~
siruncledrew
People are downvoting this, but it's true:

[http://oceancrusaders.org/plastic-crusades/plastic-
statistic...](http://oceancrusaders.org/plastic-crusades/plastic-statistics/)

[https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/06/90-of-plastic-
polluti...](https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/06/90-of-plastic-polluting-
our-oceans-comes-from-just-10-rivers/)

On a local level, it's still good to encourage better environmental practices
and reduce plastic waste. On a global level, I suppose this is a "feel good"
law in the sense that the heaviest polluters are mostly Asian countries, and a
lot of work needs to be done there.

------
brandonmenc
They're banned here in Austin.

So what I do now is ask for paper or heavy duty plastic bags (because those
are apparently still legal here?) every time I go shopping because I never,
ever remember to lug a bunch of dirty, empty canvas bags back to my car.

I also buy more garbage bags because I used to use the plastic bags from the
grocery store as small garbage bags.

I'm creating more waste than ever.

~~~
nichos
We visited Austin and had no idea about this law. We were at the mall and
picked up a shirt, had no bag, paid for the shirt, and then walked around with
it feeling like a shoplifter.

------
EGreg
Why don't these lawmakers ever think about trying incentives first?

Like rewarding stores for doing the following:

• Having a reusable bag - or even better, delivery services which can optimize
fuel usage for delivering products, and are more convenient for people too!

• Rewarding people with large discounts for bringing it into the store, to be
re-used, otherwise "punishing" them fees for a bag.

• This creates loyalty. They can even set up an app to sign up and be notified
when new items are in stock.

• Stores can cross-promote each other with these bags, and even print
advertising on them.

~~~
dahart
A per bag charge _is_ an incentive, and it has exactly the effect you propose:
you get a discount by bringing your own reusable bags.

Stores are already promoting with print advertising on their reusable bags.

Moreover, some communities are starting to recognize that they simply don’t
want people to have the option to take single use plastic bags. It’s so crazy
wasteful for the 100 feet of walking, why should it even be offered?

~~~
Wowfunhappy
> It’s so crazy wasteful for the 100 feet of walking, why should it even be
> offered?

It's often a lot more than 100 feet if you're in a big city and don't have a
car.

~~~
dahart
I agree, I made that number up. I’m speculating that the average across the
entire country is rather small, and that the primary mode of transport for the
average person is a car.

But one question here is whether that matters at all? Even if the distance is
much longer and doesn’t involve a car, isn’t a single use bag/carrier still
ridiculously wasteful?

~~~
Wowfunhappy
I suspect the average person using a car won't pay 10 cents extra for a
plastic bag given the choice, and the data seems to bear this out. A surcharge
ensures only the people who _need_ a bag will use one.

> But one question here is whether that matters at all? Even if the distance
> is much longer and doesn’t involve a car, isn’t a single use bag/carrier
> still ridiculously wasteful?

The fact of the matter is that without a car, I need _something_ to carry my
groceries. Another commenter posted this article downthread:
[https://theconversation.com/plastic-bag-bans-can-backfire-
if...](https://theconversation.com/plastic-bag-bans-can-backfire-if-consumers-
just-use-other-plastics-instead-110571?mc_cid=3e3bfe8208&mc_eid=07419f81f0)

> A shopper would need to reuse a cotton carryout bag 131 times to reduce its
> global warming potential [...] below that of plastic carryout bags used once
> to carry newly purchased goods. To have less impact on the climate than
> plastic carryout bags also reused as trash bags, consumers would need to use
> the cotton bag 327 times.

I'm legitimately unclear why the second number isn't "infinity". By my
estimation, plastic shopping bags + zero trash bags should have the same (or
worse) emissions as reusable shopping bags + plastic trash bag. Regardless, I
am also unconvinced I'd be able to reuse a cotton bag more than 300 times
before it tears, or I somehow lose it, etc.

~~~
dahart
I can be in favor of a per bag charge or tax or other alternatives, if that’s
what needs to happen. I’m not arguing that a ban is the solution, just
pointing out that single use plastics do use a crazy amount of resource
compared to the benefit they provide. That’s tautologically true regardless of
environmental concerns, right? We don’t put on a brand new shirt every single
day or buy a new car every time we drive, right?

I admit I’m a tad skeptical that there’s ever a true “need” for single use
bags & containers. Entire countries are proving this isn’t the case. Once time
has passed and everyone expects to have to bring their bags, there’s no
problem. This is what already happens outside the U.S.

Keep in mind when citing numbers about the environmental offset of cotton bags
that plastic single use bags are not offset at all, they’re basically 100%
damage. And how many re-uses of a plastic bag would it take to offset them?

Estimating the reuse numbers isn’t comparing apples to apples, IMO, it’s using
narrative to make reusable bags sound tedious and inconvenient. My wife and I
have some reusable bags that we’ve used daily for years, possibly a decade.
I’m sure we’ve used them thousands of times, if low hundreds of uses is all it
takes, then it’s really not very hard to achieve offset once you get some good
bags.

~~~
Wowfunhappy
> Keep in mind when citing numbers about the environmental offset of cotton
> bags that plastic single use bags are not offset at all, they’re 100%
> damage. And how many re-uses of a plastic bag does it take to offset?

I don't understand what you're saying here. Both cotton and plastic bags
produce some emissions; which one produces more will vary depending on how
often each type is reused. I need some way to carry stuff.

> My wife and I have some reusable bags that we’ve used daily for years,
> possibly a decade. I’m sure we’ve used them thousands of times, it’s really
> not very hard to achieve offset once you get some good bags.

And I'm guessing you have a car.

To be clear, my life will continue without plastic bags, so in that sense,
there's no "need". But I heavily suspect I'll end up producing more carbon
overall, for a bunch of reasons I've explained upthread: I'll be using more
paper bags (which I can't reuse), and I'll be buying plastic trash bags.

~~~
dahart
> I don’t understand what you’re saying here... which one produces more will
> vary depending on how often each type is reused.

Exactly. Free plastic bags at the grocery store are not intended and not build
for re-use. They are in fact on average used only once. Cotton bags are
designed and intended for re-use. So, there’s very little point to comparing
their carbon offsets. Single use plastic bags never achieve carbon offset in
practice, as opposed to cotton bags which sometimes do.

> And I’m guessing you have a car.

We have bikes and use them for grocery as often as possible. I do have a car
and I feel the same way about cars as single use plastics; they’re incredibly
wasteful and we could really use a cultural behavior change to reduce their
use.

> I heavily suspect I’ll end up producing more carbon overall ... I’ll be
> using more paper bags, and I’ll be buying plastic trash bags.

Just curious, is buying plastic trash bags a change from what you’re doing
now?

Replacing plastic grocery bags with paper is carbon positive _and_ renewable,
so that doesn’t sound like a larger carbon footprint to me...

I’m a bit lost where we’re going, and it feels like we’re talking past each
other a little. I’m looking for some things to agree on, not disagree on. A
per bag charge is a behavioral incentive, right? And all else being equal,
throwing away something that can be used again is wasteful, right?

Are you mainly trying to say that you believe free single use plastic bags are
the most environmentally friendly thing we can do right now?

*EDIT, never mind, I read your other thread, I understand what you’re saying about using more carbon now as a result of the law change. So, I don’t know. You might be right that your footprint is getting worse as a result, and I can see you’re actually worried about it. I’d hope the law was well considered enough that on average it’s a reduction across the New York population, even if it’s forcing some folks like you into bad habits.

~~~
Wowfunhappy
Fwiw, I shouldn't be assuming everyone has read every parallel comment thread,
so apologies for that.

Edit:

> Single use plastic bags never achieve carbon offset in practice, as opposed
> to cotton bags which sometimes do.

But producing a reusable bag requires much more carbon, so unless that bag
_actually_ gets reused at least 131 times (compared to plastic bags which are
immediately thrown away), you're not saving carbon, you're actually producing
more.

It's worth actually looking at the numbers on this stuff. Similar to how
buying a more efficient car isn't necessarily better for the environment if
you're retiring the old car earlier than necessary.

I'm not as confident as you that lawmakers actually ran the numbers on this
stuff. It feels somewhat haphazard.

~~~
dahart
And I should have actually read upthread when you mentioned it, before I
commented. ;)

Agreed, you have to re-use a bag many times before it’s neutral. I guess what
I’m trying to say is that neutral isn’t where plastic bags are, so it might be
more fair to ask the question how many time do you re-use a cotton bag before
it’s _better_ than a single-use plastic bag. And it’s plausible that number is
closer to, say 10, than 130.

And I don’t doubt for a second that you have to re-use a bag many times before
it’s neutral, but I’ve looked into the specific numbers cited many times
before and always found that it was more guessestimate than science. The
number might be 130, or it might be 25 or 227 or 632 or 3. We can’t talk about
specific numbers with talking about very specific bags and knowing every
detail of the production and distribution process, which is too hard to do in
reality. So I always take them with a grain of salt.

Like you, I’m actually confident the lawmakers do not have the science pinned
down, I’m guessing more that they have strong enough public and business
support to offset those against, and that it’s widely believed to be a net
positive. It might be more specific to New York though, it might be more about
visible litter than environmental concerns.

Thanks for the explanation, I hear your concerns about the law that was
passed. It’s not at all a clear win for your personal situation.

