Saturday, March 31, 2007

Plastic bag ban

This is good news from an environmental point of view. I am quoting from an article entitled "S.F. FIRST CITY TO BAN PLASTIC SHOPPING BAGS":

Paper or plastic? Not anymore in San Francisco.

The city's Board of Supervisors approved groundbreaking legislation Tuesday to outlaw plastic checkout bags at large supermarkets in about six months and large chain pharmacies in about a year.

The ordinance, sponsored by Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi, is the first such law in any city in the United States and has been drawing global scrutiny this week.

"I am astounded and surprised by the worldwide attention," Mirkarimi said. "Hopefully, other cities and other states will follow suit."

Fifty years ago, plastic bags -- starting first with the sandwich bag -- were seen in the United States as a more sanitary and environmentally friendly alternative to the deforesting paper bag. Now an estimated 180 million plastic bags are distributed to shoppers each year in San Francisco. Made of filmy plastic, they are hard to recycle and easily blow into trees and waterways, where they are blamed for killing marine life. They also occupy much-needed landfill space.

I hope if you use plastic bags that you recycle them.

1 comment:

  1. It's really cheap to the same in Tulsa. Any Dollar Store, and even Hobby Lobby, has canvas bags that you can purchase for under a dollar and reuse whenever you go shopping. The only drawback is that you have to remember your sacks! (that's why it's best to keep some in your trunk)

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