Disposable bags are undeniably convenient. But is this convenience worth the environmental implications of choosing disposable over reusable bags?
Plastic bags are the most common type of disposable bags. According to research done by the Environmental Protection Agency, over 1 trillion plastic bags are used worldwide. Americans on average use 100 billion plastic bags a year. To manufacture this tremendous amount, 12 million barrels of oil, 2.2 billion pounds of fossil fuels and 3.9 billion gallons of freshwater are used. The manufacturing process produces around 2.7 million tons of CO2 emissions. These estimates don’t even include the untold amount of energy used to ship the bags to your grocery store check-out line. The environmental impacts of plastic bags don’t end at production. Consumers use plastic bags for an average of 12 minutes, while it takes an estimated 500-1000 years for them to degrade in a landfill. Recycling is an option at many supermarkets, but only .5 to 3% end up in recycling facilities. The 97% of plastic bags that are not recycled are disposed of in landfills, burned, or end up as litter on land or in waterways. Plastic bags don’t biodegrade, rather, they photodegrade by breaking down into smaller and smaller pieces absorbing toxins and contaminating the environment. These pieces often clog waterways causing flooding and posing a risk to wildlife. Annually, plastic bags cause over 100,000 marine animal deaths when animals mistake bags for food. Furthermore, plastic bags are consistently in the top 10 items of trash found during coastal cleanups throughout the world.
Although it may seem like it, paper is not a more sustainable option. Paper bag production consumes four times as much energy and three times as much water as plastic bag production. In order to support the 10 billion paper bags consumed annually in the US, 14 million trees are cut down. Even after use, paper bags generate 80 percent more solid waste and take 91% more energy to recycle than plastic.
How should you carry your groceries home when there are so many problems with both paper and plastic? The best way to go is a reusable canvas bag. With just energy in mind, canvas bags are 14 times better than plastic and 39 times better than paper. These figures don’t even consider the immense impacts of keeping single-use disposables out of the waste stream. For a simple way to choose more sustainably the next time you go shopping, refuse that disposable bag and use your own reusable one!
For more information on the environmental disadvantages of disposable bags, check out http://science.howstuffworks.com/environmental/green-science/paper-plastic.htm and http://www.treehugger.com/culture/paper-bags-or-plastic-bags-everything-you-need-to-know.html
Natalie Steinberg