It was a decade ago when California became the first state in the nation to ban single-use plastic bags, ushering in a wave of anti-plastic legislation from coast to coast.
But in the years after California seemingly kicked its plastic grocery sack habit, material recovery facilities and environmental activists noticed a peculiar trend: Plastic bag waste by weight was increasing to unprecedented levels.
According to a report by the consumer advocacy group CALPIRG, 157,385 tons of plastic bag waste was discarded in California the year the law was passed. By 2022, however, the tonnage of discarded plastic bags had skyrocketed to 231,072 — a 47% jump. Even accounting for an increase in population, the number rose from 4.08 tons per 1,000 people in 2014 to 5.89 tons per 1,000 people in 2022.
The problem, it turns out, was a section of the law that allowed grocery stores and large retailers to provide thicker, heavier-weight plastic bags to customers for the price of a dime.
That is such an idiotic loophole there is no way in hell it wasn’t bought by lobbyists
You described most CA laws - don’t get me started on CARB and how is just pushing us toward bigger, less efficient cars while killing innovation by smaller engineering shops
I’ma have to get you started. Explain yourself.
It has virtually nothing to do with emissions (as if it did, they would just hook up a sniffer to test and be fine)- instead there are blanket bans on any modification not from Edelbrock or a s couple others unless those companies pay exorbitant fees to be “CARB-approved” which has snuffed out innovation from smaller machine shops. And the loopholes are what has driven cars to be bigger and not more fuel efficient
The whole scheme is a farce designed to take what was once complimentary and turn it into a highly profitable side business. It’s the same the world over.
The fillip to retailers is incidental I suspect. The aim of plastic manufacturers when they engage in the lawmaking process is probably safeguarding their ability to produce plastic at an uninterrupted level. They’re happy to reduce total units provided the units are heavier. The environmental impact doesn’t matter: government and industry will continue forcing the recycling meme so it looks as though the conservation angle is covered. Once their part of the problem is solved, the problem no longer exists :^)
“banned…”
They never banned them. They just made people have to pay for them, and forced them to be made differently. The new bags are better than before; but they’re still plastic and most people aren’t re-using them.
Yeah. Why are they even offering these? Use paper for instacart shoppers only. Everyone else needs to bring their own. Why is it so hard to put this into play?
this isnt just california. they rolled out these thicker bags everywhere so they are no longer ‘single use’ except to the people that use them.
The bags sold in NJ aren’t plastic. It is this weird cloth product.
I don’t know if it is synthetic.
If it’s the really common kind of reusable bag that costs about $1 and resembles this…
…then yes, it’s synthetic.
They did this in the UK and it worked. The Cali law just has dumb ass loopholes in it.
That’s cause we didn’t actually ban them. Neo Liberals thought people would stop using them if they had to pay 10 cents.
Turns out, nobody cared. We need an actual ban.
It could still be a financial penalty, but it should be 10 dollars instead of 10 cents.
