Think Of The Earth; Reuse Your Bags, Sacks And Containers
When considering how you are planning on carrying your brand new purchase home, please take the time to think whether your plastic or Paper Bags will find their way to a landfill. Once at that landfill, will the plastic and Paper Sacks be there for a small or large amount of time? Perhaps they will be there forever. It would be wonderful if these things were taken into account before you answer that vital question, “paper or plastic?”
In today’s world we need to be cognizant that every action we take can (and often does) have a tremendous impact on the earth. When we visita restaurant for Carryout food, the amount of trash left behind is enormous. Think about the Styrofoam container the food comes in as well as the plastic utensils, paper napkins, cups, straws and bag. All of these things need to go somewhere and often it is into the trash, on its way to a landfill far from your home. After that we rarely ponder its effect.
The bags, sacks and containers have a lasting effect on the world. Well over a billion single-use plastic bags are given out every single day. There are repercussions for the fleeting convenience of unlimited, free, single-use plastic bags. To see the true costs, we must look at the multiple impacts of a bag’s life. In a landfill, plastic bags take up to 1,000 years to degrade. As trash on our streets, they breakdown into tiny bits, contaminating our soil and water. When plastic bags decompose, small plastic particles can create threats to sea life and contaminate the food supply for all mammals. Collection, hauling and disposal of plastic bag waste create another environmental issue. Around 7 billion pounds of plastic bags, wraps and sacks enter the waste stream every year in just America, placing an unwanted burden on our diminishing landfill room. It has been noted that when incinerated, plastic bags cause air pollution.
Many scientists consider paper bags to be a superior alternative. Their negative consequence on our globe is far less. It takes almost 85%less energy to recycle a pound of plastic than it takes to recycle a pound of paper, recycling rates of paper bags are greater than that of plastic bags. Often the paper bags were made of recycled paper to spin]begin|start[/spin] with. Paper sacks in today’s landfills do not break down at a substantially faster rate than plastic does. In reality nothing fully degrades in present landfills because of the lack of water, light, and oxygen. A paper sack consumes more space than a conventional plastic bag, but since paper is recycled at an elevated rate, the added space in a landfill is not a worry.
What should we do then when transporting our stuff? First, try to choose paper over plastic if possible. Perhaps you could use and reuse both your paper and plastic bags many, many times. Several stores will give you a slight discount for doing so. You also are saving the store money to. Most significantly however you should take along a cloth bag with you always. This way you will be prepared if asked “paper or plastic?” You can answer “neither, I brought my own bag, thank you.” And the world will thank you in return.
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mary
