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Glass, cleaned and sterilized for commercial reuse, DOES take a lot of water, time, and energy. For a commercial reuse, it's quite a bit more than hydrogen peroxide and baking soda and a "small amount of water"! They must be washed, rinsed, sanitized. It takes a LOT of water to wash glass containers.
Food based plastics are.... plastic. Plastics are simply polymer chains. Some polymer chains break down easier than others. Not mold. Just google "food based plastics" for a lot of info. It's interesting. It's plastic made from food, but the bottom line is it is still plastic. The biggest advantage of food based plastic is that is does not require petroleum to make.
I'm not sure what commercial use would require, I'm talking about a household supply. I brew alcohol in glass carboys and what I described is standard protocol in the home brewing world, it turns out that this same protocol would be used for home water in glass refill containers, such as a carboy. This is what I personally do with my own water and I have had no issues.
There are numerous downsides to sugar based plastic, they aren't heat resistant, they do not biodegrade unless in specific environments and they are hard to process by manufacturers.
We get charged a nickel per bag if you don't bring your own bag.
We usually bring our groceries home in a plastic bin. But in the event the bin is at home or I don't buy enough to justify lugging it, I wait until after I pay for my groceries before asking for bags. The cashier is never going to Interac a separate $0.20 purchase for the bags, she just gives them to me.
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That has made a huge difference in people's behavior.
Do you live in a welfare town or something? Because even if I did have to pay for the bags, $0.50 for 10 is never going to be a reason for me not buying them. Who worries about 50 cents? You can't even get a cup of coffee for 50 cents for the love of god.
And how much trash do people produce???? Do you honestly use every single bag you bring home? Because I use shopping bags as liners and I go to the supermarket about once every couple of months without my normal bags in order to get plastic bags. The other day I got more than 20 from a single supermarket run. Our family uses one every two days for trash, so that weekly shopping trip netted me about six weeks worth of bags. There is now way people use all the bags they bring home. So yes, they need to e forced to bring fewer bags home.
Besides, you pay five cents per bag now when you don't claim the credit. It's cheaper to buy them in bulk.
I don't eat cereal, so no cereal bags.
I go through about 1 loaf of bread every 2 weeks.
I don't get any papers.
I don't eat chips.
I buy a big box of 80 Kcups, so no coffee bags.
As far as bathroom trash can liners....women require liners. Women of a certain age have wetter garbage at certain times of the month.
I still use plastic ...
I'm more concerned with the coming environmental mess our over use of consumer electronics will cause.
Mostly BTW made in China.
This bothers me too. But i still think the invention of plastics has had the worst effect on the ecosystem.
The world's dirty disposable diapers haunt my dreams at night.
We usually bring our groceries home in a plastic bin. But in the event the bin is at home or I don't buy enough to justify lugging it, I wait until after I pay for my groceries before asking for bags. The cashier is never going to Interac a separate $0.20 purchase for the bags, she just gives them to me.
Do you live in a welfare town or something? Because even if I did have to pay for the bags, $0.50 for 10 is never going to be a reason for me not buying them. Who worries about 50 cents? You can't even get a cup of coffee for 50 cents for the love of god.
My wife lugs her reusable bags around in the back of her Mercedes.
And how much trash do people produce???? Do you honestly use every single bag you bring home? Because I use shopping bags as liners and I go to the supermarket about once every couple of months without my normal bags in order to get plastic bags. The other day I got more than 20 from a single supermarket run. Our family uses one every two days for trash, so that weekly shopping trip netted me about six weeks worth of bags. There is now way people use all the bags they bring home. So yes, they need to e forced to bring fewer bags home.
Besides, you pay five cents per bag now when you don't claim the credit. It's cheaper to buy them in bulk.
My dog has 14-21 craps per week. 2-3 per day.
Yesterday, I used 3 plastic bags for my dog's poo on our walks. He pooed, so in a bag it went. Then about 2 miles down the road, he pooed again. This one had to be double-bagged, because it was very loose....gross....so I double bagged it to make sure none of the matter got on my hands. He is a BIG dog (100 pounds), so he poos big. I also used a bag to scoop my cats' litter boxes. I used a bag to scoop the dog poo from the yard, since I had to mow. I also changed out the bathroom garbages (just 2, since the boys' bathroom did not get used since the last time I changed it out). So right there was 7 bags. Today I will probably use 2-3 when I take the dog for another long walk (although he already pooed once in the yard this morning, so maybe I'll get lucky).
So, yeah, I use almost all the bags I bring home. If my boys are all home and they all decide to go shopping to get all their own favorite things, I'll just bring the overflow bags back to the big recycling bin right at the grocery store door. No biggie.
Yesterday, I used 3 plastic bags for my dog's poo on our walks. He pooed, so in a bag it went. Then about 2 miles down the road, he pooed again. This one had to be double-bagged, because it was very loose....gross....so I double bagged it to make sure none of the matter got on my hands. He is a BIG dog (100 pounds), so he poos big. I also used a bag to scoop my cats' litter boxes. I used a bag to scoop the dog poo from the yard, since I had to mow. I also changed out the bathroom garbages (just 2, since the boys' bathroom did not get used since the last time I changed it out). So right there was 7 bags. Today I will probably use 2-3 when I take the dog for another long walk (although he already pooed once in the yard this morning, so maybe I'll get lucky).
So, yeah, I use almost all the bags I bring home. If my boys are all home and they all decide to go shopping to get all their own favorite things, I'll just bring the overflow bags back to the big recycling bin right at the grocery store door. No biggie.
However, you are the minority...or we wouldn't see all the plastic bags flying in the wind and bobbing in waterways.
We have trained our dogs to do their business in a backyard sandpit that we rake a few times per week and dispose in our paper waste bags. I understand this won't work for people in apartment buildings or in the city. But it is not full bags that are littering the landscape. There are also biodegradable poop bags on the market.
I'm sure we can get past the use of plastic grocery bags in trash cans inside the house. My grandmother never had plastic bags and she did just fine. The kitchen can had a brown paper grocery bag and the smaller cans had smaller paper bags. She trained all of the girls up to wrap their ick items a few times around in toilet paper before putting them in the garbage. And again, it is not the full bags that are blowing in the wind. If you have to pay for trash bags you tend to fill them until they can hold no more!
Leaves and other yard trash can either be composted or put out with the regular trash. So they need to be contained in a bag? We compost now. But before that we used to buy a few paper painter's drop cloths at the hardware store and contain the leaves in that until trash day.
Plastic water and drink bottles? Whatever did we do back in the 60's? We had milk in cartons at school and went to the water fountain if we were thirsty. At home my mom had a drinking glass at the sink if we were thirsty. My dad took coffee to work in a thermos. And soda was only for special occasions. It came in a paper cup at the hot dog stand. But since we are now in the 21st century and everyone lives on fast food that has to be eaten on the fly...Why don't hot dogs and hamburgers come wrapped in paper (only!) like they used to? Why isn't soda served in paper cups? Why did 7-11 get away from the refillable coffee mugs and soda jugs?
I also believe that some of the comments on this thread are assuming things that may not be universally true. Where my daughter lives there is no trash recycling. So everything just goes in the regular garbage. So sad that all those plastic bottles, etc are going to the dump. Our county charges us for recycling so almost no one does. My mom's county will only pick up trash that is contained in very large, thick paper bags. They garbage bags hold about 4 paper grocery bags worth of waste. You can also use them for leaves and yard trash, label them appropriately and they will be separated out to go to their composting facility instead of the dump. And everyone who pays for trash (just take your latest bill receipt) is eligible to go to the composting facility and avail themselves of the beautiful compost and wood chips.
Me? I keep a handful of reusable grocery bags folded and stuck between the car seats for anything I stop for on my way home from work. I do my main grocery shopping once/month (that's how we get paid so it's just my habit) so I keep all the bags folded inside one bigger bag to take to the store. Once we unpack the groceries I run the bags through the laundry and re-fold until next use. My daily lunch is packed in a reusable lunch sack, drinks are taken in a reusable plastic bottle or thermos, and the items in my lunch bag are put into glass containers (leftover dinner casserole) or wrapped in wax paper (sandwiches, etc). My kitchen trash can uses a brown paper grocery bag that costs me a nickel at the grocery (when I shop monthly the reusable bag credit-0.05 each- pays for the 8-10 paper bags that I use for trash). For the bathrooms I went to the local newspaper office and they gave me an end roll of clean paper. I tear off a chunk and cram it into the little trash cans. Works great. Since it costs to recycle where we live and I don't think it's worth the cost, we pay close attention to how our food is packaged. My husband, the soda drinker, buys his in cans and takes them to the aluminum recycler in town for a little extra spending money. My milk comes in a glass jug. We try to buy things packaged in paper rather than plastic. I don't deal with things like cereal bags but we do have a rare bread bag (most of our bread is made at home or bought at the local bakery that uses paper). The rare bread bag is saved in a container and used for really awful messes. I can't think of a good reason at our house to use plastic bags. I have a box of plastic sandwich bags that have been in the drawer for years because they rarely get used. Even when our daughter was home her lunch contents were packaged in paper or thermos. She had, and still uses a reusable water bottle. Since we usually have hot breakfasts here we don't deal with the cereal bags. There is a bit of plastic and styrofoam from the meat we purchase, but it's not much. We don't use commercial laundry detergent (make our own liquid laundry soap-visit the frugal living section on this forum) so no major plastic there either. Instead of the wet wipes in the kitchen I bought a stack of white washcloths and white hand towels. The washcloths are for wiping up spills, wiping doen the stove and counters, etc. The hands towels are the same size as a kitchen towel used for drying hands. At the end of the day they are hung to dry in the laundry room then thrown in the wash once/week and bleached along with the white bath towels. I do not use a kitchen sponge because they breed bacteria like crazy and must be replace regularly...made of plastic too.
It can be done, and becomes habit, if you just put some thought into it. Keep the grocery bags in the car, buy a thermos commuter cup for your coffee. Even Starbucks will put your drink in your own travel mug and it doesn't have to be a Starbucks mug. Buy a few reusable water bottles. Keep one at work, one in the car, one in your lunch box. I bought 6 of them for our family of three maybe 8 years ago at Costco (cost me maybe $20?) and every one of them is still in use. Same with the travel mugs, every one of them is still in use. Think of the waste or paper and plastic over those years. If you want cold water every day just put some water in the drink bottle and lay it on its side overnight in the freezer. Fill with tap water and it will stay cold til at least mid-afternoon. And it keeps my lunch chilled til lunchtime too!
Just think!
However, you are the minority...or we wouldn't see all the plastic bags flying in the wind and bobbing in waterways.
Exactly. Numerous studies have shown that over 90% of the "free" plastic shopping bags simply wind up being thrown away without any secondary use whatsoever. The "pooper-scoopers" we're hearing from are in the minority. Most people, most of the time, just toss those bags in their garbage.
And even where plastic bag recycling is offered, it isn't always effective. In one city I used to live in, I once accidentally stumbled across the fact that the fellow emptying the bag recycling bin in front of a large supermarket I used to patronize was simply taking them around to the back and throwing them in the dumpster headed for the landfill. When I challenged the manager on this practice he told me that in some other cities their bag "recycling" was actually recycled, but in this city there was no such vendor. But for consistency of corporate image, HQ insisted he have the recycling bin out front, even though it was pointless.
And that's precisely why the city government there banned those bags a year or so ago, and old friends who still live there say it has gone very well, and has really cleaned up the "bag birds" nesting in the fences and in the trees, and the "urban tumbleweeds" blowing along the streets and roads.
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