Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Mumbai bans plastic bags, bottles, and single-use plastic containers

theguardian.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 362 posts

Re: Mumbai bans plastic bags, bottles, and single-use plastic containers

#131

Post by goldenkey »

oftenwrong wrote: post #95
1ba9115454 wrote: post #17

Great. Let's roll this out everywhere. Actually it would be nice to do something about cigeratte butts too.

You could ban cellulose acetate filters, which do not readily degrade. One day we may figure out how to make cigarette filters that are more biodegradable. I also recall reading about a group training birds to collect cigarette butts.

It only takes a couple years for the deacetylzation process to occur from UV light and weathering. The cellulose backbone decays in a matter of days once the acetate is gone.

Carbon impregnated polyester works just fine as a smoke filter and is readily degradable.

Re: Mumbai bans plastic bags, bottles, and single-use plastic containers

#132

Post by vishaltelangre »

FactolSarin wrote: post #124
vishaltelangre wrote: post #105

Instead, government could've imposed ban on the consumer products which are wrapped using plastic material. Almost 50% plastic come directly from such consumer products sold by all FMCG companies. Such plastic material which is used as a wrapper (e.g. mineral bottles, wrappers of chocolates, biscuits, wafers, tobacco, etc.) is often useless and people tend to throw it right away. I agree that "we", the people need to…

Just because it doesn't completely solve everything, that doesn't mean it isn't a step in the right direction.

Imposing a ban on "public" and practically making sure that it is followed by the huge population of India is really difficult. We have seen such bans imposed on public before, and none of them were successful till the date.

On the other hand, keeping an eye on the handful of (big) companies to restrict them from supplying plastic to people is comparatively an easy task and requires less (man, money and infrastructure) power.

Besides, government(s) can also think of funding research program(s) to synthesize an eco-friendly material alternative to plastic which can be produced with same cost as of plastic; or funding program(s) to at least efficiently recycle plastic directly proportional to its growing usage.

Re: Mumbai bans plastic bags, bottles, and single-use plastic containers

#133

Post by sschueller »

protonfish wrote: post #117
sschueller wrote: post #64

I think this is a good step but what a lot of countries lack is also proper disposal of trash. Landfills are a poor solution, better are clean trash burning facilities[1] that also produce energy as well as proper pre sorting. China is building the largest in the world which is to open in 2020. [2] [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/13/science/earth/13trash.htm... [2] https://www.sciencealert.com/china-is-building-t…

The "ban single-use plastic" hype train seems illogical to me. Having your city littered with garbage is a government services problem - they should provide convenient waste disposal receptacles, empty them frequently to be disposed of properly, and give citations to litterers. We should not be cheering this short-sighted law. I also don't understand why plastic in a landfill is all that bad. The fact that it is biod…

A landfill is open and birds etc will take items out of it.

Re: Mumbai bans plastic bags, bottles, and single-use plastic containers

#134

Post by seszett »

protonfish wrote: post #117
sschueller wrote: post #64

I think this is a good step but what a lot of countries lack is also proper disposal of trash. Landfills are a poor solution, better are clean trash burning facilities[1] that also produce energy as well as proper pre sorting. China is building the largest in the world which is to open in 2020. [2] [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/13/science/earth/13trash.htm... [2] https://www.sciencealert.com/china-is-building-t…

The "ban single-use plastic" hype train seems illogical to me. Having your city littered with garbage is a government services problem - they should provide convenient waste disposal receptacles, empty them frequently to be disposed of properly, and give citations to litterers. We should not be cheering this short-sighted law. I also don't understand why plastic in a landfill is all that bad. The fact that it is biod…

> With an eye toward AGW, how can paper packaging and burning refuse be seen as a responsible choice?

Plastic takes oil and therefore carbon out of the depths of the Earth, until it eventually gets burnt, biodegrades or otherwise degrades and turns into CO2 contributing to global warming.

Trees instead take CO2 from the atmosphere, turn it into solid cellulose that we make paper from, until the paper biodegrades or gets burnt and returns to the atmosphere from which it came in the first place. If a new tree is planted for each tree that gets cut for paper, as is done in most developed countries, paper can be carbon neutral (it all depends on the source of the energy used for processing it).

Re: Mumbai bans plastic bags, bottles, and single-use plastic containers

#135

Post by nerdponx »

godelmachine wrote: post #109
nerdponx wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds like a bizarre misunderstanding.

Please elaborate.

Since I doubt there is actually a law against bringing plastic bags into certain buildings, it sounds like the security guard just misunderstands

Re: Mumbai bans plastic bags, bottles, and single-use plastic containers

#137

Post by thinkcontext »

protonfish wrote: post #117
sschueller wrote: post #64

I think this is a good step but what a lot of countries lack is also proper disposal of trash. Landfills are a poor solution, better are clean trash burning facilities[1] that also produce energy as well as proper pre sorting. China is building the largest in the world which is to open in 2020. [2] [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/13/science/earth/13trash.htm... [2] https://www.sciencealert.com/china-is-building-t…

The "ban single-use plastic" hype train seems illogical to me. Having your city littered with garbage is a government services problem - they should provide convenient waste disposal receptacles, empty them frequently to be disposed of properly, and give citations to litterers. We should not be cheering this short-sighted law. I also don't understand why plastic in a landfill is all that bad. The fact that it is biod…

City services are expensive, why spend more money picking up trash, cleaning waterways, unclogging sewers, etc when you can do less of that? Particularly in developing countries which have scarce resources.

My city (Washington, DC) opted for a 5 cent tax on plastic bags. This caused use of them to drop 80% and been considered a huge success.

Re: Mumbai bans plastic bags, bottles, and single-use plastic containers

#138

Post by [deleted] »

kumarvvr wrote: post #107

The offset in reduced plastic use by consumers will be more than compensated with the rapidly growing e-commerce market. I am terrified of the amount of plastic my Amazon purchases bring with their packing. It is a step in the right direction, but the govt. should invest and provide alternatives, perhaps use existing research institutions to come up with new, eco-friendly packing materials, and popularize them.

[deleted]

Re: Mumbai bans plastic bags, bottles, and single-use plastic containers

#139

Post by EGreg »

vishaltelangre wrote: post #132
FactolSarin wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just because it doesn't completely solve everything, that doesn't mean it isn't a step in the right direction.

Imposing a ban on "public" and practically making sure that it is followed by the huge population of India is really difficult. We have seen such bans imposed on public before, and none of them were successful till the date. On the other hand, keeping an eye on the handful of (big) companies to restrict them from supplying plastic to people is comparatively an easy task and requires less (man, money and infrastructur…

Arent there eco friendly alternatives already?

Re: Mumbai bans plastic bags, bottles, and single-use plastic containers

#140

Post by paulie_a »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #130
kumarvvr wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it so? I haven't heard of it. I recently ordered a set of knives and they came wrapped in a plastic cover (black) and wrapped with a cardboard box. But the knives themselves are packed in plastic and cardboard boxes. If I'd gone to a store, I could have picked them up by hand and avoided the plastic covering required for transport. E-commerce generates additional non-biodegradable waste and that is a problem that…

At the store just the other day - shopkeeper ringing up the guy in front of me asked "Do you want a bag for that?" It was a product, in a box, wrapped in plastic. And the guy had his own canvas bag out already. If he'd accepted, he'd have had the product in a box in a bag in a bag. My god. When does it all end? What was the product? Plastic bags.

It's getting annoying when I go to a store. Put my backpack on the counter and get asked about a bag for the two small items I am buying.
Post reply on HN