When China, India, Indonesia and orhers do this we are making true progress.
Though not sure what would be the process to get this thru in United States?
Canada aims to ban single-use plastics by 2021
21–30 of 136 posts
Re: Canada aims to ban single-use plastics by 2021
#22Can we add cigarette filters to the list? If I had a penny for every ...
You'd have a bunch of currency that isn't really in circulation anymore, if my understanding of the Canadian penny is correct!
Re: Canada aims to ban single-use plastics by 2021
#23Aren't there many legitimate uses of single-use plastics? Like medical products? What will Canada replace them with?
> Trudeau did not specify the products to be banned, but said likely candidates include plastic bags, straws, cutlery, plates and stir sticks “where supported by scientific evidence and warranted.”
I don't think legitimate medical uses of single use plastics are at risk here, as long as no reasonable alternative exists.
Re: Canada aims to ban single-use plastics by 2021
#24Aren't there many legitimate uses of single-use plastics? Like medical products? What will Canada replace them with?
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Re: Canada aims to ban single-use plastics by 2021
#25Aren't there many legitimate uses of single-use plastics? Like medical products? What will Canada replace them with?
By having nuanced legislation and regulation?
This isn't a formal declaration of rule making, or legislation, simply a declaration of intent from the Prime Minister. There's no formal weight behind this (except probably to start getting internal government bodies working on policy).
There's lot of time and room for sane (or dumb) rules to come out of this.
Medical (and similar) use exceptions are common. For example RoHS initially had a medical device exemption (and still has an implantable device exemption).
Re: Canada aims to ban single-use plastics by 2021
#26Which is funny because at most Canadian grocery stores they don't even offer or have paper bags. At least in Alberta.
What would be the point of offering paper bags, when they can instead sell you their high-margin reusable cloth bags (which are common in Canadian grocery stores)?
Re: Canada aims to ban single-use plastics by 2021
#27There was a similar thread for Germany here recently, and I remember someone saying that most companies will just start using multi-use plastics instead of single-use ones... without reusing them. Is that really likely or am I not foolish to hope that companies will eventually just research and use more biodegradable materials?
The "biodegradable" plastics can still take a _long_ time to decompose if not put into a city compost collection bin. The city has to "biodegrade" them via a method different from what you would do at home (throw it into a heap). Wikipedia has a list of plastics that are approved for "home composting" here[0].
Plus, these plastics still take a lot of energy to produce.
I definitely think that multi-use plastics make the most sense, if we can build the supply chain to get there. Sort of like how old glass milk bottles worked: You left them out and they were collected by the milk man.
0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biodegradable_plastic#Home_com...
Re: Canada aims to ban single-use plastics by 2021
#28Aren't there many legitimate uses of single-use plastics? Like medical products? What will Canada replace them with?
By having nuanced legislation and regulation? This isn't a formal declaration of rule making, or legislation, simply a declaration of intent from the Prime Minister. There's no formal weight behind this (except probably to start getting internal government bodies working on policy). There's lot of time and room for sane (or dumb) rules to come out of this. Medical (and similar) use exceptions are common. For example…
So the headline is just absolute bollocks and means nothing when you start to interrogate it? Oh ok.
Re: Canada aims to ban single-use plastics by 2021
#29I remember reading somewhere that some bottled product replaced plastic with glass, which weighs more, which led to an increase in trucks required, which led to more of a carbon footprint, which is also bad.
Re: Canada aims to ban single-use plastics by 2021
#30Interesting side-note: here in Vancouver BC, we were full steam ahead on eliminating plastics (e.g. styrofoam take-out containers, plastic drinking straws, shopping bags, etc.) but that was seemingly all instantly reversed once social distancing started. I can understand the reversal of charging for shopping bags to encourage bringing reusable bags: reusable bags are potentially a disease vector. But what's with the…
Likely major swings in demand combined with supply chains being affected. Change is tough during normal times, but toss in a global pandemic and...