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85% of People Want Global Ban on Single-Use Plastics

worldwildlife.org

251–260 of 263 posts

Re: 85% of People Want Global Ban on Single-Use Plastics

#251
post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> an inconvenience to actually reuse the bag that is inevitably covered in rancid meat juice Why do you have rancid meat juice in your grocery bag!? Why do you have rancid meat! > not caring about burying a few plastic bags in the landfill I don’t particularly care about this. I still have a couple reusable bags in the back of my car that I use to transport food from the grocery store home. (I never have to deal with…

You've never had a package of meat leak a little juice in to the grocery bag? If you have, you either wash it (inconvenient) or you have rancid meat juice if you don't (it doesn't start rancid).

> You've never had a package of meat leak a little juice in to the grocery bag?

No, and if it was a common occurrence I'd find a different butcher that can actually package the meat properly.

There have been a few times I've washed a bag because it got dirty. It wasn't really inconvenient. I just tossed it in the laundry with the rest of my clothes. Or do you also just throw away clothes once they get a little dirty?

Re: 85% of People Want Global Ban on Single-Use Plastics

#252
post #52
post #16

Yes yes instead of single use bags at the store I now get more durable plastic bags that I throw away after using once. Well done.

If the grocery store made plastic bags that didn't have holes in them all the time, they make a good pooper-scooper bag and thus reusable.

I get doggie poop bags that are allegedly compostable. I never have to worry about the condition of the bag, they come in neat rolls for the dispenser on my leash. They're way handier than disposable shopping bags and cost a few pennies each. I buy a case of them and they last me a few years at a time.

They do seem to be somewhat water soluble. I left some out in the rain one time and they got oddly mushy and weaker, different from regular plastic.

Re: 85% of People Want Global Ban on Single-Use Plastics

#253

Don't need a survey for that. Just go to the nearest supermarket, stand near the cash register, and count how many people buy plastic bags, and divide by how many bring their own multiple-use bag. You will get the true picture, which I suspect is 10:1 in favor of single-use plastics.

The last time I was in a place that had a disposable shopping bag ban for a while, I was the only one seemingly grabbing some of the bags for sale as I was a visitor and did not have any of my own bags yet. I didn't see a single other person who actually lived there buy any bags on any of the trips I took to the grocery.

Re: 85% of People Want Global Ban on Single-Use Plastics

#255

Can anyone explain to me how this works in practice? Eg if i now buy meat or cheese or pre-cut vegetables or bread at the supermarket, it’s in plastic packaging. What do legislators propose we replace that by? I understand (and use) reusable shopping bags but keeping sliced ham fresh sounds less practical. For clarity, I’m not skeptical, I’m all for the strictest plastic ban that’s remotely practical. But I don’t get…

You could get them individually packed, but I believe that shelf-life would likely be affected significantly. Meaning that food waste would also go up. Packing anything with nitrogen or like is really hard without plastics. Same goes for vacuum.

So end result would be more traveling and emissions to go to stores more regularly and lot more wasted food. Again significantly increasing emissions.

Re: 85% of People Want Global Ban on Single-Use Plastics

#256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These days I often see the grocers using gloves when stocking shelves.

Single use plastic gloves?

> Single use plastic gloves?

Probably.

Clean hands are better, IMO, than those gloves

Re: 85% of People Want Global Ban on Single-Use Plastics

#257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pesticides are water soluble. Cat feces is not.

When you wash something you're not dissolving contaminants - you're mechanically removing them. Most bacteria are not water soluble yet we manage to wash them off our hands.

> Most bacteria are not water soluble yet we manage to wash them off our hands.

We use soap.

Well, I do

Re: 85% of People Want Global Ban on Single-Use Plastics

#258
post #91

I don't want a ban, I want a tax on them. There's a strong use for single use plastics - medical goods being one of the important ones that I highly suspect people don't want a ban of. They define these as "necessary" versus "unnecessary" in their poll (ie the 85% figure is specifically for "ban unnecessary single-use plastic products, e.g., shopping bags, cutlery, cups & plates"). Things get murky really quickly whe…

> Are all plastic liquid containers bad? Almost certainly not, you wouldn't want to store a corrosive acid that eats through glass in a glass bottle. I'd argue that most, especially containers in regard to food item, are. You don't have to have a database to figure this out, you can start simple by just banning the use of single use plastic with regards to food. There aren't many (any?) items that are highly corrosiv…

> There aren't many (any?) items that are highly corrosive and intended for human consumption.

Pop cans have a plastic liner so it doesn't eat through the metal.

Re: 85% of People Want Global Ban on Single-Use Plastics

#259
post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Single use plastic gloves?

> Single use plastic gloves? Probably. Clean hands are better, IMO, than those gloves

Indeed. I used to work in a supermarket and we used those gloves. It just meant that the hands got really sweaty and nasty before the gloves inevitably ripped and put your manky hands in contact with the product anyway. By the end of my tenure I just washed my hands before each task.

Re: 85% of People Want Global Ban on Single-Use Plastics

#260
post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the trash created after use of shopping bags is not a big deal either; a typical non-reusable shopping bag weighs 200 milligrams, so if you use three per day for 72 years, you produce a grand total of 16 kilograms of shopping bags. that's less than even your own bones, which will also last thousands of years the issue with paper mills is not their energy consumption, which generally is fueled by the same biomass they…

When I go fishing at the creek it is not a ton of paper bags littering it. Single-use plastic bags are terrible and people overly use them. Go get a pack of gum from a bodega and you'll be offered a plastic bag by default. Maybe we shouldn't necessarily ban them, but we should definitely tax them to make people question "do I really need that bag?"

it sounds like your assessment of environmental harms is mostly guided by surface appearances, but things like paper mill pollution are not easily visible or understandable
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