Plastic Bag Synthesis Essay

The use of paper, plastic, and reusable carrying bags has yielded much controversy over the past couple decades. Some argue that plastic bags aren’t as much of a hindrance as paper bags can be to the environment, however our well being on Earth seems more at risk in terms of longevity when it comes to plastic bags. My community should should limit plastic bag use by imposing a fee on it to both boost waste programs and reduce the amount of non-biodegradable material in the Earth. PLastic bags can prove to be convenient and useful for many circumstances, however convenience never directly meant positivity, and fees should be put in place to limit the use of plastic bags. Some may argue that plastic bag use should be up to the user, that choosing

Imposing a fee on plastic bag use can supply as a very effective way of both reducing plastic bag use and enhancing the programs put in place to deal with environmental waste. As Source E describes, the City of Aspen in Colorado had a 20 cent plastic bag fee put in place for the two grocery stores in the area. With, “...$44,826 in fees since the ban was put into place in May of 2012…”(Soruce E) such a report has proven how a small change to limit plastic bag use can go a long way. Source E describes these proceeds as another means to boost waste programs in which, “... the money goes to a city-administered fund which is used to pay for outreach, implementation and a waste and reduction program which supplies

While paper bags may not be seen as the panacea for pollution and waste issues, they are proven to still eventually breakdown in the Earth, even if it is at a slower rate. As source F details, while “...paper doesn’t degrade all that much faster than plastics.”(Source F) it still manages to degrade eventually. No one wants to look at human civilization on Earth as something that will eventually end, so why prepare for such a thing? Source F explains, “Light breaks down plastic so it photodegrades rather than biodegrades… this process can take up to 1000 years in land fills.”(Source F) Source F indicates that plastic doesn’t even biodegrade, it breaks down overtime by light, but not by natural degradation from Earth. The first step in a healthier Earth environment would be reducing the plastic waste built up globally. Source C includes a bar chart displaying how 969,244 plastic bags were found in their ocean litter search as opposed to 412,879 paper bags, that is more than double! A fee placed on the plastic bags of the many grocery stores in my community would greatly aid in reducing such numbers of waste and pollution. As both an incentive to not use plastic bags and a method of boosting waste programs, my community should implement a fee on the use of plastic bags to reduce the overall buildup of non-biodegradable material in the