There I Go About Those Bags Again

All fresh and irritated from the beach cleanup over the weekend I figured I would bring up my environmental pet peeve numero uno. Plastic bags. Yep, those handy plastic bags that they pass out at the grocery store, pharmacy and just about anyplace you buy anything are choking the planet one bag at a time. 

They're everywhere.  Just look around as you walk or drive around the city, you'll see them clogging storm drains or even stuck in a trees . I bet you can guess where most of those bags end up - at the beach and in the ocean, where marine mammals and birds eat them and die. Or possibly they end up in the "Great Pacific Garbage Patch" or maybe me and my friends pick them up as we cleanup the beach.

Let me give you some numbers to consider.

• Californians use more than 19 billion disposable plastic shopping bags each year.

• Taxpayers spend more than $25 million to collect and dispose of them.

• Over one million plastic bags are used every minute worldwide.

• In the US less than 5% of plastic bags are recycled.

• Plastics are not biodegradable, they photo-degrade which means they break down into little toxic pieces. That can contaminate soil, water and harm wildlife.

• Approximately 60 to 90 percent of marine debris is plastic.

• Plastic bags, which resemble jellyfish or sponges, are mistaken for food by seabirds, marine mammals, fish and sea turtles.

• More than 1 million seabirds and marine mammals die each year because of ingestion and entanglement of debris including bags.

• Single-use bags made out of high-density polyethylene (HDPE) are the big problem. They stay on the planet up to 1,000 years.

• It takes 11 barrels of oil to produce a ton of plastic bags.

• Producing 1 million bags generates 13 million pounds of carbon dioxide.

It's so easy to switch to reusable shopping bags, I say take the first step. There are so many styles options and sizes to choose from. Click here to check some out. If you worry about remembering to bring them along, don't, just keep a few in the trunk of your car. That way you are always prepared.