Legislative Blog
J.B. Williams, J.D.
Plastic vs Reusable Bags
A Blog about Environmental impact
A Bit of Background
The following backgrounds help summarize the author's views on both the general topic: Other and more specifically Environmental impact as it relates to that topic.
Brief Summary of Other
Topics here may be related to legal matters but not innately legal. For instance, discussing grocery plastic bags versus cotton cloth bags. The item itself is not legal but many city governments have placed it into legislation.
Summary of Environmental impact
The goal here is to read studies and articles on different small items that become, or have become, an environmental target. I'm doing this mostly because I bought into some of the hype many years ago, and now sadly I see that what was being pushed as better environmentally was not.
Blog Summary
I've read a multitude of studies and articles concerning the plastic grocery bag, plastic bag, cotton (or organic cotton) reusable bag, poly reusable bags, and paper bags. While I've read article claiming victory for cotton bags, none of those provided any specifics as to how they made their evaluation. Most seemed to make it solely based upon the volume of grocery bags that are discarded into the environment. I get that issue but changing to another much less environmental bag does not solve the problem, it merely removes the problem from your sight. This seems to have extremely often - we don't solve the problem, we merely change to something where the problem becomes less visible.
Plastic grocery bags win the environmental challenge substantially. What we need to do is begin education concerning re-use and recycling. I recently saw a new mark for plastics that shows store recycle - it actually says "store drop-off". If people were educated and actually re-used and/or recycled their plastics we could make a huge win. It's better to fix the problem rather than move it into the dark where it can be ignored.
Plastic vs Reusable Bags
Published: 2022-07-29
After reading a multitude of studies and articles discussing studies, the final answer seems to be that HDPE bags, like those at check out registers, are the least environmentall harmful. I'll be honest, I read some articles that claimed that cotton bags were environmentally better or that re-usable bags in general were better. However, none of those articles linked to any studies and none discussed the details of why they were better. One said cotton was better because it didn't leave any residue requiring breakdown even though it used more resources to make. And then said that even if it required the cotton bag to be used 170 times to equal the grocery bag then that was fine. But it didn't provide any basis for why the 170 number was computed, it was just stated as if it were fact. To be honest, I sincerely hoped that cotton bags were better environmentally. Many years ago I began using them as often as possible, and over the years I have ended up with quite a few bags. (Although a few are not cotton, and those seem to break down much sooner than the cotton bags. My oldest ones, still in great shape, are all cotton.) I was saddened to find that I would need to use my cotton bags 7,100 times to equal a single use plastic bag being used. From all of the studies I read the 7,100 was the lowest number, most of the ones I read at it at somewhere near 10,000 to 12,000 uses. So I apparently need to leave my cotton bags to someone to use after my death.
When looking at the best bag, you need to consider the life cycle analysis - or LCA - of the product. It looks at how much energy is used and how many environmental impacts a product is responsible for. This includes extracting raw materials, refining them, manufacturing, packaging for shipment, transporting and distributing, use and possible reuse, recycling and disposal. Life cycle studies in Europe and North America have determined that plastic bags for better environmentally than paper or reusable bags. There are caveats to this.
For plastic, the HDPE (high density polyethylene) used at most cash register check-outs are the best. They use less fuel and water, produce less greenhouse gases, less acid rain emissions, and less solid waste. Comparing plastic to paper (looking at 1,500 plastic to 1,000 paper):
| Impact | Plastic bags | Paper bags |
|---|---|---|
| Fossil fuels to manufacture | 14.9 kg | 23.2 kg |
| Solid waste | 7kg | 33.9 kg |
| Greenhouse gas emissions | .04 tons | .08 tons |
| Water used | 58 gallons | 1004 gallons |
| Energy used | 763 megajoules | 2622 megajoules |
| Sulfur oxides (acid rain) | 50.5 grams | 579 grams |
| Nitrogen oxides (acid rain) | 45.4 grams | 264 grams |
The concerns are that plastic bags are rarely recycle and can take 20-1,000 years to break down. I find this sad and shocking, considering the ease at which they can be recycled. Every grocery store has a place where you can return the bags on your very next trip to the grocery store. It could not possibly be any easier than that. While I am not sure about anyone who picks up their groceries, I would imagine if you ask they would take the plastic bags in for recycle. And if they don't, I would keep nudging my store until they were willing to do this.
Paper bags come from a renewable source and are biodegradable. Currently in the US there are over 10 billion paper bags consumed each year, requiring the felling of 14 million trees. Because of the toxic chemicals used, paper is responsible for 70 times more air pollution and 50 times more water pollution than plastic bag production. And 66 percent of paper and cardboard are recycled, but this requires additional chemicals to remove ink and return paper to pulp. They also use more water and can add to algae growth and depletion of oxygen.
Comparing an LDPE plastic to paper bag for environmental impact, they were much the same as far as environmental impact as long as the paper was unbleached. A bleached paper bag would need to be used 43 times to be equal to LDPE's environmental impact. One of the issues with paper bags are the weight being 6 to 10 times heavier than plastic, thereby requiring more fuel to transport. One study stated it would take 7 truckloads of paper bags to equal a single truckload of plastic bags. But if a forest is sustainably managed, and the processing plant takes environmental measures into account, it can reduce it's environmental impact accordingly.
Looking at cotton totes they are renewable and biodegradable. They are also strong and durable for use multiple times. Cotton needs to be harvest and ginned, which ends up leaving only 33% of the cotton that was harvested being usable. It then must be bailed and shipped for fluffing, cleaning, flattening and spinning. The thread is woven into fabric, which undergoes chemical washing and bleaching, then possibly dyed and printed. Spinning, weaving, and other manufacturing is energy intensive. While washing, bleaching, dyeing, printing and such use large amounts of water and electricity. Several studies found that they have the worst environmental impact of all bags for all of these reasons, plus it requires substantial land, water, and fertilizers to grow. They are also heavy and bulky, and difficult to recycle. A cotton bag needs to be used at least 7,100 times to equal the single use plastic bag. Bags made from organic cotton are even worse. Their yields are 30% less than non-organic cotton, they require 30% more water and land. An organic cotton bag needs to be used at least 20,000 times to equal the single use plastic bag.
The other issue with re-usable bags are the bacteria content since they are rarely washed. And the amount of energy/water used to keep them clean is not even considered in the environmental impact.
If you already have re-usable bags, try to use them as much as possible. For cotton bags at 7,100 uses, using the bag once a week for 52 weeks in the year would mean you'd need to use them for 136.54 years. So use them as much as possible and hope that someone after you does the same. If you don't have re-usable bags, then try to use your single use plastic bag a second time to store food, line trash cans, pick up dog poop (which will help them break down faster), pack lunches, pad packages, etc. And if it's second use doesn't involve an item going in the trash, then recycle, recycle, recycle. The more we recycle, the lower the environmental impact.
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