Local Environmental Group Urges City Council to Ban Plastic Bags in Austin
11th May, 2010 - Posted by carsi - 5 Comments
The Austin Zero Waste Alliance, a group of environmental advocates, is requesting that the City of Austin create a ban on plastic bags, similar to the ban that San Francisco already has in place. Six large area retailers including H-E-B, Randalls, Wal-Mart, Target, Walgreens and Whole Foods have voluntarily reduced the amount of plastic bags they send to the landfill by 38 percent since 2008, but their efforts have fallen short of the 50 percent decrease they originally promised. The alliance is requesting the ban be phased in over a period of six months. City Council members and the mayor have yet to say publicly whether or not they support the ban.
5 Comments
Aryn
May 11th, 2010 at 5:35 pm
I think this sounds like a good idea. I wonder how they got the 38%. Are they taking into account that some people recycle the bags and they don’t always throw them in the trash?
I like getting plastic bags at the store so I can use them for me trash bags which have to be changed frequently because of my cat’s waste. However, I am sure I could come up with something else if this went into effect.
carsi
May 12th, 2010 at 6:32 am
Hey, Aryn! The article notes that “the retailers reduced the pounds of plastic bags they purchased by 27 percent, increased the amount they recycled by 42 percent, reduced the amount they sent to landfills by 38 percent, and sold about 907,000 reusable bags, according to data compiled by the Texas Retailers Association.” So I guess a combination of buying less plastic bags, recycling, and selling reusable bags created the 38%? It’s a little unclear where that number came from.
And I am the same way–I use plastic bags for my cat’s waste too, but I can usually find plastic bags that aren’t plastic grocery bags and that does the trick. I’ve used the bags inside cereal boxes or the bags that bread comes in before.
Aryn
May 12th, 2010 at 4:59 pm
Thanks for the bag ideas Carsi! I will definitely be saving those other bags and using them as well. I could also invest more time into training my cat to use the toilet, but I don´t know if I am that committed. lol.
carsi
May 13th, 2010 at 8:59 am
haha that would be an ideal solution!
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