The Frisco council has lost their collective minds. Not only are they legislating outside their purview, they are pretending to be scientists. The most successful recycling programs in the world involve plastics. Polystyrene and Polyethylene are amoung the most recycled plastics on the globe. The plastic bags they are banning are the result of closing the loop on a huge recycling effort. The amount of plastics that are kept out of landfills by the production of these platics bags is phenominal. To give you an idea of the volume. If one could capture 37 minutes of the water volume of Niagra falls runoff, that would equal the volume of plastics kept out of landfills from the produciton of these plastic bags in a single year.

San Fransisco has got it wrong again. They are on the wrong side of an environmental effort. They are legislating outside their area of responsibility, and they are creating an adverse impact to the environment by using paper bags.

Finally, there are two items that have not been considered with starch technologies. The first is starch technology is not reliable. Starch products are humidity sensitive. They can collapse or degrade with moderate changes in ambient humidity. Finally, if one has ever been in a starch packaging peanut manufacturing plant, the rodents that accompany starch products will make the NY sewer rats look like trained gerbils.

Stop the insanity. Rescind the new law and allow plastic bags to continue use.

I posted the previous comment by the anonymous reader, and I'll take this opportunity to set some ground rules for such comments on the blog.

I much prefer that participants include their names for publication. But if you include correct contact information with your comments (including your working email address), I'll consider posting your comments under pen names or as anonymous contributions.

Keep in mind that the comments here are moderated, and will not be posted without approval.

Food for thought
When have BANS ever been effective on non toxic discards?

Does San Francisco have regulations and implement fines for littering?

Who will decide on class of Degradablility to be utilised - Bio or Oxo other?

What size of "competent" police force will be required to enforce the regulation?

Will the "Degradables" selected degrade ( mineralise ) in all current composting systems , the ocean or if littered?

No doubt cost performance factors will also be important

Have points such as this been fully thought through Before Leaping?

Jim Cairns EPAS 604 922 7899

Keep your commentary fair and multi-lateral, this article sums up everything nicely:
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/182949_bags21.html

I am not sure whether this is a right thing to do for an industrialized nation like the US. Recent researches have shown that plastic bags can be recycled into crude oil. I would have been more happy if there was a legislation to curb the junk food thats making my fellow Americans fatty!

This site is worth a visit to know whats happening on the other side of the world!
http://www.plastic2petrol.com/

This proves concusively that the San Francisco board of supervisors have missed the last spaceship home. What they have done is to encourage replacement products that are less environmentally friendly than the ubiquitous plastic bag. All alternatives are heavier, bulkier, require more energy to make, more energy to recycle, produce more carbon dioxide if and when they degrade, need more trucks to deliver, more warehouses to store, more garbage trucks to collect, and are neither waterproof nor hygenic in the way that the plastic bags are.

Sheer, unaldulterated madness. Yes it is politically the flavour of the month, but it is such a distasteful flavour when it harms the environment. Is there no intelligent input in this Board?

Our Government threw out a bill to tax plastic bags as it proved there was no net environmental benefit to the country. If is is good for a country then it would have been even better for a single city.

J Neil Young.
Glasgow,
Scotland, UK

Estoy interesada en conocer los productos bio debgradables, ustedes los fabrican?
Sin mas por el momento y en espera de su pronta atencion, quedo de ustedes.
Atentamnte

Man Sits in World?s Largest Reusable Shopping Bag to Raise Environmental Awareness about Plastic Bags

September 8, 2007, San Angelo, TX ? Can Americans live without the omnipresent plastic shopping bag? The world?s very first Bagonaut, Egan Sanders, (www.bagonaut.com) hopes to pave the way for a new era of eco-friendly shopping via reusable shopping bags. Donned in an eco-suit made of canvas, self-proclaimed ?Bagonaut? Sanders will be lowered by crane into BIGBAG1, the world?s largest reusable canvas shopping bag, at noon on Saturday, September 8th, to raise awareness of the environmental challenges that plastic shopping bags present. Bagonaut will remain sealed within BIGBAG1 for 24 hours during the ?Big Bag Event?, as it is being called, which will take place at the Sam?s Club store in San Angelo, Texas. People who donate non-perishable food items to the Concho Valley Regional Food Bank at the ?Big Bag Event? will receive free reusable shopping bags donated by local, national, and international businesses.

Bagonaut wants to show people a way they can make a difference by shopping with reusable bags. It is one simple thing every person on Earth can do right now to conserve energy and petroleum, reduce landfills, decrease pollution, and prevent harm to wildlife. In addition, talks on environmental issues affecting communities and what sensible things can be done to solve them will be made. On Saturday evening a Plastic Bag Film Festival, featuring such bag classics as, ?I Don't Need a Bag? and ?Bag Monster Attacks San Francisco? will be screened on the front of BIGBAG1, the world?s largest reusable canvas shopping bag. Standing over 8 feet tall and 6 feet wide, BIGBAG1 was constructed in San Angelo by the West Texas Lighthouse for the Blind, a sheltered facility providing employment for blind and visually impaired individuals.

Plastic bags begin their lives as natural gas or other petrochemical substances. According to Worldwatch Institute, factories around the world manufacture 4 to 5 trillion plastic bags per year. Although many of these bags are recyclable, each year Americans return less than 1% and discard the rest. Once plastic bags are in the environment - whether in a landfill or polluting a lake - it can take several hundred years for them to decompose, and they contribute toxins to the soil and water as they do. According to the EPA, over 380 billion plastic bags, sacks, and wraps are consumed in the U.S. each year. Around 12 million barrels of oil are used to make plastic bags in the U.S. alone.

Both plastic and paper shopping bags can waste energy and natural resources, pollute the environment, and harm wildlife. Nationwide landfills already hold countless bags. According to the Wall Street Journal the U.S. goes through 100 billion plastic shopping bags annually at an estimated cost to retailers of 4 billion dollars. Each American typically uses over 300 plastic bags per year with each bag used for less than an hour. By contrast, reusable shopping bags can be used for many years, conserve resources, and are a safe way to both shop and protect the environment without excessive use of plastic or paper.

Plastic is a useful material that has created many products for society. How people use plastic bags and dispose of them is an issue that needs to be examined as increasing worldwide population and industrialization burdens the Earths ecosystems. If Bagonaut Sanders safely emerges from BIGBAG1 at noon, Sunday, September 9, he plans to continue to spread the word of eco-friendly shopping. Sanders, who resides in San Angelo, has been working with his local city government on an environmental plan to address the very visible effects of global warming, pollution, frequent droughts, high electricity rates, and recycling.

The Big Bag event has received generous support from a wide variety of local, national, and international reusable bag companies: 1 Bag at a Time, Bring Your Own Bag, ChicoBag, Coyote's Corner, Eco Bags, Eco-Logics, Envirosax, Get Hip Get Green, Globotote, Go-Again Bags, Greenkit, Green Sak, Organic Fred, The Planet Bag, Reusablecanvasbags.com, See2Sea Sourcing, Smart Sac, Texas Earth Bag, and The Abe Lincoln Story. Local sponsors include: Sam?s Club, Total Sports, West Texas Lighthouse for the Blind, A Plus Sign, Company Printing, Albertsons LLC, West Texas Broadcasting, and the San Angelo Standard Times. Special thanks go out to volunteers from the Concho Holistic Association, Keep San Angelo Beautiful, San Angelo Friends of the Environment, and Goodfellow Air Force Base.

Bagonaut.com features tips for conserving water, saving money on your electric bill, ways to effectively reduce your use of plastic bags, and much more. Bagonaut regularly travels and gives public talks on environmental issues. Updates on the ecological adventures of Bagonaut and BIGBAG1 can be found at www.bagonaut.com

http://www.prweb.com//releases/2007/8/prweb550146.htm

San Francisco legislators have made a serious mistake by defining degradability of plastic by reference to ASTM 6400.

Oxo-biodegradable plastic bags, complying with American Standard 6954 are not expensive, and they degrade in a few months leaving no fragments or harmful residues. They are made from a by-product of gasoline refining which would otherwise be wasted, so nobody is importing oil to make them.

The starch-based bags (complying with ASTM 6400) made from crops are really bad news. They are at least 400% more expensive, they are not strong enough, and they emit methane (a serious greenhouse gas) in landfill. It is crazy to use land to grow plastic bags and to drive up the cost of food for the poorest people.

Paper bags use 300% more energy to produce, they are not strong enough, and they will also emit methane in landfill

Michael Stephen
Symphony Environmental, UK
www.degradable.net

The first anonymous poster claims that the one-time use bags close a petrolchemical loop. This is ridiculous because all you have to do is open your eyes to see the millions of these bags in landfills and in oceans. Bloody nicknamed the national flag in Ireland. A closed loop would involve having these shopping bags return to the manufacturer so they could return these bags to their original form. But, as is the norm with these glutonous corporations and companies no responsibility has been taken to have the bags returned, instead our environment must bear the brunt.

Have a conscious life.

I hate rubbish

OMG, IT'S NOT FRISCO!
IT'S SAN FRANCISCO!!
Damn tourists.