How many people today grab a takeaway coffee cup from the local cafe to drink on the go? We don’t know, but the number must be enormous.. Most every one of the above have a plastic top that will last 100s of years. Some cafes still use plastic cups that last a similar time. Is 10 minutes of coffee worth 100s of years of trash?
These items can be seen littering our gutters and on our streets all over the place. If they were all cardboard, they would still be littered, but they would, at least, be gone in a short time.
They do not need to be made of plastic.
On the way home from the gym last week, a distance of about 1 km (1/2 mile), I counted the items of plastic litter on the curb as I walked. In that short distance I counted 63 pieces of plastic litter. Plastic drink bottles, bottle tops, candy wrappers, plastic film, polystyrene fragments etc. That seemed to be a lot to me. I guess it is a generational thing. Our parents would have been horrified to see that amount, whereas it seems to go unnoticed by our youth of today. In another 20 years how many pieces will there be on this stretch, -- 200? What will today’s youth think of that new amount then when they are older? Will their children be so readily accepting of a higher amount of litter? Scotland consults on carrier bag charge
Posted on August 11, 2012 by DrRossH in Plastic Limiting RegulationsShoppers in Scotland may soon have to pay at least 5p for a disposable bag under proposals to cut litter and protect the environment
The Scottish Government has recently launched a three-month consultation on a range of environmental proposals, including phasing out free carrier bags, with the aim of safeguarding Scotland’s resources through efficient use of materials such as cutting waste and encouraging more positive environmental behaviour.
Plastics manufacturers always try to hide behind the story of it is more environmentally beneficial to make a plastic bag than it is a reusable bag. What they don’t want to admit though is that if they recycled their water they would not use more water. If they used renewable energy rather than coal energy they would not be polluting the air as much. The other big factor they hide away from is what happens on the disposal side of their product as they have no answer for that. A plastic bag can be used once for 5 minutes for simple convenience then discarded where it last for 100’s of years. Is that the legacy we want to leave to future generations? Certainly not so the only way to stop this is face up to it that we have to stop using these plastic bags. Putting a fee on them will bring about the first part of a good chance to get their use down.
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