Six Alternatives to the Six Pack Rings of Death

Peanut, a turtle in Missouri, who was rescued
from a 6 pack ring of death in 1993.

In five years time, I hope that young children will never meet a plastic 6-pack ring. I hope that those rings of death will be relegated to the past, never to appear again.

That might be a forlorn hope. There are already millions of 6-pack rings floating around in the oceans and waterways of our beautiful planet. But... new ones are on their way out. Soon enough plastic 6 pack rings will be a thing of the past.

Paper or Plastic? Reusable or Cotton? Which Shopping Bags are Better for the Environment?

Photo by Evie Calder on Unsplash

I've killed a few reusable grocery bags in the last few weeks. Not intentionally of course, it was accidental. I was hauling them along and one of them got caught on a sharp edge of something or other and... boom... there's a tear in it now. It's still good... for a while but... at some point it will fail entirely. On another one, the seam has gone. A third one has a handle that is coming undone from the stitching. The last two I could theoretically fix if we had a sewing machine... but we don't... so I'm not sure what will become of them. Save them until I can visit someone with a sewing machine maybe...

But, this mass mortality of reusable grocery bags annoyed me. Don't these things need to last for more than a few dozen uses before they fall apart?? If we're really trying to help the environment by ditching plastic bags, don't we have to use the typical fold-up reusable grocery bag 100 times or more? Some of these dying bags are only a year old!

I decided to do some digging... and what I found is fascinating and insanely complicated. In terms of environmental impact, you've got two basic factors to consider: (1) what goes into making and transporting the bag and (2) what happens to the bag after it dies. So some bags have really bag environmental impacts at the front end (e.g. paper bags) but have really good back end environmental impacts (e.g. paper bags). Sooo... are paper bags good or bad? It's complicated.

There have been a number of studies (Denmark and UK) that measure the environmental impact of different types of grocery bag options. I'm going to synthesize that information here.

1. Virgin Plastic Bag
This is the standard against which all other bags are measured, because these virgin bags are the ones we are trying to get rid of. Plastic bags are made from petroleum products (bad) but they are light weight and easy to transport (good) and they can be recycled (good) but if they aren't recycled (and only 5% are recycled), plastic bags can blow around and end up in waterways (e.g. rivers, lakes oceans) where they either break down into micro-plastics (very bad) and/or end up in the stomachs of whales and dolphins and turtles (very bad). If they are landfilled, they last a very, very, very long time (bad).

You'll see that the numbers below vary widely. It is, as I mentioned above, a complicated issue. It depends on whether we are just looking at climate change impacts or whether we are considering the entire environmental impact of a bag from creation until destruction. Most of the studies also use a baseline virgin plastic bag that has been used twice - once to go grocery shopping and once as a garbage bag. If a plastic bag is only used once and then ends up in the ditch... that is a whole other kettle of fish. Sooo... These numbers need to be taken with a grain of salt, but they all trend in roughly the same direction and some of them might just surprise you.

2. Recycled Plastic Bag - Use 2 to 4 times
A recycled plastic bag can have various percentages of recycled plastic and this is obviously better than a virgin plastic bag. But, if you use it to haul your groceries and then use it to bring library books back to the library and then use it to take pop cans to the recycling depot and then use it for some garbage in your car, you're having less of an environmental impact than using a virgin plastic bag. 

3. Paper Bag - Use 4 to 43 times

If you are diligent about recycling your plastic bags, then a paper bag would need to be used 43 times before it's environmental impact is less than your plastic bags. If the plastic bags are not recycled, then paper bags only need to be reused 4 times to beat plastic's environmental impact. These numbers can also be influenced by the amount of recycled content in the paper bag. Like I said, it's complicated!

But using a paper bag 4 to 43 times seems a big ridiculous. Paper bags are not that sturdy and I don't know that I'd be able to even eke out four grocery store runs out of one paper bag. I'm not even sure I could make a paper bag last that long at home. Our Fresh Prep meals come in medium-sized paper bags and I save those and then use them for picking mushrooms, at which point they are pretty much toast and that's only two uses... I suppose paper bags from some high-end store (like The Bay?) could be reused for gift bags... but then what?

So paper bags are not really a solution in my mind. The look and sound eco-friendly, but they really don't seem to be... particularly when you think about the forests that are being cut down to make a bag that will only be used twice and then discarded. Although paper bags made from recycled content are obviously better...

4. Typical Fold-up Reusable Bag (NWPP)- Use 6 to 52 times

Right then, this is the number I'm looking for! These are the reusable bags made from non-woven polypropylene (NWPP) and are sometimes called "Bag for Life". These are the bags that kind of look and feel like fabric but can stand up on their own with a bit  of help. They usually fold into a nice, neat rectangle and sometimes have a plastic insert in the bottom.

These are not the same as the old Superstore (Loblaws) bags which look and feel like fabric and are quite floppy. Those bags are apparently made from PET plastic (recycled pop bottles) and need to be used anywhere from 8 to 84 times.

Then there are woven polypropylene bags which I like to call tarp bags, because they kind of look like they are made from plastic tarp material. They need to be used 5 to 45 times to have a lower environmental impact than a virgin plastic bag.

There are soooo many different options out there. But for our purposes, the only comparisons I could find were to the typical non-wove PP bag. So these need to be used anywhere from 6 to 52 times before they are better (environmentally) than a virgin plastic bag.

Well, that makes me feel slightly better. Because if I use them every week to go grocery shopping then, after a year of weekly use, I've come out ahead in the environmental department! It's just... there are some of these bags that I don't use all that often. Like the non-woven PP bag from the funeral home that handled my Dad's cremation. It's a black bag with the name of the funeral home on it. They gave it to me to carry my Dad's box of ashes but... it seems kind of macabre to use it for grocery shopping. Not to mention it's smaller than a typical grocery bag. Hmmm...

5. Cotton Tote Bag - Use 7100 to 20,000 times

I don't know about you, but this surprised the heck out of me! You'd think that cotton bags would be far better than any of the other options but... no. A lot of it has to do with the environmental impact of growing cotton (water use, fertilizer, pesticides, etc) and then processing the cotton into fabric which then needs to get sewed and shipped, etc.

And... organic cotton is actually worse than regular cotton! That's where the 20,000 times comes in... So, while "organic cotton" might sound like it's good for the environment (no pesticides or fertilizer), it's actually far, far worse (mostly due to lower crop yields).

You'd have to use a regular cotton bag every week for almost 12 years (7100 times) to come out ahead against a virgin plastic bag. And an organic cotton bag would need to be used every week for more than 32 years...

Chart showing Life Cycle Assessment of grocery bags (from EuroNews site)

Conclusion

Of course, you'll find that the plastics industry will be touting the environmental benefits of the thin and filmy plastic bag. They will argue that human behaviour is key and that if people would just recycle their plastic bags, then that would be far better than any of the other options. Which might be true "IF" plastic bags were actually recycled. But given their flimsy, fly away nature, even if they end up at a recycling facility, some invariable blow away or get caught in machinery. I know that in our city, plastic bags can NOT go in the blue bin but need to be bagged up and dropped off at the recycling depot. Or taken back to the grocery store from whence they came. And how many people are going to do that?

So, what's a regular person to do? As it turns out, what really matters is human behaviour. All of the studies and articles gave several key recommendations:

1. Whatever bags you already have (plastic, paper, reusable, cotton), keep reusing them (for all sorts of things) until they fall apart, and then use them to bag up your garbage (or compost in the case of paper bags). Single-use anything is bad...

This was actually a helpful tidbit for me because I've been wondering what to do with the falling apart bags... should I be recycling them or not? But it would appear that none of the reusable bags are currently recyclable in Canada. sigh.

Obviously, I would still try to repair the damaged ones. I'm thinking a piece of Gorilla tape might help the one that has the puncture/tear in it. The ones with burst seams, I'll save until I can visit my sister again and we can sew them back together.

2. Do not buy new bags.

There are an overabundance of reusable bags already out there. And for goodness sake, do NOT buy organic cotton bags... or even just regular cotton bags. They are the worst. Check out your local thrift store and you'll likely find all sorts of bags waiting to be adopted.

Maybe even try making your own. I was already wondering what to do with my old, dying t-shirts. Turns out, they can be repurposed into tote bags as well (no sewing required)! That'll be in an upcoming blog post... and I really like the idea of being able to reuse something like an old t-shirt... Not a still wearable t-shirt. That would be just silly...

3. Wash your reusable bags on a regular (weekly) basis. Particularly if you buy meat. 

You don't want bacteria growing on your plastic bags... or viruses... particularly in the age of Covid-19.

British Columbia is going to introduce a single-use plastics ban this year, which will include single-use plastic bags. But... do you see the loop hole in there? Yup... plastic producers see it too. In some jurisdictions, all they've done is produce thicker plastic bags which are theoretically "multi-use" and... voila... they do an end run around the legislation. Time will tell how this plays out in B.C.

Sources

National Geographic - Sustainable Shopping—Which Bag Is Best?

The Atlantic - Are Tote Bags Really Good for the Environment?

Quartz - Your cotton tote is pretty much the worst replacement for a plastic bag

The Conversation - Here’s how many times you actually need to reuse your shopping bags

Columbia University -  Plastic, Paper or Cotton: Which Shopping Bag is Best?

Danish study (opens as pdf) - Lifecycle Assessment of Grocery Carrier Bags (2018)

UK study (opens as pdf) - Life cycle assessment of supermarket carrier bags (2006)

The Conversation - Here’s how many times you actually need to reuse your shopping bags

In the News - Canada to ban some single use plastics by the end of 2021

So, some good news. Not only is British Columbia banning some single use plastics... but now Canada is moving in that direction as well. But it's not all single-use plastics... only the top six offenders.

First up... Grocery check-out bags... I know that I have been using these a lot more thanks to Covid-19 and the ban on bringing my own bags into stores. And it is soooo easy to slip back into that habit even now that I can bring my own bags. But, Covid-19 is not going to be around forever and, as we learn more about the virus, experts are questioning how much touch-transfer can occur at various points. So, banning grocery check-out bags is a good start. But it leaves me wondering... does this include the check-out bags from other stores? Home Depot? Dollar Store? Corner stores? And this ban doesn't address the whole line of produce bags. I got some resuable mesh produce bags for Christmas last year and, with Covid-19, haven't been using them. Wondering if maybe now is a good time to start again? And let's not even talk about Bulk Barn and all of their filmy plastic bags as well. Still... grocery check-out bags is a good start. (Image at left from CBC News)

Next up - Plastic Straws. We've all seen the picture of a turtle with a straw stuck up its nose. We know that straws are very bad for the environment. So, getting rid of plastic straws is an excellent move. There are now cardboard straws out there as well as metal straws. I know that some people with disabilities do better with plastic straws so presumably there may be an exception for them? But gone are the days when you would automatically get a little straw with your soft drink or juice in a restaurant.

Then we have Plastic Stir Sticks. I know that Starbucks switched over to wooden stir sticks several years ago. The one thing they still have is those plastic stir stick/plugs for the to-go cup lids. Ah... I looked it up, they are called Splash Sticks. And I see them everywhere when I go walking in parks... Because, once you've got your to-go drink and are walking in the park with it... what are you supposed to do with the little green splash stick? Toss it on the ground I guess. So, kudos to Starbucks for getting rid of their plastic stir sticks... now it's time to get rid of the splash sticks as well.

Missouri Department of Conservation

And... at last... Six Pack Rings are being banned!! Hooray!!!! It's about time. We've all seen pics of animals with their necks stuck in a plastic six pack ring. No? You haven't? Here... a pic of a turtle... from the Missouri Department of Conservation no less. I know that I always, always, always, take a pair of scissors and cut each circle/opening of the plastic rings... even the small ones. But I can't tell you how many of these things I find lying on the ground. As early as the 1970s they were identified as a particularly dangerous form of marine debris. Good riddance.

We can also bid adieu to Plastic Cutlery. I started this last year for myself.... carrying around my own camping cutlery in my bag for whenever I went into a Starbucks and wanted to order warmed-up brownie. It's not hard to do... and it felt good to be able to turn down the plastic fork contained within a plastic bag. But now, it's going to become mandatory... no more plastic cutlery. There are plenty of other options out there for take-out meals. I had a quick look at ULine.ca which sells plastic cutlery... about $0.07/plastic utensil of standard weight. They didn't have a non-plastic alternative. For that... I went to Let'sGoGreen where they sell cutlery made from plant starch for... about $0.07/utensil... Mind you, that's probably in $US so... more like $0.09/utensil. Ya know, if I knew that I was paying an extra $0.06 for a set of eco-friendly disposable utensils... I'd be all over that.

Finally... we have Takeout Containers made from "hard to recycle plastics". This is your everyday styrofoam, polystyrene containers. It's kind of crazy in this day and age that any business would actually still be using these things but I you can still buy styrofoam cups in the stores! ULine Canada sells them... grocery stores sell them... and I'm hoping that they are included in the ban. As well, are the take-out containers made from polystyrene... nowadays you can get take-out containers made from sugar cane waste... so we really don't need to resort of polystyrene. And I know that if I ever get take-out again... that will be one of my first questions "What sort of containers do you use?" I'm not sure what the solution is for take-out... I have had some restaurants use hard-shell plastic containers (white bottom and clear lid). I have had some use what looks like plastic-lined paper-based boxes with little metal lid/handles. But there are other options, everything from restaurants charging and extra $1 for serving the take-out meal in reusable plastic containers to restaurants taking back their dirty usable containers the next day. There are options... At the very least, some people recommend bringing your own plastic containers when you eat out a restaurant (those were the days). That way, if you have leftovers, you just pack them in your own container and don't have to get a disposable doggie bag container from the restaurant.

What's NOT Included

 Of course, there are a whole host of single-use plastics that are not included:

• Garbage bags - but without grocery check-out bags... we'll have to buy more "real" garbage bags
  
• Milk bags - they still sell milk in bags? Apparently Eastern Canada is still big on this while the West has gone back to milk jugs. Go figure.
  
• Snack food wrappers - chocolate bar wrappers, chips bags, etc.
  
• Disposable personal care items and their packaging - toothbrushes, single-use razors, shampoo bottles, etc, etc.
  
• Beverage containers and lids - to-go coffee and drink cups with their plastic lids. Too bad... that should be the next thing to go though.
  
• Contact lenses and packaging
  
• Cigarette filters - I guess they figure the harm that filters do to the environment is better than the harm that no-filters would do to smokers.
  
• Items used in medical facilities - soooo very many items... all necessary...
  
• Personal protective equipment - masks, etc.
  

And let's not even talk about all the other packaging for everything from screws and nails to toilet paper to bags of rice. And there is no mention of produce bags which makes me wonder... where are they?

I did find an article from the Vancouver Courier which mentioned that Vancouver is banning plastic bags by January 2021 but that produce bags will be exempt. So it looks like plastic produce bags are here to stay for a while.

I looked at some produce bag alternatives... Credo Bags in Montreal, for example. They have produce and bulk bag options. But they are NOT cheap. There is always the option of sew-your-own... but that will have to be another blog post.

Suffice to say... anything we can do to reduce our plastic footprint is a step in the right direction and I am very proud of Canada for making that move.