November 4th 2007

Now that i know that 12 million barrels of oil per year go into the creation of plastic bags worldwide, i will not be forgetting to bring my own canvas bags sitting in my car. apparently in 2002 ireland imposed a tax on plastic bags that reduced their consumption by 90%. new york is considering a first step in cutting the use of plastic bags: to require all stores over 5,000 s.f. to reuse in store bags and sell them back to customers. not so radical, considering how most stores in new york are under the proposed square footage. while in san fran, in march 2007, plastic bags were banned from large supermarkets. how large, i don't know. i'm amazed that in europe, they just decide to enact these recycling laws and it seems to work, while in this country we have to take these teeny weeny steps before anything of importance happens.