California governor signs law banning all plastic shopping bags at grocery stores.
California governor signs law banning all plastic shopping bags at grocery stores.
Under the measure to take effect in 2026, shoppers will still be able to purchase bags made of thicker plastic that purportedly makes them reusable and recyclable
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In Seattle we did this years ago. In practice, people just treat the new "reusable" bags as disposable. This law is a stop gap and ultimately kicks the can down thr road to placate business interests and the bullshit plastic lobby.
Bring on the downvotes, folks, but the reality is that now people will be throwing away thicker plastic.
Those are the bags this law bans.
Yeah no. Plastic bags given in the UK were around 8.5 billion in 2014, which reduced to under half a billion by 2023 just from introducing a charge.
In Hawaii every county did it independently around 10 years ago. Some counties have done it better than others. I don’t think I’ve had a single plastic bag on the big island in that entire time, but when I’m on Oahu I occasionally get them (for example the Apple Store thicker plastic bags that are “reusable”—somewhat true).
I don’t see people treating reusable bags as disposable, but it’s also completely acceptable here to just bring a cart full of stuff unbagged from target to your car here if you didn’t bring bags (groceries people will get paper if they forgot). I don’t think that’s as acceptable other places.
That doesn't line up with my experience. Canada banned single-use bags in 2023, and I notice a lot less reusable bags discarded on the street than the single-use ones before the ban.
That depends on how Canada implemented their plastic bag ban.
California's ban allowed "reusable" bags, which the plastics industry interpreted to produce bags that looked a lot like the thin single use bags, but of thicker plastic, and consumer habits weren't changed by much.
In Austin, most grocery stores switched to paper and sold canvas when we had our ban. Only Texas’ beloved H‑E‑B decided to sell thick plastic replacement bags and has continued to do so post-ban. Hopefully the California law counts these stupid thick bags as plastic in their ban.
Those stupid thick bags are exactly the 2014 loophole that this 2024 ban is closing.