The plastic bag is the latest useful item to fall victim to a factually challenged campaign aimed at achieving a world-wide ban in the false name of being 'green' or 'saving the planet.' Australia has to take much of the blame for this, due to a 2002 report misinterpreting the original 1987 Canadian Study in Newfoundland claiming that 100,000 marine mammals and birds were killed by 'plastic debris.' In a 2002 report commissioned by the Australian Government into the environmental effects of plastic bags, 'plastic debris' became 'plastic bags.' The report became known as the Nolan-ITU report. In 2006 the report was updated. The same sentence was repeated but 'bags' was changed back to 'debris' with an explanatory note stating that the original article actually referred to 'fishing nets.' The damage to the reputation of the plastic bag was already done.
Read the excellent 8th March Times article, 'Series of blunders turned the plastic bag into global villain' online
or see a pdf version here.
The carrier bag industry is attempting to fight back and swim against the tide using the Carrier Bag Consortium website:
The following myth-busters are copied from 'Useful Soundbites for the Media:'
SPEAK THE SCIENCE
BIN THE SPIN
1: OFFICIAL VIEWS
• A levy on plastic bags in Ireland only made matters worse… people underestimate how many plastic bags are used to put out recycling or are substituted for plastic bin bags. “We have got to remember that taxes and levies can have perverse effects – such as making people use more plastic not less” … Liz Goodwin, Chief Executive WRAP (Government’s Waste Resources Action Programme) The Daily Telegraph 28 Sept 2007
• “This (voluntary) agreement is working - with retailers offering shoppers reusable bags-for-life. We don’t think a ban or levy is the right way to go. In Ireland, people just bought more bin liners to replace free carrier bags, so the volume of waste stayed the same.” … DEFRA, The Guardian, 3 October 2007
• “But until supermarkets reduce the energy used in their stores, minimise food miles and treat farmers better, saving a few plastic bags is just window dressing.”…Tony Juniper, Friends of the Earth, Daily Mail, 28 January 2008
• “There have been unforeseen consequences in the Irish Experience … increase in the use of paper bags which are actually worse for the environment …” … Ben Bradshaw, UK Environment Minister, 4 August 2006
• “A number of unintended consequences appear likely to be connected with the proposed levy … the net environmental impact is an issue of considerable dispute … the Committee therefore recommends that Parliament does not agree to … the Bill” … Unanimous Conclusion (including the Green party) of the Scottish Parliament, Environment and Rural Development Committee, after two years of investigations, 2006
• “0.2% of the average household dustbin is plastic carrier bags … hence a tax on plastic carrier bags alone would be unlikely to have any significant impact on volumes of waste” (Plastic Bag Tax Assessment, HM Treasury, December 2002)
• Because so many plastic bags are re-used for domestic waste disposal, the following increase in bin liners and refuse sacks occurred after the tax in Ireland:
o Tesco – 77% increase in pedal bin liner sales
o SuperQuinn – 84% increase in nappy disposable bag sales
o SuperValue/Centra – 75% increase in swing bin liner sales
Evidence to Scottish Parliament, Environment and Rural Development Committee Hearings 2005
• The use of plastic bags in Ireland (including substitute bin liners) analysed through HM Customs figures shows the amount of plastic bags imported into Ireland has actually gone up after their bag tax from 29,846 tonnes in 2001 to 31,649 tonnes in 2006… HM Customs statistics (analysed by Mike Kidwell Associates/PAFA 2007)
• “They represent a fraction of 1%* of waste going to landfill. Retailers of all types are well on the way to reducing the environmental impacts of bags by 25%. They are doing that with the cooperation of customers by rewarding re-use, giving away sturdier bags-for-life, enabling and encouraging recycling and reducing the amount of plastic in bags” Kevin Hawkins, Director General, British Retail Consortium, 13 July 2007
• *The fraction of landfill represented by plastic shopping bags is 0.05%. This is based on domestic waste being 17% of landfill and plastic bags being 0.2% of the average dustbin. Packaging and Films Association 2007.
• 59% of people re-use ALL their lightweight plastic bags and a FURTHER 16% say they re-use MOST of them. … WRAP Survey 2005
2: THE SCIENCE
• The manufacture of plastic bags uses one third of the energy, results in half the pollution and one eighth of the raw material requirement of paper bag production (Winnipeg University Studies)
• Paper bags weigh 6 times more than plastic on our roads and are 10 times the volume in storage. Switching to paper as result of plastic bag bans or taxes will put an extra 32,000 lorries on London’s roads. Extrapolated by CBC from Simpac Ltd Studies presented to Scottish Parliament ERDC Hearings, 2006
• The average round trip to the supermarket is 12 miles, the petrol equivalent of 210 plastic bags (typically one year’s usage of bags per person in the UK) … Dr Gerard McCrum, Oxford, The Daily Telegraph 24 July 2007
• “(plastic bags) contribution to climate change is miniscule. The average Brit uses 134 bags a year, resulting in just (2.6) kilos of the typical 11 tonnes of carbon dioxide he or she will emit in a year. That is one five thousandth of their overall climate impact.” George Marshall, The Guardian, Thursday September 13 2007
• In Scotland alone, taxing plastic carrier bags would have created an EXTRA 13,500 tonnes of (largely paper) waste going to landfill. (This would mean an EXTRA 150,000 tonnes of waste created in the UK) Extrapolated from Scottish Executive Impact Assessment Studies 2005
• Taxing plastic bags will send more paper to landfill where it will degrade to give off greenhouse gases in direct contravention of the EU Landfill Directive. Plastic remains inert and will not give off CO2 or Methane in landfill. Packaging and Films Association 2002.
• Plastic has a higher calorific value than any other element of waste. The energy released in clean-burn municipal incineration by a single carrier bag keeps a 60 watt light bulb burning for one hour. APME/Plastics Europe 2006
• No other shopping container can carry 2,500 times its own weight and stay strong when wet. CBC 2001
• A typical plastic carrier bag uses 70% less plastic today than 20 years ago. No other industry has a better track record in material reduction. Packaging and Films Association 2003
• Plastic bags do not waste oil, they are derived mainly from oil refining by-products (naptha, ethylene, etc) which would otherwise be flared off. So plastic bags are an excellent use of otherwise waste products. All plastic packaging of all types uses no more than 2% of total oil extraction compared with 29% for transport and 35% for heating/industry. Plastics Europe 2007
3: THE RETAIL EFFECT
• The Irish tax has cost small to medium retailers an estimated €24.3m (after the first year of operation) mostly as a result of theft plus additional theft of €10m in “push out” thefts (where unbagged and unpaid for goods are wheeled through the doors due to absence of carrier bags as evidence of purchase) (Note: This is more than the income “generated for the good of the environment” and includes the theft of trolleys and baskets) … RGDTA - Irish Grocers Association and Irish Trade Journal “Shelf Life” estimates 2003,
• A 10p tax per carrier bag represents a tax level of 1400% on cost price. If applied equally across popular goods, a can of Coke would cost £8 and a packet of crisps £5. Simpac Ltd Study for CBC 2005
Roger: "What a wonderful bedside manner you must have."
I do I get on very well with my patients it's those with personality disorders that have difficulty with me, because I don't get sucked in by their manipulative behaviours the way they want, and respond to me the way you have done here, but that's another story.
"My point is that just because there is no evidence from what is known, doesn't mean it's not real."
It is however irrelevant whether it's real or not you don't go cutting people open if you don't know why or prescribing poisons without good reason and an unnecessary or incorrect medication is a poison.
"Dropping dead is a part of life in fact a universal conclusion to every life" - Jan Pompe.
What a wonderful bedside manner you must have.
"get used to it and for you own sake stop watching House it's not even remotely real." - Jan Pompe.
I mention this Jan because we have such cases here. Doctor's don't trust the patient's own assessment of how they feel and send them home. Later they are back, but in the morgue. My point is that just because there is no evidence from what is known, doesn't mean it's not real.
Roger: "Do you ever have cases of patients complaining of feeling ill and no evidence for any illness presents itself, despite barrages of tests"
What are you suggesting that we then send them off to a surgeon cut them open for a peek? Have them scarred for life only to find nothing again? Prescribe potentially deadly medication (there is no such thing as a perfectly benign medicine) on a vague suspicion?
I don't think so.
Dropping dead is a part of life in fact a universal conclusion to every life - get used to it and for you own sake stop watching House it's not even remotely real.
BTW, there was a Northern bottlenose whale that beached itself in a fjord 2 years ago in Sweden, necropsy revealed plastic bags and the death cause was starvation.
"I AM NOT THE ONE THAT NEEDS CONVINCING!!" - Jan Pompe.
Well it certainly came across that way.
"That's right. It's called evidence based action." - Jan Pompe
Do you ever have cases of patients complaining of feeling ill and no evidence for any illness presents itself, despite barrages of tests? When they are sent home and drop dead, it becomes a real problem.
Viking lady: "I had a short discussion with my old man and he said that re the obstruction of plastics in the digestive tract it must probably be caused by accumulation of objects( unless they don't choke on the plastic)"
You make it sound like they have a steady diet of plastic surely there is some real food mixed in with it somewhere. How much public priority should be given to something that might be statistically insignificant?
( unless its not sticky and can cause perforation) ?? do you mean unless it is sharp?
"Due to observations by ordinary walkers, ornithologists etc , that could take pics and report this back to authorities , a ban was imposed on the plastic 6 pack wrapping in Sweden"
It's a good result but I don't think we can reasonably expect it to work every where.
Roger: "Thankfully not everyone is as self-obsessed as you appear to be."
Just attempting to poison the well - a logical fallacy.
Since you seem to be having difficulty with comprehension I'll spell it out for you.
I AM NOT THE ONE THAT NEEDS CONVINCING!!
It's those who don't care the planet is being trashed.
Do you understand now?
"So a report containing stats from various veterinary post mortems is satisfactory, but the pm photos alone are not?"
That's right. It's called evidence based action.
As I mentioned earlier , there were many cases of sea birds that got killed by the plastic wrapping around six pack beers and Coke. Due to observations by ordinary walkers, ornithologists etc , that could take pics and report this back to authorities , a ban was imposed on the plastic 6 pack wrapping in Sweden
" The difficulty is in seeing how something can get through a pipe of a certain size but not through a larger more flexible pipe after. " - Jan
I had a short discussion with my old man and he said that re the obstruction of plastics in the digestive tract it must probably be caused by accumulation of objects( unless they don't choke on the plastic) A single little plastic piece won't probably not cause any harm ( unless its not sticky and can cause perforation) but as it is the cause with the orange ileus , it depends on eating lots of oranges and the cellulosa accumulate and cause obstruction.
"If I want to get people to dispose of garbage properly I need evidence to sow there is a need beyond personal obsession." - Jan Pompe.
Thankfully not everyone is as self-obsessed as you appear to be. Some do see a problem, whether it be aesthetics, hygiene or detrimental effects on animals. Some also don't see it as their right to trash the planet.
"Anecdotal or emotive evidence will simply not cut it, photos unless accompanied with statistical data of actual direct cause of death is no better than anecdotal though it may be more emotive. All useful to garner volunteers but to get governments to assign resources/legislation that are not unlimited takes a little more." - Jan Pompe
So a report containing stats from various veterinary post mortems is satisfactory, but the pm photos alone are not? All the pictures and videos of dead animals just don't count in the real world? What an interesting way of looking at things. It's a wonder any medical or scientific advances have been made. I wonder why we got MARPOL then? Maybe just a whim.