How does buying green bags help if the plastic bags are already made?

Question

If the plastic bags are already in the store how would you be saving the world?

Answer 1

Hola Carmelita,

They will be in the store for as long as they are for free. If they charge us for having them, then we will be looking for using something else.

Look at this video, it's very touching: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_F8IQRw-1...

It's about how plastic bags thrown out kill at least 100,000 birds, whales, seals and turtles

every year. Animals die slowly of starvation or suffocation.

Once their bodies decompose the plastic bags are liberated to kill again.

I'll share something else I recently read:

Los Angeles Times, 07.23.08

The Los Angeles City Council voted Tuesday to ban plastic carryout bags in the city's supermarkets and stores by July 2010

Council members said they hope an impending ban would spur consumers to begin carrying canvas or other reusable bags, reducing the amount of plastic that washes into the city's storm drains and the ocean.

"This is a major moment for our city, to bite the bullet and go with something that is more ecologically sensitive than what we've ever done before," said Councilman Bill Rosendahl.

Los Angeles alone will put a dent in plastic bag consumption by reducing the 2.3 billion plastic bags it uses each year. We hope the city proves to be a model for many more across the nation.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown announced last month that he would force supermarkets to charge for the bags, saying that they were “one of the most visible symbols of environmental waste.”

Retailers and some pressure groups, including the Campaign to Protect Rural England, threw their support behind him, and similar movements have spread across the United States.

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SAY NO TO PLASTIC BAGS

Answer 2

There are a few stores that will not carry plastic bags in the future and you will be forced to purchase the green bags.

Answer 3

Green bags are meant for the more people that buy them the less plastic bags stores will need therefor the less bags to make.

Answer 4

Because when I use my bags the stores buys fewer bags, when a whole city outlaws plastic bags then all the stores stop buying bags. Eventually the reduced demand means fewer bags will be made. When people use fewer bags then less get released into the environment to become litter. The bag you will need to carry your groceries for Thanksgiving haven't been made yet. So if enough people chose to switch to reusable perhaps it will never get made.

Answer 5

Because is everybody starts doing it, then obviously they won't have to make anymore or at least reduce the amount they are making.

Answer 6

it only works if many people do it. because then they have to reduce the amount of plastic bags produced. But you're right - the effect you cause as one person is very, very, very small.

And even if everyone bought the green ones the world would not really be saved.

Answer 7

It takes a little while to go down the supply and demand chain.  When people buy less of a particular product, then the stores order less of it for the next time.  If a bunch of stores order less of it then the factories are told by the selling people that they need less of it so they make less.  Finally, the research and development people try to find out why, and skew the future products toward what will be demanded more.

That's why we have products like "fat free whipped cream topping" which would have made absolutely no sense in previous generations, where the idea would be, if you don't want to eat fat, whipped cream is not a good choice.  So finally the manufacturers were all "But wait!  We can do it fat free for you!  Come back!"

I don't know what the plastic bag makers will end up making, but I look forward to seeing it, because it's kind of interesting as well as being more eco.

Answer 8

well if we are able to track if the plastic bag companies are closing down even if it is one or two nation wide  because of people are going green it make good sense to keep using the green bag. or it maybe just another money making idea at work and free adds at our expense. hope they are washable and color does not run to other clothes in the machine or we are just using green and reusable germs.  

Answer 9

exactly - top of the class.  It's all bullshit and a tax point.

Answer 10

Supply and demand.  If you don't use them those no demand for the next batch to made. It's saving the next generation really.

Answer 11

The savings come in the future orders the store places for the plastic bags.  If there are 100 bags in one of those little bundles, and 20 people a day bring five of their own bags, that's one bundle a day or 30 bundles a month that the store doesn't have to buy.  That's also 3000 fewer bags going to the landfill each month.

Answer 12

Change takes time. As demand decreases there will be less manufactured.

Answer 13

Plastic bags are manufactured based on need, so if fewer bags are needed, fewer bags will be produced. The bags are indeed already made but if more people use their own bags, the plastic bags would be used less frequently, therefore reducing the amount of bags being wasted and ending up in landfills.

Plus, it is also a way for the store or company to make money because they usually do not charge customers for plastic bags but they do charge at least $1 for the reusable bags.

Answer 14

good point; i think the idea is to cut down on the need for them, so they dnt have to make as much plastic

Answer 15

The problem is that those green bags are made in China, the biggest producer of greenhouse gases. When you buy one, you support their totalitarian government and every thing that goes along with it.

  If you want to make an impact  make your own bags  out of cotton.