Paper or Plastic: Which Bags Hurt the Environment More?

Paper vs. plastic bags: You'd think this fight would have been settled by now. But as Trace explains, for cities around the world, the fight is more complicated than you'd think.

Read More:

Do Bans on Plastic Grocery Bags Save Cities Money?
Consumers choose plastic bags far more often than paper or reusable bags to carry their purchases. Consumers like the fact that compared to paper and reusable bags, plastic bags
are lightweight, strong, flexible and moisture resistant.

Plastic Bag Bans 'Hurt the Environment,' Study Says
"Plastic bag bans don't decrease costs for cities and hurt the environment, according to a study from the National Center for Policy Analysis."

The Country That Bans Plastic Bags
"When you suffer a genocide as a people or a nation it can empower you to achieve extraordinary things. It gives you a rare, not to say unique, opportunity to start again."

Bangladesh to ban plastic bags in capital city
From the beginning of January 2002, the Bangladesh government is banning the use of plastic bags in Dhaka, its third attempt to carry out such legislation. Currently, 9.3 million plastic bags are dumped in the city every day, with only 10-15% put in dustbins."

How banning plastic bags helped clean up Rwanda
"As Kenya's residents side-step water gushing from clogged drains, inhale toxic fumes from the burning of plastics and watch livestock choke to death as a result of ingesting plastic paper bags; they do so in unison with most of Africa."

The Country That Bans Plastic Bags
"When you suffer a genocide as a people or a nation it can empower you to achieve extraordinary things. It gives you a rare, not to say unique, opportunity to start again."

Are Plastic Grocery Bags Sacking the Environment?
"The "paper or plastic" conundrum that vexed earnest shoppers throughout the 1980s and 90s is largely moot today. Most grocery store baggers don't bother to ask anymore."

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[leveldeathknight]

Don't use bags at all. I work at a grocery store and see a lady regularly that uses two clothing baskets to carry her groceries in. She then uses those baskets for laundry, so they're getting twice as much use out of the manufacturing/shipping of that item. Better than reusable bags.

[KevinRank]

I remember looking at this over 20 years ago.  Plastic bags are the way to go.  Most of the major supermarkets take the bags for recycling around here.  I have seen benches and other furniture made from recycled bags (I worked at Albertsons years ago).  There are things that can be done with plastics.  Plastics require a LOT less space in landfills.  They require a LOT less energy to produce.  They can be incinerated and produce a lot more energy.  No, they don't break down, but through recycling and other waste control methods, they have less impact than paper.  

I found it interesting when he talked about the biodegrading in landfills. Landfills are generally built in a clay area.  That way, the break down process can be stopped.  Massive biodegrading in landfills produces a lot of pollutants.  It's not as cut and dry as people try to make it.  It is a VERY complex issue.  Everything I read, showed plastic to be far superior.  

[abrahamchapman]

I disagree with Trace on the reusable bags. They may be worse to make than the disposable bags, but if they are 100 times worse to make than disposable bags, and can be used 1000 times before becoming torn and unusable, then reusable bags are ten times better than disposable bags.

[haiggoh]

The material of the bags (paper, plastic, canvas, whatever) is not the problem. People acting *dumb and irresponsible* is the problem. Plastic bags are perfectly fine as long as you put them in the recycle bin and don't use more than you need. Same goes for paper bags. Trees have to be cut down for paper so think twice before you throw them in the regular bin. Paper belongs in the paper recycling bin. And don't throw your litter on the street and *especially* don't leave all your shit at the beach! It's not that hard guys!

[gustagusss]

What about making bags out of hemp instead? Lighter and more efficient, no?

[CliventheTraveller]

Title of the video's about environmental damage and he spends 75 percent of the video talking about monetary cost: disconnect much?

Paper biodegrades. Conversation over, except for using cloth bags, which is the real win: those are biodegradable, durable, AND inexpensive

[Japanthewoman]

In my hometown city they are big on recycling everything. As far as plastic bags are concerned there is a special recycle bin just for plastic bags. At least some of the bags have been used to make park benches. In my current city the local grocery store has signed up for some program that I think makes them pledge to reduce plastic bag use by 1 trillion bags by 2015, or something like that. I have some reusable bags I use sometimes but sometimes go for the plastic bags anyway as a way to get "trash bags" for my smaller trash cans around the house.

[scorpionkings]

We need a government run 100% recycling program on all paper and plastic items. The reason why you need the government to do this is because in the private sector there  just isn't enough financial incentive for it to be done on a large enough basis because of the lack of MONEY in the recycling industry!! Believe it or not a capitalistic approach doesn't work for every problem..

[MichaelTheCynic]

Here in the part of the UK specifically Wales we have to pay 5p for standard plastic bags, not many places use paper but if you want a bag you can buy a thicker, bigger plastic bag that's about 10p that lasts a long time and doesn't break like the standard ones do, they a pretty cool. 

[manictiger]

Here's what I do:
1. Use reusable cloth bag when I have decent stock of plastic grocery bags.
2. Use plastic grocery bags to take out trash (my recycle bags tend to be sizable, but my garbage output is much smaller).
3. Leave cloth bag at home and use plastic bags to shop when my plastic bag supply is low.
4. Rinse, repeat.

This makes recycle bags re-usable, because you didn't taint them with garbage.

Saves you some money and makes you much nicer for the environment, because you waste so few trash bags.

[brent]

In Minnesota they have a lot of trash burning power plants.  They keep the garbage from filling up landfills plus it makes power for the cities.  The don't pollute the air any more than a normal power plant because of all the cleaners on the exhaust stacks; so I see it as a win win.

[superdau]

Of course you can recycle plastic bags, and they may be lighter and use less space. But just look around how people care about recycling. When the plastic bags end up in the environment, they stay there (in pieces) for years and decades.
Look at the giant pacific garbage patch. Wouldn't happen with paper.

[SgtMantis]

Why haven't we made use of the biodegradable plastic bags that were said to have been invented over ten years ago. ?

[StevenFullmer]

Buy a reusable bag for just 99 cents, and use that every time you go shopping. That's the most environmentally friendly thing you can do instead of using plastic or paper bags only once and then throwing them away never using them again.

[GSSCHOPAWE]

I personally just use all the plastic bags at home instead of throwing them away, I use them for lots of things since I move a lot. This realy helps and their easy to store, just find a big bag and crumple a bunch into that one, but I'm sure they're better ways

[StarSnowGhost]

I don't understand how anyone living in a coastal city could even think about going back to plastic bags. They fall right into the ocean, get carried along the currents, and become part of the great plastic gyres that we may never be able to clean up! Yes, the landfills may not have seen much improvement (though paper is more recyclable than the plastic), but the sea doesn't need any more of that artificial gunk in it.

[ADayOOO]

If you use reusable bags, they don't have to be the "made for groceries" bags. You can use any bag, so just pick what works well for you and go with that. Heck, I've even seen people bring in a few of their own hand baskets to fill up. Just make sure you wash your bags...I work in a grocery store and you can tell if a customer doesn't wash their bags, it's super gross...

[ericfellner]

Wouldn't we, theoretically, need less reusable bags than thin plastic ones? So even though the footprint is just as bad to produce, we produce fewer reusable bags, making the footprint smaller over time. In addition, I feel like the benefit of paper bags being biodegradable outweighs the added weight and cost.

[Juniorfunny]

Its actually kinda weird. See at my old school in asia they showed us a bag that was strong and durable but if you just put it in hot water it melted it away and was pratically safe to drink the water since the materials were fats and oils and other things and such.

[lewisdoherty]

Instead of buying plastic bags for garbage, I put the garbage in the bags I got from the store.  The plastic bags from the stores have handles in them and can be tied and thrown in a residential can or dumpster.  If the plastic goes into the landfill, it doesn't break down and pollute the environment with plastic debris.

Generally, we buy plastic garbage bags and then throw those in the landfill - what a waste.  Instead of trying to recycle plastic grocery bags to make more plastic items like garbage bags to go into the landfills, the grocery bags go into the landfill directly without having to consume more energy and time.

One would also suspect that the volume of trash going out of a residence is proportional to the new stuff bought at stores, so that the volume of bags available for waste would be satisfactory.