Friday, November 21st, 2008

English: How I finally transitioned to reusable shopping bags

By Sonya English

Tuesday, September 16th, 2008

My environmental epiphanies typically develop slowly. It’s less of an a-ha light bulb moment (CFL or otherwise), but usually little by little, like your biodegradable fork from the Union decomposing (in a landfill or otherwise).

That describes how, over 11 years of critical thought on the subject, I came to be a cloth-bag-carrying grocery shopper.

“Paper or plastic?”

I’d heard the question dozens of times before it permeated the distracted existence I led as a 9 year old. I began to wonder why one was better than the other. How did people decide?

Preference exists, I concluded, as the man in front of us gathered his army of plastic bags in the same moment that my mother said, “Paper. Double-bag it, please.”

My quest to determine the best choice took me through stages. Paper emerged as the Round One victor, based solely on Mom’s endorsement. Plastic made a strong showing on my first solo trip to the store because it was easier to carry

And finally, or so I thought, came my environmental awakening. The choice to recycle whichever bag you take home renders the paper-plastic debate obsolete. In this stage, I stuffed bags into bags full of more bags that I took to the recycling center weekly, all the while bathing in self-satisfaction.

Americans use 90 billion plastic bags each year, according to The American Chemistry Council. In the best-case scenario that I conjured up, 100 percent of those would be recycled, which we all know is not the case. I can’t imagine the energy and resources it would take collect and process 90 billion plastic bags, recycling them to their next stage of life.

You know the option exists. But do you know how easy it is to do?

You can read articles about the waste and the production costs (petroleum and natural gas, both non-renewable), the economic food chain (the cost of production gets passed down to the consumer in the form of higher prices in the grocery store) and the toxic pollution of their manufacture. And you should. But this is an appeal to common sense.

I’m ready. Show me them big buts.

But what do I do when I forget?

Keep them in your trunk, and even though you may forget once or twice, the habit will form. Leave them out after you unload your groceries where you’ll see them the next time you go to your car.

But plastic bags are free. I don’t want to buy a cloth bag when I’m spending $50 on groceries.

Then don’t. Use bags you already own. I bet you have old backpacks and totes you don’t use every day. If you must buy grocery store bags, they cost about $1, which means after 20 5-cent refunds the store will give you for providing your own bag, it pays for itself.

But I’m just one person. What difference will it make?

Then tell your friends. People are doing it, and it is making a difference. San Francisco banned plastic bags in November and saves 5 billion bags each month. Lawrence has no ban in place, but Kevin Lawrence, a manager at the Clinton Parkway HyVee, said he had seen a dramatic increase in reusable bags in the last few months and predicted it will only increase.

But I’ve been carrying cloth bags for years. This isn’t news.

This idea’s been out there. On an episode of “Home Improvement,” Jill came home from the grocery store with, you guessed it, an armload of cloth bags.

The length of time it took me to settle on an answer I’m comfortable with is pretty embarrassing. More embarrassing is that when I told my mom the good news, she was shocked that I wasn’t already doing it and offered me some of her bags. Snap.

English is a Overland Park junior in journalism and economics.

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