Hacker News Reader

Comment by spirit557 | Hacker News Reader

Curious what is it like with grocery stores and plastic bags where you live? If I go to a large grocery store in US there could 100+ people in the store I can guarantee you I am the only one there with my resuable cloth/insulated grocery bags. Everyone else walks out with single use plastic bags.

View on HN

Some countries have already sort-of banned single-use plastic bags (with exceptions where it makes sense).

Where I live supermarkets now only have paper bags or sturdy multi-use bags.

There will also be some EU wide legislation pretty soon.

I wish I could buy slightly thicker paper bags that lasted 10-15 uses for 8 cents apiece. I would gladly buy boxes of those instead of the cheap crappy single-use paper shopping bags. I reuse the paper bags as much as possible. The reusable bags are often made with plastic or plastic fibers. At least if a paper bag makes its way into the environment the wood pulp fiber gets digested by bacteria and fungi.

I tend to shop at Aldi (US) and never seem to have a bag with me. I buy the paper bags for $0.10 or whatever they cost, then I reuse them for recycling until they tear or fall apart, then they get recycled themselves.

The bigger supermarkets (Kroger, etc.) all default to using single-use plastic. They will give you paper bags if you ask, and of course you can bring your own but it doesn't seem very common.

As long as the markets provide disposable bags free/cheap, people will tend to do that out of convenience.

Well I'm in the UK and there's a plastic bag tax of 25p per bag. Since that law was introduced, everyone comes to the supermarket with their own bag.

The bag tax is 10p [1]. California has had a similar one since 2016 with a 10 cent fee [2].

Anecdotally, the fee seems to work well in both places, or at least single-use plastic bag use seems relatively low as most people seem to bring a reusable bag or use a backpack or similar.

[1] https://www.gov.uk/guidance/carrier-bag-charges-retailers-re...

[2] https://calrecycle.ca.gov/plastics/carryoutbags/

in caifornia the bag tax is applied equally to paper and plastic bags.

Yes, but the reusable bags seem to have become less durable and there has been a huge increase in the number of them used and therefore the amount of plastic used.

https://assets.ctfassets.net/bffxiku554r1/4TNPmg4tzrgoH39Iev...

I am not an expert in the field, but I have seen studies that claim single use plastic bags are better for the environment per use than multi-use bags, because the multiuse bags use so much more material and don't last long enough to make up for it.

I still use plastic bags, the ones I got over the years and they are completely worn out (as in, faded). Use them mostly for return of bottles/cans since they are not moisture absorbant.

Plastic bags here in Norway cost around 5 NOK (0.5$) and a reuse bag costs 10 but you get 1 back every time you use it.

You kind of have to explain yourself to the cashier if you want a plastic one.

If norway or norwegians cared so much, they wouldn't be pumping out so much oil. Norway is a top oil producer on a per capita basis ( along with saudi arabia, qatar, etc ).

If norwegians care so much about the environment or climate change, let them take out their oil platforms first.

The argument here (that I don't buy) has always been that the extraction and processing is much cleaner here than in some of the countries you mention.

Personally I agree that we should stop the oil and gas extraction as the more oil stay in the ground the better, and the country is split about 50/50 on this issue.

Unfortunately, the major parties have been against so far but the conservatives are finally starting to debate it internally and if they come down on the planned phase out of oil and gas it will happen. The major left wing parties are not interested so far.

There has been some movement the in the legal route, the supreme court recently declared some recent exploration licenses invalid due to a clause in our constitution, however we'll see how long that ban lasts.

In any case, not being fast enough in one area does not mean you have to pollute max in other areas.

My plastic bags get reused. Either by myself or I'll send a box to my sister in a state that banned them so she can reuse them.

Turns out there's a black market for plastic grocery bags.

I believe there have been a few studies that studied localities (in different parts of the world) that banned plastic bags, and they've all had either zero net effect on plastic usage or it actually increased.

Anecdotally, 100% of grocery-store plastic bags I get are reused as trash bags and doggy poop bags. Same for most other people I know. Very few actually get thrown away after one use. And as it turns out, people in areas where such bags are banned, they buy other kinds of plastic bags to use for those purposes.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com