The article in the url below is a depressing comparison between paper or plastic bags to see which imposes the greater environmental burden, in terms of both production, consumption, and disposal:
"Paper or Plastic? We hear the question almost every time we go grocery shopping. Some shoppers answer automatically; plastic - convinced that they are making a better choice for the environment. Others ask for paper, believing the very same thing. The reality is that both paper and plastic bogs gobble up natural resources and cause significant pollution. When you weigh all the costs to the environment, you might just choose to reuse."
There are some surprising statistics, but the upshot is that neither is particularly good:
"It takes more than four times as much energy to manufacture a paper bag as it does a plastic bag. The production of paper bags generates 70 percent more air and 50 times more water pollutants than production of plastic bags."
"... it can cost $4,000 to process and recycle 1 ton of plastic bags. This can then be sold on the commodities market for about $32."
"More often than not, bags collected for recycling never get recycled. A growing trend is to ship them to countries such as India and China, where they are cheaply incinerated under more lax environmental laws. Paper is degradable, but it cannot completely break down in modern landfills because of the lack of water, light, oxygen and other necessary elements. About 95 percent of garbage is buried beneath layers of soil that make it difficult for air and sunlight to reach it."
An editorial at the Washington Post in July 2007 (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/05/AR2007070501806.html) makes a similar point in response to a proposal to ban plastic shopping bags in Maryland:
"The problem, opponents of the idea counter, is that paper bags are harmful, too: They cost more to make, they gobble up more resources to transport, and recycling them causes more pollution than recycling plastic. The argument for depriving Annapolis residents of their plastic bags is far from made."
It seems there is only one thing on which most people can agree:
"Disposable shopping bags of any type are wasteful, and the best outcome would be for customers to reuse bags instead."
Have a good weekend.
Dave
Bill Werther & David Chandler
Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility
© Sage Publications, 2006
http://www.sagepub.com/Werther
'More than Meets the Eye: Paper or Plastic?'
by Brenna Maloney and Laura Stanton
989 words
4 October, 2007
The Washington Post
FINAL
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/graphic/2007/10/03/GR2007100301385.html