HomeMy WebLinkAboutCOM 0064.068 2010-2012 Page 1 of 2
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Murashige, Laura
From: Donna R. Goodale [donna @goodale.org]
Sent: Monday, February 14, 2011 6:57 PM , it F E [j
To: counciltestimony @co.hawaii.hi.us
Subject: FW:
From: Tristan Kilkenny [mailto:tckilkenny @gmail.com]
Sent: Monday, January 31, 2011 10:11 AM
To: counciltestimony @co.hawaii.us
Cc: dgoodale @hualalai.org
Subject:
Tristan Kilkenny
Hualalai Academy, 7th
75 -6060 Kuakini Hwy G4
Kailua Kona, HI 96740
(808) 895 -3211
Plastic shopping bags are made out of polyethylene. Polyethylene costs fifty cents per pound.
Plastic bags cost less than a penny each. Which means that big stores can buy them on a massive scale,
and not worry about the cost because the cost of the bags is embedded in everything you buy. It doesn't
raise the price much. But it does raise the price. And, plastic bags are made out of nonrenewable
resources, which means when those resources get harder to find and more expensive, the price of plastic
bags will go up. Which will make the price of everything you buy go up. It might not go up much, but it
will add up.
Plastic bags don't biodegrade. They photodegrade, and can take up to 1,000 years to degrade
fully. If something photodegrades, it just means that they break up into smaller and smaller pieces.
Those pieces of plastic absorb toxins and can be eaten accidentally by animals along with other food.
Even whales can accidentally eat plastic bags. Plastic bags are only a tiny part of plastic trash. But if we
can ban them, it's a step.
There are three main type s of bags that stores use. Plastic, paper, and compostable.
Plastic bags can cost less than a penny. Even when it's that cheap, the price can add up if the
U.S. is throwing away a hundred billion of them every year. Plastic bags can be recycled into
planks for benches or decking, but it isn't worth it to recycle plastic bags into plastic bags
because it costs much more to recycle the bag than the bag itself costs. Paper bags cost about
four to six cents each, and it's true, easier to recycle. But, millions of gallons of water, clean
water, is used in the making and recycling of these bags. Compostable bags can cost from
nine to twelve cents, which is just too much to use on a large scale. The only real solution is
to use reusable bags that last years.
There see a lot of zooplankton in the ocean. But nowadays, there are more pieces of
plastic in the ocean than zooplankton. Six times as many. In every square mile of ocean,
there are forty six thousand pieces of plastic. Not all of it is plastic bag, but some of it is.
Even if it's only about five percent plastic shopping bag pieces, that's still a lot. Still more
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than two thousand pieces. And all of those pieces of plastic can accidentally or purposely be
eaten by marine life. And if a plastic bag completely covered a sponge or polyp, it could
starve it. Even whales can be killed if they swallow enough bags
Even though some plastic bags may be around hundreds of years later, isn't that better
than thousands? If we can ban them now, they won't be here for thousands of years. And
paper bags aren't a solution either, because of how much water is used. Compostable bags
can just be too expensive. So, the only real long term solution is to use reusable bags.
Reusable bags even hold more than plastic bags, nit to mention that you get around a five
cent discount when you use them, depending on the store.
-- This message has been checked by ESVA and is believed to be clean.
2/15/2011