There is always a chaotic atmosphere in terms of Environmental Conservation and Protection in the use of Plastics or Paper bags. One can say, it is more efficient to use plastics. Others say, it is more eco-friendly to use paper. But if we try to dig deeper through where this objects came from, how many times we could reuse it, how durable it is and so on; will our perspective be different? Which is which?
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| Credits To: Evelyn Pantig |
Here are some things we can think about:
SOURCE:
Where does plastic come from?
{http://www.design-technology.org/plastics.htm}
Plastics can be either found in natural substances or may
be man-made. Most of the plastics used today are man-made. Man-made plastics are
known as synthetic plastics.
Natural 'plastic products' occur in such things as animals' horns,
animals' milk, insects, plants and trees.
Where do
brown paper bags come from?
{http://www.treehugger.com/culture/paper-bags-or-plastic-bags-everything-you-need-to-know.html}
Paper comes from trees -- lots and lots of trees. The
logging industry is huge, and the process to get that paper bag to the grocery
store is long, sordid and exacts a heavy toll on the planet. First, the trees
are found, marked and felled in a process that all too often involves clear-cutting, resulting
in massive habitat destruction and long-term ecological damage. Mega-machinery
comes in to remove the logs from what used to be forest, either by logging
trucks or even helicopters in more remote areas. This machinery requires fossil
fuel to operate and roads to drive on, logging
even a small area has a large impact on the entire ecological chain in
surrounding areas.
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| www.treehugger.com |
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| biofinagroup.com
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DURABILITY:
Bag is a must in our grocery shopping. It is significant to
choose what type of bags we have to use. We have been accustomed to plastic a long time.
It is light, easy to carry and is not torn easily. Frequently, argue arises in the implementation
of the usage of plastic bags because of its durability. In the market, even in
meat section, they will give you the paper bag which in turn will be damaged
after a minute or two because of the moist of what you have purchased.
RE- USABILITY/RECYCLE ABILITY:
- Consumes water: The production of paper bags uses three times the amount of water it takes to make plastic bags. in the process of recycling, it will take more water to be use.
- Inefficiency: The process of recycling paper can be inefficient -- often consuming more fuel than it would take to make a new bag . In addition, it takes about 91 percent more energy to recycle a pound of paper than a pound of plastic . In the other hand, several negative effects arising from the consumption and disposal of plastics materials are described. Such consequences include the aesthetic damage created by landfills containing plastic waste, the impact to marine life of plastic residuals, the hazardous emissions of plastic incineration, and the economic inefficiencies created by the difficulty of plastic re-utilization from recycling.
- Produces waste: According to some measures, paper bags generate 80 percent more solid waste. While, enough plastic is thrown away each year to circle the earth four times.We currently recover only five percent of the plastics we produce.
Plastic accounts for around 10 percent of the total waste we generate.
Annually approximately 500 billion plastic bags are used worldwide. More than one million bags are used every minute.
It constitutes approximately 90 percent of all trash floating on the ocean’s surface, with 46,000 pieces of plastic per square mile.
- Biodegrading difficulties: Surprisingly, the EPA has stated that in landfills, paper doesn't degrade all that much faster than plastics. These volume of paper can be decomposed in a shorter span than plastics. In the case of plastics, it takes 500-1,000 years for plastic to degrade.
- Recycling difficulties: Although for the most part, plastic takes less energy to recycle than paper, plastic bags are a frustrating recycling dilemma. The curbside recycling in many communities is not meant for plastic bags because they can screw up the plant's machines . Instead, some stores offer bins in which to properly recycle plastic bags. Because of its lightness, plastics were drag everywhere by the wind of those which a re not disposed properly.
ENVIRONMENT IMPACT:
Use-Less-Stuff.com (“ULS”) has issued a report and has the following findings:
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| www.mrbambooflooring.com
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| flightkeeper.hubpages.com\ |
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| ocean.si.edu
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1. Plastic bags generate 39% less greenhouse gas emissions than uncomposted
paper bags, and 68% less greenhouse gas emissions than composted paper
bags. The plastic bags generate 4,645 tons of CO2 equivalents per 150 million
bags; while uncomposted paper bags generate 7,621 tons, and composted paper
bags generate 14,558 tons, per 100 million bags produced.
2. Plastic bags consume less than 6% of the water needed to make paper bags. It
takes 1004 gallons of water to produce 1000 paper bags and 58 gallons of water
to produce 1500 plastic bags.
3. Plastic grocery bags consume 71% less energy during production than paper
bags. Significantly, even though traditional disposable plastic bags are produced
from fossil fuels, the total non-renewable energy consumed during their lifecycle
is up to 36% less than the non-renewable energy consumed during the lifecycle
of paper bags and up to 64% less than that consumed by biodegradable plastic
bags.
4. Using paper sacks generates almost five times more solid waste than using
plastic bags.
5. After four or more uses, reusable plastic bags are superior to all types of
disposable bags -- paper, polyethylene and compostable plastic -- across all
significant environmental indicators.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rbFPkOwUojY
Either way, we can say that the use of both deprives the beauty of environment. But the reduce of their usage, discipline in disposing, and so on is in need. As the adage says, "We can not avoid things to happen" but "Prevention is better than a pound of cure" .
Why not promote the these.
Source: Check
Durability: Check
Re-usability/ Recycle- ability: Check
Environment Impact:Check
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| ecoki.com
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Citations:
- 22 Facts About Plastic Pollution (And 10 Things We Can Do About It) by Lynn Hasselberger, April 7, 2014 from http://listverse.com/2013/01/27/10-ways-recycling-hurts-the-environment/.
- Paper Bags or Plastic Bags? Everything You Need to Know by Collin Dunn July 9, 2008 from http://www.treehugger.com/culture/paper-bags-or-plastic-bags-everything-you-need-to-know.html
- Which is more environmentally friendly: paper or plastic?
- by Jane McGrath from http://science.howstuffworks.com/environmental/green-science/paper-plastic1.html Retrieved on: January 29, 2014.
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