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My anecdotal experience as a diver in Sweden that do a few ocean clean days per year, and who have operated during the periods of before, during and after a pla
by belorn 1y ago
My anecdotal experience as a diver in Sweden that do a few ocean clean days per year, and who have operated during the periods of before, during and after a plastic bag ban, my experience has been that the ban worked greatly in reducing bags and plastic eating tools to a very major degree. Before the ban we saw plastic garbage practically every single dive, and the days we were cleaning we picked up bags of it by the end of the day. In contrast, plastic garbage is now thankfully rather rare to see, maybe once every 10th dive, and the effect has continued after the ban was lifted (so far). On cleaning days we might get like a few items in total. Plastic is no longer a major thing we pick up, and focus is instead on e-scooters and cans of laughing gas. In the couple ocean clean up events we have found more scooters than plastic bags.
I have seen a few canvas bags, but they don't seem to last long under the water.
- DanielHB 1y agoIt worked in Sweden because the bags you can buy (used to) cost 7kr (about a US dollar in purchasing power). So even though those bags are heavier and sturdier people do reuse them. I cringe every time I have to buy one because I didn't plan ahead.
- jay_kyburz 1y agoI think its the same here in Australia. Whats more, a lot of the bags you pay extra for are paper anyhow.
- trollbridge 1y agoThere really needs to be a ban on single use eating utensils and most single use plastic food packaging. It would require a tiny bit of planning ahead, such as people would need to carry around a fork, knife, metal straw, and perhaps a cup or coffee mug. Considering how minimal the cost of forks and spoons are, eateries could simply sell metal forks and spoons to people who forget them. An easy way to implement this is a tax / user fee on single use plastics for mitigating waste that ends up in shorelines or in the ocean, and make the fee enough to actually mitigate it + set the fee so that reusable metal or wood cutlery is price competitive.