BetterBagsColorado is lobbying the Denver City Council to impose a 10-cent surcharge on take-home bag from grocery stores with annual revenues of $2 million or more. The proposed tax is intended to protect the environment by reducing demand for plastic and paper bags, thereby reducing related pollution and landfill impacts. Their hope is that this type of charge will discourage casual consumption and disposal of bags, and encourage the reuse of existing bags or cloth bags.

The founders of the proposed measure were inspired to advocate for the change by An Inconvenient Truth producer Laurie David’s appearance in Denver last year with Mayor Hickenlooper - they feel that a bag tax is one small but concrete way to reduce the amount of material in the waste stream and so reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

For many, the issue of grocery bags and environmental impact is framed in terms of a choice for “paper or plastic”. The Denver proposal does not seek to determine which type of bag is more polluting, but to reduce all new bag use. Grocery stores report that 90% of coustomers request plastic bags.

Why Does it Matter? Some facts to consider:

Researchers say that discarded plastic bags can be found almost everywhere on the planet. Paper bags will biodegrade in the open environment where most plastic bags won’t, but the paper vs. plastic choice isn’t so clear-cut.

594 Btu are consumed producing each plastic bag, while 2,511 Btu are consumed producing each paper bag.

70% more air pollutants and 50 times more water pollutants are generated making paper bags in contrast to plastic bags.

91% less energy is consumed recycling a plastic bag. But 10 to 15 percent of paper bags are recycled, while only 1 to 3 percent of plastic bags are.

Plastic bags increase the visibility of litter as wind easily snags the white, light-weight material on fences and high in trees; they are not biodegradable and break down slowly when exposed to sunlight, and are made of petroleum products that could be used for other purposes

Paper bags require 11 times more energy per pound to recycle compared with plastic, and degrade slowly, if at all, in most modern landfills, where they are sealed away from water, light and oxygen.

(Sources: reusablebags.com, Natural Resources Defense Council)

Do Denverites care about this issue?In late March of 2007, San Francisco’s city council voted to require big grocery chains, with more than $2 million in annual sales, within six months to stop using conventional plastic bags and start using plastic bags that break down in big, commercial compost heaps. Pharmacies and retailers with at least five locations have one year. The ban will be enforced with fines up to $500.

Greenprint Denver staff received an overwhelming volume of mail following the adoption of San Fran’s policy, suggesting that the City follow suit. The city has not taken action, but BetterBagsColorado is now forcing the issue through their proposal to City Council.

Opponents of the proposed Denver measure, including the editorial board of the Rocky Mountain News , decry the use of a tax to achieve the desired outcome, and point out that lower income populations would bear a greater burden for failing to recycle, and that a Denver-only tax may hurt area stores if shoppers go to the suburbs to buy groceries.

This leads me to consider other ways to encourage the reduction and reuse of all grocery (and other retail) bags -

1. Some stores already offer a small rebate if you bring your own bags, and others are offering cloth bags for 99 cents apiece or less. Others should follow suit in making it easy and attractive for consumers to reuse bags. After all, the bags cost them money up front, and those costs are passed along to the consumer in one way or another.

2. Stores could follow the lead of Whole Foods Market, which will eliminate plastic bags in its 270 stores in the U.S. and Canada by April 22 - Earth Day. Shoppers will be able to get recycled paper bags for no charge, bring their own or buy reusable bags in the store for 99 cents.

3. Explore a statewide bag deposit bill: My usual problem with bag reuse is that I forget to bring my recycled bags into the store with me, requiring a last minute dash to the car, or the use of new bags. If stores required a small deposit for bags (similar to bottle bills passed in several states), perhaps I would be more conscientious about bringing my old bags back to the store with me (torn bags could be returned for cash back). This would also provide an incentive for cleaning up discarded bags in the streets and alleys.

4. Likewise, Safeway offers “points” on every purchase toward reduced price gas or free Starbucks coffee drinks and could provide similar benefits to those who bring their own bags - the reward for which could be a grocery gift card or savings coupon. These days Safeway pipes information on their climate protection policies over the PA system in my neighborhood store. This would be a nice way for them to walk the talk in the checkout line.

5. Provide voluntary bag recycling centers in grocery stores near checkout lines - those with extras could leave them (separated into paper and plastic), and those seeking to reuse bags could pick them up there.

A few resources for reusable bags:

- chicobag.com
-baggy-shirts.com, a local company (link)
-reusablebags.com (link)
-shesabetty.typepad.com (link)
-envirosax.com (link)
-cafepress.com (link)

Cities and countries that have banned or restricted plastic bags include:

* London has a proposal on the boards to ban the bags. If it passes, the city would join 80 British cities and towns that have bans.

* San Francisco and Melbourne, Australia, have banned plastic grocery bags.

* Ireland imposed a tax on bags in 2002. This has reportedly reduced their usage by 90%.

* China has announced a ban on free plastic bags to take effect in June. The government called for “a return to the use of cloth bags and shopping baskets.”

* Bangladesh also banned the bags in 2002. Drains plugged by the bags were cited as part of the problem during widespread monsoon flooding in the country in 1997 and 1998.