Paper or Plastic……Not such an obvious choice!
Have you ever wondered if you were making the right choice between Paper and Plastic when you are at the checkout? Turns out it’s not such an obvious choice.
Here’s how paper and plastic stack up side by side:
To make all the paper bags we use each year, it takes 14 million trees for paper and 12 million barrels of oil for plastic. The production of paper bags creates 70 percent more air pollution than plastic, but plastic bags create four times the solid waste — enough to fill the Empire State Building two and a half times. And they can last up to a thousand years in our landfills.
Plastic, because it’s cheaper to produce, is the overwhelming choice of grocery stores across the nation — the average family of four uses almost 1,500 of these a year. States like California are now limiting consumers’ freedom of choice, allowing only biodegradable plastic bags, which break down over months rather than hundreds of years. For both types of bags, the environmentalist mantra is the same — reuse and recycle. But the best choice, actually, is cloth or canvas, and BYOB — bring your own bags.
I recycle all the plastic shopping bags that I collect when shopping and transform them into Art Jewelry – rings, bracelets necklaces etc. In my recycled art jewelry I alway try to see the beauty and potential of all things, and the possibilities that a different point of view can create. It may be an empty water bottle, plastic utensils, rubber tubing, electrical wires or trash bags. Whatever the material or the original purpose, I have found that it can be transformed into something new and unexpected with a new and viable reason for existing.
Check out my jewelry collection called ‘Bag It‘ made entirely out of recycled plastic shopping bags.
