I have to admit that on more than one, two, ten…heck…20 occasions, I have forgotten my bags. Either in the car…or still at home. We drive almost 40 miles to do any major grocery shopping, so going back home is rarely an option. I have, however, trekked back to the car to retrieve my multi-colored, eclectic managerie of bags. I also admit, bringing home twice as many plastic bags as I have recycled bags from our major shopping trips.

The other day, I came across this article in the Wall Street Journal…thus the title for this post.

An Inconvenient Bag… the green giveaway of the moment–the reusable shopping bag– is a case study in how tricky it is to make products environmentally friendly. 

It’s manufactured in China, shipped thousands of miles overseas, made with plastic and could take years to decompose. It’s also the hot “green” giveaway of the moment: the reusable shopping bag.

The bags usually are printed with environmental slogans as well as corporate logos and pitched as earth-friendly substitutes for the billions of disposable plastic bags that wind up in landfills every year. Home Depot distributed 500,000 free reusable shopping bags last April on Earth Day, and Wal-Mart gave away one million. One line of bags features tags that read, “Saving the World One Bag at a Time.”

View Slideshow

But well-meaning companies and consumers are finding that shopping bags, like biofuels, are another area where it’s complicated to go green. “If you don’t reuse them, you’re actually worse off by taking one of them,” says Bob Lilienfeld, author of the Use Less Stuff Report, an online newsletter about waste prevention. And because many of the bags are made from heavier material, they’re also likely to sit longer in landfills than their thinner, disposable cousins, according to Ned Thomas, who heads the department of material science and engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

{snip}

Some, such as the ones sold in Gristedes stores in New York that are printed with the slogan “I used to be a plastic bag,” are misleading. Those bags are also made in China from nonwoven polypropylene and have no recycled content. Stanley Joffe, president of Earthwise Bag Co., the Commerce, Calif., company that designed the bags, says the slogan is meant to point out that the bag itself is reusable, taking the place of a disposable plastic bag.

Some plastic bags are, in fact, made with recycled materials. The polypropylene bags at Staples are made from 30% recycled content, according to company spokesman Mike Black. Target sells six types of bags, including a $5.99 variety made from recycled plastic bags, says spokesman Steve Linders.

And yesterday, at the Clinton Global Initiative, a public-policy gathering in New York of business and political leaders, Wal-Mart pledged to reduce plastic bag waste by about 33% in every store world-wide in the next five years. Starting next month, the company will sell a new blue reusable plastic bag with a small amount of recycled material for 50 cents, half the price of its current black bag, which is 85% recycled plastic, says spokeswoman Shannon Frederick.

Getting people to actually use the bags is another matter. Maximizing their benefits requires changing deeply ingrained behavior, like getting used to taking 30-second showers to lower one’s energy and water use. At present, many of the bags go unused — remaining stashed instead in consumers’ closets or in the trunks of their cars. Earlier this year, KPIX in San Francisco polled 500 of its television viewers and found that more than half — 58% — said they almost never take reusable cloth shopping bags to the grocery store.

Grab That Tote, Use That Bag

Tips for getting into the habit of reusing the reusables:

1. 1. Leave bags by the front door or in the trunk of your car and dangle a reminder from your key chain or the rearview mirror to grab them.
2. 2. Put a reminder on your grocery list and make part of the kids’ allowance hinge on whether they told you to bring the bags that week.
3. 3. When stuck in the checkout line without a reusable bag, choose paper or plastic based on the one you think you’ll reuse the most.

In the spirit of fun, I thought I would share a photo of a bit of my reusable bag collection. The very last of the article quotes a woman talking about not using certain bags for certain grocery items, such as dripping chicken containers. Do you have a favorite that you treat differently than the others in your collection? I know I do! Do you have one that is more practical than others?

My favorites are my Mount Rushmore and the purple Co-Op bags..which both came from very memorable trips. The Home Depot bag and Sam’s insulated bags are ones that I would recommend to everyone who asks. You cannot tell it by the photo, but that HD bag is HU-U-UGE! It expands and has a sturdy clip and reinforced bars in the top of the bag. I even use it to take my Ebay packages/boxes to the post office.  The insulated bag from Sam’s was a giveaway for signing up for something…I don’t remember…but it is great to get those frozen items home when its 103 degrees outside.

Spin Dry: The Washing Machine that Needs Just One Cup of Water

A washing machine that uses only a cup of water to carry out a full wash, leaving clothes virtually dry, has been developed by British inventors.

Researchers say the technology, which uses less than 2 per cent of the water and energy of a conventional machine, could save billions of litres of water each year.

The machine, which has been created by academics at Leeds University, works by using thousands of plastic chips  -  each about half a centimetre in size  -  to absorb and remove dirt.

Remainder of story here

The story says the chips should last up to 6 months with up to 100 uses…does that sound right to you? Do you wash only 4 loads of clothes of clothes a week? What happens to the chips once they need to be replaced?

GREEN!

I often visit No Impact Man’s Blog and found this was posted while I was away this weekend. I hope to assist in spreading the word even to my small readership. If you have not ever visited his site…you are in for a treat!

No Impact Man  

We can really make a difference. TODAY. But I need your help. Plus I have some free Reverend Billy DVDs to give away.

I really, really need support from all of you today (and I’m unashamedly bribing you with the offer of free Reverend Billy DVDs). But first I have to give you some background. Just read the bits in bold if you’re in hurry.

Next Friday, May 30, Representative Jerrold Nadler of New York’s Eight Congressional District has kindly agreed to meet with me in his New York office. As one of his constituents, I intend to ask Representative Nadler to support an effective global warming mitigation policy that is based not on what is politically possible but on what is scientifically necessary.

More specifically, I intend to ask him to:

• Introduce, as soon as possible, a non-binding resolution to the House of Representatives asserting that we need a climate change mitigation policy with a goal of no more than 350 ppm of atmospheric carbon dioxide (read why here). Furthermore, the resolution should say that the United States must collaborate with the international community to achieve an effective successor to the Kyoto Protocol that will achieve the 350 goal or better (depending on how the science progresses).
• Pledge to support the 1sky.org policy platform that also includes creating five million green jobs (through, for example, weatherizing our buildings and manufacturing solar panels and windmills), and placing a moratorium on the building of new coal power plants.
• Pass on to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi a letter addressed jointly to her and Representative Nadler, in his position as Assistant Whip, asking them both to push for the introduction of new and the strengthening of currently pending climate change legislation to reflect the crucial 350 goal. This means, at the very least, aiming for an 80% reduction in climate emissions below 1990 levels by 2050 and a 25% reduction by 2020.

Now then, here’s how I was hoping you could help. My dream is to present Representative Nadler and Speaker Pelosi with between 350 and 3,500 (10 x 350) emails of support for these policy objectives.

Can you help? All it requires is a cut and paste job (see below).

Fellow bloggers: would you be willing to pass this request onto your readers?

Everyone: would you email this around and get your friends to pitch in?

Two bits of good news:

1. Representative Nadler has been an ardent supporter of environmental issues ranging from the thorough cleanup of the World Trade Center site to securing federal funding for state conservation and wildlife grants. He received a score of 95% for his voting record in the 1st session of the 110th Congress from the League of Conservation Voters.
2. Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping have provided me with five copies of their new DVD, What Would Jesus Buy (watch the trailer here). I’m going to give the DVDs to people who send in their emails of support (the 1st, the 35th, 100th, the 350th and the 1000th).

Here’s how to send in your email of support:

Simply cut and paste the below, making sure to substitute in your name, mailing address and email address, and send it to noimpactman+nadler+pelosi@gmail.com (it looks like a weird email address but, don’t worry, it will work).

Dear Representative Nadler and Speaker Pelosi–

Thank you for your hard work on behalf of the people of the United States. It is indisputable that the health, happiness and security of the American people depends upon the well-being of our planetary habitat. It is also indisputable that the anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases is causing changes in our habitat that will adversely effect Americans on every level–from our health to our economy.

On May 30, Colin Beavan aka No Impact Man will visit Representative Nadler to express to him support for a number of climate change mitigation policies that are much stronger than those currently passing through Congress. Please consider this a letter of support for the measures Colin Beavan will be advocating.

Specifically, I support Colin Beavan in requesting that Representative Nadler and Speaker Pelosi both, together or separately:

• Introduce, as soon as possible, a non-binding resolution to the House of Representatives asserting that we need a climate change mitigation policy that accords not with what is politically possible but what is scientifically necessary–a goal of no more than 350 ppm of atmospheric carbon dioxide (read why here). Furthermore, this resolution should assert that the United States must collaborate with the international community to achieve an effective successor to the Kyoto Protocol that will achieve the 350 goal or better (depending on how the science progresses).
• Pledge to support the 1sky.org policy platform that also includes creating five million green jobs (through, for example, weatherizing our buildings and manufacturing solar panels and windmills) and placing a moratorium on the building of new coal power plants.
• Push for the introduction of new and the strengthening of currently pending climate change legislation to reflect the crucial 350 goal. This means, at the very least, aiming for an 80% reduction in climate emissions below 1990 levels by 2050 and a 25% reduction by 2020.

Yours sincerely,

<Your Name>
<Your Mailing Address>
<Your Email Address>

I have just been introduced to a new blog…well, new to me anyways….at Wisdom of the Trowel. There, I found an entry about an article for which I had been searching for a few days now. An opinion piece entitled, Civilization’s Last Chance, in the New York Times discusses humanity’s never-ending belief that there will always be second chances and “do-overs” when it comes to our ecological environment. Filled with metaphors, this article offers a grim look at a future headed for disaster if emissions are not limited quickly.

 I would like to send a special thank you to Lewru for posting the article along with the link. I had seen several blogs discuss the article without giving credit to Bill McKibben or the New York Times.