Data released by the United States Environmental Protection Agency shows that somewhere between 500 billion and a trillion plastic bags are consumed worldwide each year. National Geographic News September 2, 2003 Less than 1% of bags are recycled. It cost more to recycle a bag than to produce a new one. “There's harsh economics behind bag recycling: It costs $4,000 to process and recycle 1 ton of plastic bags, which can then be sold on the commodities market for $32” Then… Plastic bags have been found floating north of the Arctic Circle near Spitzbergen, and as far south as the Falkland Islands So… If we use a cloth bag, we can save 6 bags a week That's 24 bags a month That's 288 bags a year That's 22,176 bags in an average life time If just 1 out of 5 people in our country did this we would save 1,330,560,000,000 bags over our life time Bangladesh has banned plastic bags China has banned free plastic bags Ireland took the lead in Europe, taxing plastic bags in 2002 and have now reduced plastic bag consumption by 90% In 2005 Rwanda banned plastic bags Israel, Canada, western India, Botswana, Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa, Taiwan, and Singapore have also banned or are moving toward banning the plastic bag On March 27th 2007, San Francisco becomes first U.S. city to ban plastic bags... Oakland and Boston are considering a ban Plastic shopping bags are made from polyethylene: a thermoplastic made from oil Reducing plastic bags will decrease foreign oil dependency China will save 37 million barrels of oil each year due to their ban of free plastic bags... It is possible... National Geographic News September 2, 2003 -- --

※ 发信站: 批踢踢实业坊(ptt.cc) ◆ From: 61.228.212.155