The UK's top supermarket Tesco has announced that they are to introduce bio-degradable carrier bags. It also aims to cut the number of plastic bags given to customers by nearly a billion each year.
According to letsrecycle.com the UK gets through over 17.5 billion plastic carrier bags a year from supermarkets alone. So you would have thought they would be happy with the supermarkets plans. Not at all.
The fact they are to be biodegradable got the Liberal Democrat environment spokesman Chris Huhne a bit fired up. He accused the supermarket chain of misunderstanding waste issues, suggesting that degradable plastic bags will produce greenhouse gases when they break down. You just can't win sometimes.
5-13-2006 @9:33AM Annie Lorenzini said... True, the supermarket Tesco are introducing a slightly better option, but they should also make public how long it takes for these bags to break down. It could be 1000 + years, depending on what measures they are taking. Claiming they will cut out billions of bags is great, and lets hope they train their staff to ask customers if they'd like a bag. This is useful when buying something as a single item which can be placed in the handbag, carried or when you bring your own.
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