A Single-Use World

Do you pay a small fee at the store for purchasing a plastic or paper bag? Even the most environmentally-conscious of us may on occasion forget to bring our reusable bags and find ourselves faced with a .05- or .10-cent charge per bag. California was the first state to impose a statewide ban on single-use plastic bags, and in that same legislation put into place a 10-cent fee for recycled paper bags and reusable plastic bags. Seven other states have also banned plastic bags that are considered “single-use”—Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, New York, Oregon, and Vermont. 

In 2019, lawmakers in the US introduced an estimated 95 plastic-bag-related bills. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures website, “Most of these bills would ban or place a fee on plastic bags. Others would preempt local government action or improve bag recycling programs.” 

I learned this week that Lithuania is actually one of the frontrunners in Europe as far as diverting plastic bags, bottles, and other packaging materials or containers to appropriate recycling facilities rather than a landfill. According to a recent article published by The Economist, “Almost three-quarters (74%) of plastic packaging waste was recycled [in Lithuania] in 2017, the highest proportion in Europe.” The average amongst all members of the EU was a 42% recycling rate for plastic packaging. 

However, the article goes on to explain that this high rate of recycling in Lithuania  is not due to a nationwide passion for recycling or concern for the environment. A deposit refund system was established in 2016 in which customers pay an extra “deposit” when purchasing beverage containers that can later be returned to a vending machine in exchange for the deposit returned to the customer. Roughly 90% of the population of Lithuania report having used a machine at least once; according to The Economist, this may be due to low average net worth. Income distribution is incredibly unequal in Lithuania, with a significant portion of citizens surviving on fewer than $272 USD a month. 

A similar container-depositing system has also been established in Germany for about 17 years, and demonstrates that while many do return their plastic containers to get the money back, it may not be the right answer for the environment in the long-term: “The earnings from keeping the deposits from unreturned bottles seem to have discouraged producers from switching to more sustainable packaging.” (The Economist, Jan. 2020)