A ban on plastic straws and utensils in Seattle restaurants will not immediately reduce the amount of plastics fouling the environment. But it represents a good start and is one that should be copied by officials in Clark County.
As of last week, food and drink vendors in Washington’s largest city are not allowed to provide single-use plastics for customers, making Seattle the first big city in the United States to adopt such a ban. The action follows a decade-old city ordinance requiring restaurants to find recyclable or compostable alternatives to disposable containers, cups and other products — the kind of things that end up in landfills or the ocean whether or not they are used.
Therein lies the impetus for the ban on plastic straws. With increasing attention on the impact of discarded plastics in oceans, the urgency for reducing their use is becoming unavoidable. With or without a ban, consumers should recycle plastics whenever possible — including newspaper bags.
According to a 2015 study published in Science magazine, at least 4.8 million metric tons of plastic waste finds its way into oceans each year. Scientists predict that by 2050 there will be more plastics than fish in the ocean. Much of that debris collects in garbage patches formed by circular currents, and the Great Pacific Garbage Patch covers an area about twice the size of Texas in the world’s largest ocean.
That reflects only the top layer of the environment’s problem with plastics. Scientists say that about 1 percent of plastic waste collects on the surface, while the rest breaks down into microplastics that aggregate on the floor of the ocean. Although the plastics break down into tiny particles, they are not biodegradable, meaning they never really leave the ocean. Studies have found that broken-down plastics release toxins that are harmful to marine life and coral reefs — and that eventually can make their way into the food chain. As Mami Hara of Seattle Public Utilities said, “Plastic pollution is surpassing crisis levels in the world’s oceans.”
Ending the use of plastic straws will not stem that tide; straws represent a tiny percentage of the debris in the ocean. But the action can spark discussions about disposable plastics and their impact. “Our straw campaign is not really about straws,” Dune Ives of Lonely Whale, an environmental organization that pushed for the Seattle ban, told Vox.com. “It’s about pointing out how prevalent single-use plastics are in our lives. Putting up a mirror to hold us accountable. We’ve all been asleep at the wheel.”
Officials throughout Clark County should join Seattle in waking up and taking a common-sense approach to reduce plastic waste. While some would consider a ban to be government overreach (or the tired trope of “political correctness”), the fact is that reducing single-use plastics would provide environmental benefits with few drawbacks for consumers and businesses. If there are concerns about customers who are unable to drink without a straw, businesses could be allowed to provide straws if requested.
Meanwhile, the issue can raise awareness regarding the prevalence of single-use plastics in our daily lives. Consumers should think globally and act locally by reducing the amount of plastic packaging in products they purchase, by having reusable water bottles, and by bringing reusable grocery bags with them to the store.
Every plastic item we use eventually ends up in a landfill or the ocean — and it never leaves. Local cities should do all they can to reduce that impact.
