EcoWarriorMe

I recently read an article which discussed how we could tackle the problem of the 800,000 tonnes of plastic bags thrown away each year in Europe, an average of 191 for every citizen of the European Union.  It highlighted the much smaller carbon footprint of disposable single use plastic carrier bags compared with alternatives.  Part of the article described re-using plastic bags as bin liners rather than using purpose made bin liners and it had a nifty graphic .  To a point, this makes sense but considering that many people use plastic bags for almost all of their domestic purchases, then to use every carrier bag once as a bin liner would require all that was bought to be disposed of in the bin.  I know that there is a lot of waste packaging in groceries but it does generally compact down to a smaller volume than the original (unless you live entirely on tinned produce) therefore assuming that all plastic bags are re-used in this way is stretching thin...

Over the past month I've tweeted frequently and blogged on water and sanitation , conservation of rhinoceros and tigers and solar electricity feed-in-tariffs , all of which are important issues in themselves but perhaps more important are the links between them. China is now the world's largest manufacturer of solar panels as a direct result of our drive to reduce carbon emissions, for example by using subsidies such as the UK's feed-in-tariff system. This is part of the exponential growth in manufacturing in China and south east Asia to satisfy our demand for cheaply  manufactured products with off-shore carbon footprints. This growth has created many wealthy individuals, some of whom are using their newly found disposable income for the purchase of  traditional   medicines  such as rhino horn and tiger parts . Of course such remedies do not work, but that knowledge hasn't stemmed demand. Crossing the Indian Ocean to Africa and we find many people trapped...

The following has been taken in its entirety from the government e-petition site: Banish the Plastic Bags Responsible department: Department for  Environment, Food and Rural Affairs 17 billion plastic bags a year are given to British consumers. The average Briton accepts 5 times a weeks. 200 million tonnes of plastic is produced worldwide and 10 % ends up in the ocean. When plastic bags get into the ocean they can entangle, suffocate and even kill marine animals. Plastic doesn't biodegrade, it just breaks up into smaller pieces . The number of plastic bags issued by UK supermarkets in the past year has risen by 333 million. Plastic bags are becoming a big problem and there are better solutions! Instead we should have reusable cotton bags/ recyclable paper bags/biodegradable starch based bags. Banish the bags and go with reusable/ biodegradable ones instead! If we want to cut the amount of waste sent to landfill this is the big step forward.. . If you are a UK cit...