Plastic Straw Bans

Politics and religion
41

We are not holding corporations accountable for their wasteful practices, we are expecting consumers to do the small scale changes themselves. We need top-down action on the environment. We need governments to fix this on a global scale by holding these companies accountable for their environmental footprint, and individual companies can scale back plastic straws as part of that, but it shouldn’t be the focus of consumer activist groups to call for legislation like this which is minimally effective.

It is this same kind of shit that will cripple any meaningful advances in the fight against climate change. I mean, if we don’t do something in 100 years there won’t be any beautiful sea turtles to choke on our plastic waste anyway.

And again, re: the disability argument, we are talking about access. And there are many disability advocates who are experts in this that say that a plastic straw ban will negatively effect the disabled community, and advocate for similar plastic straw control plans in lieu of an outright ban. The issue is, and they can tell it themselves, is that their community doesn’t have a say in this legislation that could have a significant negative impact on them.

It isn’t like disabled people want plastic waste to increase in the ocean, they want to decrease waste too, and they want that with the same accessibility as everyone else.

42

To be fair, the nine-year-old did conduct “real science”. He did research and came up with data-points based on the best available information he (or anyone, really) had at hand.

He called three major straw manufacturers (the closest thing available as experts) and asked for their guestimates as to the US market. He then averaged those three values to reduce the “noise” and come up with a reasonable figure. That figure was half a billion straws a day.

Reason magazine, which disputes his numbers, merely disputes them by engaging in their own guestimating. They contacted their own expert, in this case a marketing agency that deals with the “disposable food service packaging”. This (single!) agency admits that they don’t survey all the straw manufacturers - only the ones that package for big restaurants - but they believe that they have a view into 95 percent of of the straw market. They put the number at somewhere around 175 million a day; about a third of the kid’s number.

So what you have here are four data-points, though Reason says that the nine-year-old’s only count as one for some… reason.

Personally, having read through Reason’s… reasoning… I actually think their number is the probably far more conservative than it should be. Their marketing firm basically hand-waves away all straws that are not packaged for restaurants as inconsequential, which strikes me as silly. Not only are there plenty of straws used at home (even my straw-averse household has a bin of straws on the counter), but there are uncountable mom-and-pop restaurants that pick up wholesale straws at COSTCO or similar places for use in their establishments. [According to NPD, 55% of US restaurants are independants.]

I also suspect that their definition of “straw” is fairly lacking. For instance, there are the vast number of straws created for the juice-box market; those tiny things glued to the sides that you use to puncture the top. How many of the 65 million school-kids in the US drink at least one of those a day? How many adults? I tried to find an answer and the closest I could come up with is that 23% of Americans (~80 million) drink at least one serving of fruit juice each day. If we guess that only half of those are from the disposable cartons (which I feel is a lowball guess), then that’s 40 million additional straws, a 22% increase over Reason’s guesstimate.

So yeah, scoff at the nine-year-old’s stats, but until someone actually comes up with actual, reproducible, data, his high numbers are about as good as Reason’s lower number.

Incidentally, one of the Reason articles does provide some evidence for the larger-than-expected incidence of straws in the ocean as a percentage of all trash:

More important than how many straws Americans use each day is how many wind up in waterways. We don’t know that figure either. The closest we have is the number of straws collected by the California Costal Commission during its annual Coastal Cleanup Day: a total of 835,425 straws and stirrers since 1988, or about 4.1 percent of debris collected.

I get the impression they thought that the 4.1% would sound low, but that’s actually a very large amount when you squint at the numbers and conclude that the number of straws collected are larger than the number of cups that would require a straw that were also recovered (rolled into the cups/plates/utensils category: 5.2%).

43

So you are advocating a ban with no scientific consensus then? Is that better?

44

I know it’s been several hours, but there’s only 43 posts so far. I’ll help out and quote myself.

45

Fair enough, and not to direct that question at you exactly, but you bring up a good point. There isn’t much research in this area (and you can thank the US’ continued efforts to reduce funding to research organizations for this) yet we are pushing forward legislation dealing with the issue.

And I agree with you that the easiest solution would be as simple as an opt-in solution. Serving drinks w/o straws and stating straws are available if you need them, but we are trying to limit the impact of plastic waste. That and education that straws and lids can be recycled. That alone would do a lot and have 0 impact on the disabled community.

46

But that number is absurd, right?

I mean, the entire population of the US is only 325 million. So every person in the entire country uses 1.54 plastic straws, every single day? That seems very unlikely to me, as I generally never use straws at all… so out there, someone else is using 3 straws every day? What are they doing with them?

I guess maybe it’s just my own personal bias, but it seems like using that many straws would be weird.

47

And we are pushing forward legislation on this with admittedly scant evidence on the impact it would have on the environment, other than the published study in the OP where a panel of experts list plastic straws on the low end of the ocean waste impact spectrum.

When we could be pushing forward limitations like tightening regulations on waste disposal, funding alternative energy research, enacting a carbon tax etc. Many other solutions that are far more well researched.

Again, to me, this really feels like a marketing stunt from Starbucks based on a viral video of a turtle injured by a straw.

48

You dont know kids. There is one thing cooler than using a single straw. That is using 3 or 10 simultaneously, or better yet, make a super long straw.

Also, people go out to dinner and go out to lunch, they use more than one straw.

People are wasteful.

49

Hell, I know of a few restaurants that bring you a new straw with each refill for whatever fuckin reason.

edit: to head pedantry off at the pass, sure food safety regulations + lazy employees who don’t wanna deal with nuance or taking an extra three seconds to think it through

50

And with the water they bring everyone when they first sit down. Because picking up a cup of water is too much work for able-bodied people I guess.

51

Basically, fuck straws. Sippy cups for everyone!

52

McDonalds sells 75 hamburgers every second (worldwide). Humanity does some things at scales that beggar our imagination. Americans using three straws a day is not one of those things.

You’re a college kid and you start the day by going to Starbucks where you grab your frappacino, with straw. At lunch, you go to the food hall and grab a straw to sip your soda from. After school you hit McDonalds and snag a medium coke, complete with straw.

You’re a construction worker who hit’s McDonalds and gets an egg mcmuffin on his way to the site, which comes with cup of OJ, with straw. In your lunch-pail you have a juice box, with straw. That evening you eat at home and your put a straw in your cup from the container on your counter.

You’re a fifth-grader who gets a juice-box for breakfast, lunch and an after-dinner drink. Three straws.

You’re an office-worker who hits Starbucks on the way in, a deli for lunch, and McDonalds on the way home. Three straws.

I too think that 500 million sounds high. But it’s not unreasonably high.

Heh, I didn’t think of that, but yeah. And it kills me a little bit each time.

53

Heck even the lower estimate of 175 million is high. Knowing that 90% of those are not recycled, and that 99% of the people didn’t need them.

54

Such Madness!

55

You get straws in a cup of water in a restaurant??

Man I have to go out to eat more often.

56

Not every place does that but many do. As spoiled American diners we almost always ask for water upon sitting down and we get a wonderfully large glass of ice water with a straw.

57

I have very sensitive two front teeth. It’s like a needle in the mouth to have ice touch those. I used to ask for straws all the time, now I just awkwardly sip it from the side of my mouth or use a spoon to remove all the ice and give it to a family member.

58

Often we don’t need to ask. And sometimes there is a wedge of lime.

59

Come to the UK! You’ll never get ice in your water. Or a straw.

60

Or water! Only pickled Thames eel, free with every meal!

#BritCuisine

(I kid)