CALIFORNIA TAKES STEPS TO LIMIT THE USE OF PLASTIC STRAWS
Despite the current administration in D.C. rolling back laws that protect the environment, California has rightly continued to push for legislation to preserve it. As the most populous and geographically diverse state, California’s environmental laws often serve as a precedent for ones implemented countrywide. Thus, the current discussion surrounding the reduction of plastic straws in California is essential in determining the country’s future regarding pollution. One of the most recent bills placed on Gov. Jerry Brown’s desk is Assembly Bill 1884, Straws Upon Request. The authors of this bill aim to reduce the 500 million drinking straws Americans use daily by restricting full-service restaurants—establishments where the business’s primary purpose is serving food—from giving out straws unless the consumer requests it. Although this bill seems to be a great step forward for the environment, what it entails is not extensive enough to make a progressive change.
It is not to say that straws are not impactful, but straws only account for a small percentage of the 800 million tons of plastic that National Geographics reported flows into the oceans every year. When biology and environmental science teacher Ben Smith attends a beach clean up, he finds that straws are not the first, second or even the third most abundant trash found, but the fifth. Thus, there should be more attention focused on the first four major contributors to the plastic polluted oceans.
“I think we are targeting the issue incorrectly,” senior Mei Johnson said. “We should be focusing more on the major plastic pollutants that have a higher plastic concentration than straws and that show up on our shores the most. If we cannot do that, laws should be in place to start capping the amount of plastic that companies can put in straws so that they are thinner, smaller and require less plastic.”
Even though the bill lacks what is necessary to effectively protect the environment, it still is generating discussion about the significant roles individuals play in damaging it and what the legislation to mitigate that damage should look like. By bringing more awareness to our never-ending pollution problem and the danger of single-use plastics, people are forced to consider the size of their trash footprint and the harm it does to the world.
“The beauty of this bill is that everyone has an opinion on it because straws impact our daily lives and it may be one of the easiest single-use plastics we can start eliminating,” senior Grace Lamadrid said.
Yet attention is not action. The regulation of widespread use of single-use plastic may bring more attention to straw alternatives that are compostable, such as straws made of paper or metal, but it does nothing to encourage the necessary transition to such.
Environmental legislation is about looking to the future and should be thorough and effective in its approach to encouraging future inventions to combat pollution. The current bill fails to do both. It neither aims at creating a long term environmental framework grounded in clear and strong policy, nor incentivize businesses and people to take action on developing realistic alternatives to single-use plastic consumables.
“Although a paper straw might not be able to withstand an hour of fluid, [we still need an option] for the sake of those who have ALS or had jaw surgery, et cetera,” Smith said. “I hope we always have straws, no matter if they are made of plastic, paper or metal because some of us are going to need the function that they can provide. We all need and rely on materials, some of which will need to be made of different material or designed with a longer life cycle in terms of utility, [such that] we can use it for more than a moment. That very well might bring about innovation that did not exist before.”
