# Why do states with plastic bag bans also ban paper bags? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 4, 2022, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950 "2022-05-04T17:10:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2022, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/41 "2022-05-04T23:28:52Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > The palm oil market is a heavy contributor to deforestation, which I personally believe is the main factor in the human-caused aspect of climate change. We may replant in the U.S. and Canada, but in many other areas, they don’t. The main factor in anthropogenic climate change is unquestionably the combustion of hydrocarbon energy sources, releasing the carbon that was sequestered underground and concentrated through geological pressure and chemical action over millions of years in a span of a few decades. The cutting and burning of forests to clear room for what is typically poor grade agricultural land is a distant second in terms of absolute emissions but does turn what was formerly a carbon sink into a net carbon emitter, notwithstanding that large scale industrial agriculture and animal husbandry are also carbon dioxide and methane producers. Mangrove swamps are of particular concern because they are substantial carbon sinks (as are all wetland forests) that are also crucial for local biodiversity and, as you note, preventing both flooding and erosion. Palm oil is a major industry for several nations in Southeast Asia as it is used in a massive variety of consumer products and industrial processes as a base lipid and there is essentially nothing that these countries could pivot to that would be even close in terms of economic value. The clearcutting and use of arable land for palm oil and pulpwood plantations has also resulted in undermining sustainable local agriculture such that these nations are now net importers of processed food and foreign grain, which is its own contributor to atmospheric carbon. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Folly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/folly/32/3219_2.png) [@Folly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Folly)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2022, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/42 "2022-05-04T23:33:52Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > And why wouldn’t you use reusable bags many times? It can definitely get complicated. Here’s a Sci-Show with a comparison. Some reusable bags (cotton tote) need to be used thousands of times to make up for their total environmental impact. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/JvzvM9tf5s0/maxresdefault.jpg "The Greenest Grocery Bag") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvzvM9tf5s0) ---
**Author:** ![am77494](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d2c977/32.png) [@am77494](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/am77494)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2022, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/43 "2022-05-04T23:46:44Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > If we could incinerate plastic to make electricity, without the dioxins and other nasty pollutants they give off, then probably the most environmentally friendly thing to do would be to use a bag once and throw it away. There are huge lobbies in the US urging landfilling over incineration. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2022, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/44 "2022-05-04T23:49:27Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > You need to use those reusable plastic bags 71 times for them to be better than disposable plastic. My gf shops at ALDIs twice a week. She used the bags at the farm market once a week. She did the math before jumping in big. We used to have a ton of plastic bags, now I occasionally miss that when I could really use one. ---
**Author:** ![Folly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/folly/32/3219_2.png) [@Folly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Folly)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2022, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/45 "2022-05-04T23:53:55Z")
Sorry! I missed BigT posting the same link earlier. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2022, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/46 "2022-05-05T00:12:46Z")
> [@Folly](#): > > Some reusable bags (cotton tote) need to be used thousands of times to make up for their total environmental impact. Then don’t use cotton bags, use the heavy plastic ones. I have a set that I bought back in '06 or so that I still use. They also can hold a lot more, and as mentioned, they don’t split open when you are carrying them into your house. I even take them camping. Now, I usually do put my meats into a disposable plastic bag, but that gets reused as a poop bag for my dogs. And, as mentioned in the video, that does not take into account the disposal issues of plastic bags. > [@am77494](#): > > There are huge lobbies in the US urging landfilling over incineration. That’s because burning plastic gives off dioxins and other nasty pollutants. ---
**Author:** ![Folly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/folly/32/3219_2.png) [@Folly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Folly)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2022, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/47 "2022-05-05T00:15:27Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > Then don’t use cotton bags, use the heavy plastic ones. That does seem to be the best of not great choices. Also re-using the thin plastic bags as trash bags (or poop bags as you said) so they are at least weighed down to stay in landfills. ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2022, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/48 "2022-05-05T00:53:56Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > > [@Chronos](#): > > > > Which is a good thing. That’s carbon sequestration. > > and paper does break down into methane, offsetting the carbon sequestration. Can anyone find some quantitative comparisons on this? We know that vegetation to buried plant products to long-term sequestration is _possible_, because that’s the source of coalfields. But the details of the timescale and form of carbon outputs into the atmosphere out matters. Which is worse: a ton of carbon leaking out as methane over a century, or ten tons of carbon decomposing into carbon dioxide in a year? (Substitute in plausible rates.) ---
**Author:** ![am77494](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d2c977/32.png) [@am77494](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/am77494)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2022, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/49 "2022-05-05T04:00:59Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > That’s because burning plastic gives off dioxins and other nasty pollutants. That’s what the lobbyists want you to believe. Technology exists and has been used for half a century or more to remove dioxins from product gases. Aluminum cans are lined with plastic films. When aluminum cans are melted for recycling, that plastic film makes dioxins too . No one has stopped recycling Aluminum cans due to dioxins because they can be easily treated. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2022, 12:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/50 "2022-05-05T12:36:27Z")
> [@am77494](#): > > That’s what the lobbyists want you to believe. Technology exists and has been used for half a century or more to remove dioxins from product gases. Err, I guess I should ask you which lobbyists you mean here. The environmental lobbyists, or the fossil fuel and plastic lobbyists? Are you sure _you_ don’t just believe what the latter tell you to believe? If it’s the environmental lobbyists, they have quite the conspiracy going, as they’ve managed to convince pretty much all the scientific publications. And they managed to do so with less than a tenth the budget of the plastics industry. They’ve done work to _reduce_ pollutants, but not eliminate, and that’s _if_ they are properly operated and emissions controlled. But that costs money, making it hard to compete with lower cost electricity sources. Then there’s the fact that such incinerators have typically been sited in low income areas, contributing to [environmental racism](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-v0XiUQlRLw). They are _developing_ processes of turning used plastic into liquid fuels, but that’s still a developing technology, and if it produces fuels that cost more than current oil products, which it seems likely, then it’s not a very economically attractive technology. It’s not nearly as simple a problem as you seem to be implying here. ---
**Author:** ![Bonum\_Legatum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bonum_legatum/32/6183_2.png) [@Bonum\_Legatum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bonum_Legatum)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2022, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/51 "2022-05-05T15:47:16Z")
My greengrocer was disposing of plastic crates that cilantro came in. They are like milk crates - but larger and not as sturdy. I asked politely and got a few - and they should be good for the next twenty years or so. So at checkout - everything goes back into the shopping cart unbagged, and is transferred to the crates at the car. (OK - sometimes I have to pack ONE bag to show the door sentry that I’ve gone through checkout. And a rainy day makes this a bit unpleasant.) ---
**Author:** ![Bonum\_Legatum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bonum_legatum/32/6183_2.png) [@Bonum\_Legatum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bonum_Legatum)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2022, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/52 "2022-05-05T15:48:15Z")
I remember reading years ago that European women carried net “bags” for shopping. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2022, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/53 "2022-05-05T17:39:24Z")
> [@Bonum\_Legatum](#): > > They are like milk crates - but larger and not as sturdy. I asked politely and got a few - and they should be good for the next twenty years or so. I thought about using milk crates, that would actually make things go much easier. No crushing of eggs or breads, no chance of breakage, you can stack them. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2022, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/54 "2022-05-05T21:05:07Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > The cutting and burning of forests to clear room for what is typically poor grade agricultural land is a distant second in terms of absolute emissions but does turn what was formerly a carbon sink into a net carbon emitter, notwithstanding that large scale industrial agriculture and animal husbandry are also carbon dioxide and methane producers. Mature forests aren’t carbon sinks. They’re carbon stores, but they’re not capturing any further net carbon. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2022, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/55 "2022-05-05T21:16:13Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Or, heck, why not just do what most people have done for years and push reusing the “single use” bags? Before the ban on plastic bags and stores being required to charge a fee for paper bags, there were supermarkets in my area that would give you a credit ( a nickel, I think) for each bag you brought yourself. Didn’t matter what kind - you could reuse the plastic/paper ones you got for free, or bring a a reusable plastic/fabric/net bag. People hardly ever brought their own bags - saving a nickel for each bag you bring doesn’t change behavior as much as being charged a nickel for every bag you use. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2022, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/56 "2022-05-05T22:36:50Z")
> [@doreen](#): > > Before the ban on plastic bags and stores being required to charge a fee for paper bags, there were supermarkets in my area that would give you a credit ( a nickel, I think) for each bag you brought yourself. One store I go to has not eliminated the credit for bringing in your own bag. If you use their bag it costs a nickel; using your own gets you 6 cents, for an $.11 swing. Now we’re talking big money! Personally, I’m one of those people who bought cloth bags long ago and still use them. Although I’m shamed by the two upthread who bought theirs in the 70s or 80s, while I didn’t buy mine until the early 90s. Today, however, since most of my groceries are carried in my backpack as I ride my bicycle, I only use the cloth bags for overflow or things that would be crushed in the backpack (i.e. bread). ---
**Author:** ![Esprise\_Me](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/esprise_me/32/2947_2.png) [@Esprise\_Me](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Esprise_Me)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2022, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/57 "2022-05-05T23:45:05Z")
It’s worth noting that, while paper bags can be recycled, they’re usually not made _of_ recycled paper, because it’s not strong enough. > **[Paper, Plastic or Reusable?](https://stanfordmag.org/contents/paper-plastic-or-reusable)** > > The answer is a mixed bag. I’ll take every opportunity to shill for EnviroSax. They’re thin but strong bags made of recycled polyester. They roll up and snap shut into a wad that fits in a pocket, but they can carry around a back-breaking stack of legal files and books for years without tearing. I still have the first one I bought in the mid-aughts, so I know it hasn’t been swallowed by a fish. [There Is Plastic In Your Fish](https://www.forbes.com/sites/ariellasimke/2020/01/21/there-is-plastic-in-your-fish/) ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2022, 11:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/58 "2022-05-06T11:50:28Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Mature forests aren’t carbon sinks. They’re carbon stores, but they’re not capturing any further net carbon. That just isn’t true. Trees—even mature trees—are constantly growing, both in their canopies and outward from the trunk as well as their root systems, and they support a diverse ecosystem below the canopy layer that also utilizes carbon as well as maintaining the health of the soil layers and fungal mats. Rainforests in particular are enormous carbon sinks and clearcutting the for typically low grade agriculture and grazing lands is a huge net positive emitter. Although you see people advocating for planting new trees as a means of passive carbon capture, while this is great in the long run it is far to slow to make a substantive difference in offsetting increases in atmospheric carbon that is currently released. The cheapest and most practical thing we could do to reduce net carbon emissions short of stopping all internal combustion and carbon-emitting industrial processes would be to stop cutting down existing old growth forests and draining wetlands. Which we’re not doing, of course, because profits trump prevention. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![am77494](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d2c977/32.png) [@am77494](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/am77494)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2022, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/59 "2022-05-06T14:32:54Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > Err, I guess I should ask you which lobbyists you mean here. The environmental lobbyists, or the fossil fuel and plastic lobbyists? Are you sure _you_ don’t just believe what the latter tell you to believe? Maybe lobbyists is a wrong choice of words, I am trying to say that there is a consortium of the following kind : 1. The kind of Consortium headed by TurboTax that prevents Tax agencies to send tax payers pre-filled tax forms; even-though it has been proven effective in Europe and other parts of the world. 2. The kind of Consortium that has resulted in most places in the US being only served by one Cable / Internet Company. And the cable company can charge as much as they want and deliver as bad a service as they like. 3. The kind of Consortium that promotes Corn Ethanol where forests are cut down, massive fossil fuels converted to fertilizers, trucked to farms, massive fossil fuel usage at farms, and then brewing / distilling with fossil fuels to make Corn ethanol. Similarly the waste Industry is lead by two big companies : Waste Management and Republic Waste. Incineration has been proven to work with minimal environmental impacts in Europe and elsewhere, but it will not happen in the US. Why invest capital if you own the market ! > [@k9bfriender](#): > > They are _developing_ processes of turning used plastic into liquid fuels, but that’s still a developing technology, Yeah - I’ve worked on some of these processes… Economics in the Oil industry are cyclic , for example the 20 Billion USD Shell Pearl plant in Qatar which makes gasoline from natural gas had different economics 10 years back than now and the war in Ukraine has changed those economics. The Dakota Syngas plant converted Coal into Natural Gas and sent CO2 to Canada for EOR. Once, fracking became mature - their economics went down the drain. But now its back in the limelight because it has been doing CO2 capture and CO2 credits are being traded… ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2022, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950/60 "2022-05-06T17:44:47Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > > [@Chronos](#): > > > > Mature forests aren’t carbon sinks. They’re carbon stores, but they’re not capturing any further net carbon. > > That just isn’t true. Trees—even mature trees—are constantly growing, both in their canopies and outward from the trunk as well as their root systems, and they support a diverse ecosystem below the canopy layer that also utilizes carbon as well as maintaining the health of the soil layers and fungal mats. Perhaps that’s true, but a report I saw about 15 years ago said that undisturbed mature forests are carbon neutral in the long run. Note that “undisturbed” here means that humans don’t do things to it, and that includes fighting forest fires. Forest fires balance out the carbon added through growth. Now maybe they missed some important carbon sink in that earlier paper. But a more a recent paper says essentially the same thing: > **[Don't look to mature forests to soak up carbon dioxide emissions](https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/04/200408113300.htm)** > > Research suggests mature forests are limited in their ability to absorb 'extra' carbon as atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations increase. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-states-with-plastic-bag-bans-also-ban-paper-bags/963950.md?page=4)