Why One State Just Banned Plastic Bags … and What That Means for You

California is the first state in the nation to enact a statewide ban on plastic shopping bags, taking a concept that had been limited to cities and broadening it in new ways.

“This bill is a step in the right direction—it reduces the torrent of plastic polluting our beaches, parks and even the vast ocean itself,” said Democrat Gov. Jerry Brown. The new law goes into effect Jan. 1, 2015.

For years, green groups have lobbied for plastic bag bans in cities across America. Free-market advocates, meanwhile, called these bans an ineffective government intrusion.

Now, for Californians anyway, canvas sacks will be the new norm for carrying groceries. These reusable bags, green activists claim, reduce waste. But they also get dirty after a few uses.

“Coercing people to use cloth shopping bags will subject people to unnecessary health risks caused by festering bacteria from prior food purchases contaminating newly bought food,” said James Taylor, senior fellow for environmental policy at the Heartland Institute, an Illinois-based free-market think tank.

To avoid contamination and sickness, it’s recommended that consumers wash their reusable shopping bags after every use.

That means using more water. That’s not a major problem, unless you happen to live in a state experiencing the worst drought in its recorded history, which California currently is.

What about paper bags? They do break down faster in dumps than plastic bags, and they don’t have to be washed and reused.

They also require 70 percent more energy to produce and cost three times as much to produce, not to mention the fact they can litter city streets just as easily.

After San Francisco became one of the first cities in the country to ban plastic bags in 2007, the city’s own audit department determined the new policy didn’t cut down on litter.

Read more at Watchdog.org.