Inside a Seattle sorting facility (Image: CHS)
Earth Day 2024 in Seattle brings some hopefully material changes to the waste we create — and a few ideas for some garbage loopholes we might want to tighten up.
In Seattle, styrofoam takeout containers have been banned since 2009 but you still see the cheap but hugely wasteful packaging in use. The Seattle ban is now about to be taken more seriously as the rest of the state is finally catching up with a prohibition on single-use foam coolers and styrofoam coffee cups and clamshells going into effect this summer.
The 2021-approved ban on expanded polystyrene outlawed packing peanuts here in 2023 and will now put the coolers, cups, and takeout containers on the banned list beginning in June. The materials are difficult to recycle and end up clogging up our landfills with plastic.
Prior to the bans, Washington residents had been throwing away about 13,000 tons of the stuff per year, the state said.
The state says the Department of Ecology will focus “on education, resources and technical assistance to enforce this law,” but repeat violators can be fined up to $250.
Still left unsolved is what to do about thick styrofoam packing blocks while styrofoam trays used in groceries for things like raw meat, and egg cartons are exempt from the restrictions.
The city says styrofoam blocks can be picked up by scheduling a special collection by Seattle Public Utilities.
While Olympia gets a handle on wasteful styrofoams entering landfills, another Washington environmental restriction is quickly being eroded. In 2011, the Seattle City Council passed legislation plastic bags from Seattle stores and add a nickel fee for paper following voter rejection of a 2009 referendum that overturned a previous ban. By 2021, the rest of Washington had joined the ban.
But the chains adjusted quickly and adapted to a loophole allowing thicker, supposedly reusable bags made from at least 40% recycled material. The thicker bags are now ubiquitous in the city and across the state meaning even more plastic is being dumped — often improperly thanks to “aspirational recycling” — in public waste systems.
More bans are coming. In California, legislators are working on legislation to close the thick bag loophole there.
In Seattle, the thick bags and styrofoam blocks are sticking around, for now. Before you toss them, make sure to read up on how to avoid being an aspirational recycler in the city.
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Debbie Downer here. Most plastic recycling is ‘aspirational’ as less than 10% actually gets recycled. Compostable containers? Also not great. The new 3 Rs if we really want to quit junking up the planet: refuse, reduce, reuse. And maybe tap into those pioneer skills and make your own lunch.
Happy Earth Day💚
The thick plastic bags drive me crazy every time
Seriously, when are going to learn?!? And how in the hell did plastic bags get banned BUT NOT THICKER ONES?!?! you know the plot of Children Of Men, where for someone unknown reason we’re not having babies anymore and humanity is on a decline/extinction event? That reason is gonna be micro plastics poisoning us and everything around us… You watch.
And instead we get “compostable” containers that are often loaded with PFAS/forever chemicals, and which end up poisoning our farmland when made into compost.
Yay, progress!