How do you dispose of your trash? (doubts about shopping bag ban)

Discussion in 'Living Room' started by jaybean, 18th Oct, 2017.

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  1. jaybean

    jaybean Well-Known Member

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    Victoria is on the verge of a shopping bag ban. I’m wondering what good this will do. I literally reuse every one of my shopping bags as garbage bin liners and I know many do the same too. I’m curious whether the rest of you do as well? The only people I know that don’t do this are families with big bins but every childless couple or single person I know don’t bother buying proper bin liners.
     
    Last edited: 18th Oct, 2017
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  2. bob shovel

    bob shovel Well-Known Member

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    I think that's what they want to cut down on. Plus the general abuse of bags, plastic and waste.

    You'll need to buy biodegradable bags.

    I love my bin/s and sorting now. Like anything it's education and breaking habits

    We have 3 bins - Green, recycle and General waste smaller bin collected fortnightly (in disgust of big chunk of the community:rolleyes:)
    I sort everything now and the red bin fortnightly gets to 80% each fortnight. Im pretty happy with that. Plastic bags and all "scrunchable plastic" goes to woolies and co for recycling.

    The chaser gang did a great series
    War On Waste - Series 1 Ep 1 : ABC iview
     
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  3. DaveM

    DaveM Well-Known Member

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    Put my bin out for first time in 1.5 months on Thursday. Takes that long to fill it as I try to minimise excessive packaging on things I buy. I use bin liner rolls.

    Now my bin has gone missing from the road. Given I live in the middle of nowhere, no idea who took it.
     
  4. D.T.

    D.T. Specialist Property Manager Business Member

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    Bags are supposedly banned here. All that's changed is you get charged 10c each one when shopping, big deal.

    Still use them for all the normal things.
     
  5. Scaphella

    Scaphella Well-Known Member

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    Fun Fact: It takes 500 years for a huggies nappy to decompose. The average kid will use approximately 3796 in their lifetime. :eek:
     
  6. Peter_Tersteeg

    Peter_Tersteeg Mortgage Broker Business Member

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    Plastic bags have many more uses than carrying your shopping. Without them I don't think I'll be picking up too much dog poo at the park...

    Why not simply mandate that all plastic bags need to be bio-degradable? It's quite possible to engineer various plastics to break down within a given time.
     
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  7. Peter_Tersteeg

    Peter_Tersteeg Mortgage Broker Business Member

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    Clearly the solution is to reduce the life of the average kid.
     
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  8. Marg4000

    Marg4000 Well-Known Member

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    I guess instead of using the free shopping bags we will all be buying plastic bin liners! In a Queensland summer, unwrapped food scraps in the rubbish bin will soon be covered with maggots.

    The REAL problem is people who don't dispose of waste correctly. Until this problem is faced our roadsides, creeks and oceans will continue to be choked with rubbish.

    And remember to wash your reusable shopping bags regularly.
    Marg
     
  9. Joynz

    Joynz Well-Known Member

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    There is no need for bin liners. I haven't used a bin liner - not even a recycled shopping bag - for years.

    Food scraps go into the compost. If I have meaty bones or similar, I wrap them in paper, or an old plastic bread bag if really smelly.

    Also, in hot climates you can freeze any scraps if you don't want them to smell.

    Many kitchen 'pedal' bins come with a plastic inner bin that can be lifted out and taken to the compost or rubbish bin.
     
    Last edited: 18th Oct, 2017
  10. Marg4000

    Marg4000 Well-Known Member

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    Sorry, I'm not having a smelly, maggotty bin through a hot Queensland summer.

    Then again, I never used disposable nappies for my three kids so am well ahead in the environmental stakes.
    Marg
     
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  11. Ben Chifley

    Ben Chifley Well-Known Member

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    As David (above) mentioned, single-use bags have been banned here in nanny-state SA for several years now- occasionally I have to buy bin liners but sympathetic Victorian friends have also been saving me their bags for use as bin liners... sadly no longer apparently?
     
  12. Propagate

    Propagate Well-Known Member

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    THIS is why (one of the reasons why anyway) we need to ban all types of single use, non-biodegradable plastics.



    We are ruining this planet and killing it's inhabitants, and there's only one Earth (that we know of).

    If we weren't the dominant species on the plant we'd have been exterminated as an invasive pest species long before now.
     
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  13. Scott No Mates

    Scott No Mates Well-Known Member

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    Many have tried and failed - black plague, influenza, WWI, WWII etc
     
  14. hobartchic

    hobartchic Well-Known Member

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    They "banned" plastic bags in Coles Bay Tasmania. So the first thing anyone does that moves there is buy bags!
     
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  15. SatayKing

    SatayKing Well-Known Member

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    And if CBR isn't the exception, a considerable number of those "reusable" bags end up in landfill.
     
  16. DaveM

    DaveM Well-Known Member

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    You left McDonalds off the list
     
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  17. hobartchic

    hobartchic Well-Known Member

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    Well, yes. All for keeping trash down but there's a limit to how much you can get it down to practically. All for compost but limit it when living on my own because of pest concerns for example.
     
  18. Lizzie

    Lizzie Well-Known Member

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    Compost bin for scraps - even friends in an apartment have a communal one in the grounds (no maggots) - newprint (or junk mail) in the base of your inside bin - reusable bags for shopping - hose your outside bin onto the lawn once a month ... all good.

    I do understand that some people use them for bin liners - but you can't honestly say that all those people who have a shopping trolley full with 30-40 bags use them all each week.
     
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  19. sanj

    sanj Well-Known Member Premium Member

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    Doesn't matter if you reuse them, they still won't distintegrate in landfill hence the problem, people will buy degradable garbage bags

    Not sure i quite understand the doubts on whether a ban will do any good, those childless couples you refer to may not buy bin liners now but they will when they have no choice
     
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  20. Propagate

    Propagate Well-Known Member

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    There's a very simple thing to remember that will really make you think twice about what you buy, how you buy it (glass jars? Bags? Single Use Plastic containers?), what throw away and what you re-use...

    "When you throw something away, always remember, there is no AWAY."

    It all ends up somewhere, and anything that is not easily biodegradable will be around for a very long time indeed. Google the mass garbage islands floating around in the oceans, it's disgusting.
     
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