Plastics are everywhere, and they aren’t all recyclable. Until there’s a new system that creates a structure for using less plastic from the beginning, here’s a handy guide to what can and can’t go in the bin.
American recycling is in a crisis. But this crisis is a chance to create a better system for tomorrow. Today’s products and their packaging are often made from plastic and designed for disposal. By holding the producers of those products accountable for their polluting products, we can create a system that’s better for our communities and better for our planet.
Take the Zero Waste Challenge and fight toxic landfills by cutting plastic in your life.
Kirstie Pecci of the Conservation Law Foundation said the movement to ban plastic bags is “really rolling right now.” She said advocates are not asking people to give up all plastic products but that most plastic is unnecessary and plastic bags are “one of the most replaceable items and should be the most low-hanging fruit.”
The Rhode Island Task Force to Tackle Plastics has finished up its work with a recommendation for a statewide ban on single-use plastics. We support such a move, but it’s just the start of what needs to be done to deal with plastic pollution.
“I love all of New England,” Kirstie Pecci, senior fellow at the Conservation Law Foundation, wrote in a regional update email Tuesday. “I am busting my butt every day to move towards Zero Waste through the whole region.”
Environmental advocates gathered on the State House steps on Thursday in support of bills aimed at reducing plastics pollution and tackling climate change. “We’re here today to act on climate,” said Amy Moses, director of the Conservation Law Foundation Rhode Island.
CLF is focusing this session on five critical areas of groundbreaking, proactive legislation: cutting carbon pollution, boosting clean transportation, reducing plastic pollution in our environment, and preparing our cities and towns for climate change impacts. Learn more about the bills before the legislature and how you can get involved.
CLF is focused on cutting carbon and plastic pollution, protecting our children from lead poisoning, and securing funding to clean up Lake Champlain.
“There’s no reason why single-use plastic bags need to be a part of our daily lives,” said Kirstie Pecci, Director of the Zero Waste program at CLF. “Most bags end up filling our landfills, littering our communities and waters, and polluting our air when burned up in incinerators.”
