Taos, San Francisco and the People’s Republic of China may soon have at least one thing in common: a ban on plastic shopping bags.



The northern New Mexico town is poised to become the latest in a string of villages, cities, even entire countries to prohibit the ubiquitous sacks. San Francisco joined that club last year; Malibu, Calif., approved a ban last week. China’s nationwide ban, which encompasses both the production and distribution of thin plastic bags, takes effect June 1.



"All around the world people are doing it," said Melissa Larson, an advocate of the ban and director of a nonprofit textile recycling business called Wholly Rags. "Taos is always promoting being so green," she said, that banning plastic bags just seems a natural fit for the town.



By some estimates the world uses 1 trillion or more  plastic bags every year, which has raised a wide range o environmental concerns. Bags have been known to choke marine mammals and are suspected of causing widespread flooding by plugging drainage systems. They take hundreds of years to decompose and even then merely break down into tinier particles of plastic. Their manufacture requires millions of barrels of oil, and recycling isn’t common. But in Taos, as elsewhere, stemming the flood of plastic bags hasn’t been easy.



The Taos City Council could have banned the use of non-biodegradable plastic bags Tuesday night, but didn’t. After hearing public testimony on the proposal, councilors voted 2-2 to postpone  action, The Taos News reported earlier this week. Mayor Bobby Duran, who supports the bag ban, missed the meeting and could have broken the tie vote. The measure could come up again in two weeks.



Taos isn’t completely overrun by plastic bags, Duran told The New Mexico Independent earlier this week. But as grocery stores, drugstores, hardware stores and others have stopped using paper bags over the last few decades, lightweight, windblown plastic bags have become an environmental nuisance, he said. Too many end up on the ground rather than in the landfill, Duran said, getting caught in trees and on fences. "It makes the town — any town — look bad," he said.



In South Africa, they’re jokingly known as the "national flower." In rural Alaska, they’ve been called "tundra chickens." In parts of the United States, they’re considered "urban tumbleweeds." Americans are estimated to use 84 billion to 100 billion plastic bags a year — nearly 300 per person. Even if the rate were half that, Taos residents would use nearly 1 million bags a year.



If the ban does pass, Taos, with fewer than 6,000 residents, wouldn’t make much of a dent in the worldwide demand for plastic bags, Duran acknowledged. But a ban there may encourage another community, and another, he said, and eventually might make a difference globally. "We’re starting here, and hoping other places follow," he said, noting that Taos County already has voiced interest in a similar ban.

The Taos proposal, like San Francisco’s and Malibu’s, would prohibit the use of non-biodegradable plastic bags. Stores would have to buy bags that decompose quickly  (they’re made with corn starch) or else revert to using paper bags. But both types are more expensive than polyethylene bags, and that additional cost has been an argument used elsewhere to squelch bag bans. Los Angeles County, for example, recently backed down  from imposing a ban after grocers lobbied against it, citing the higher costs.



The Santa Fe City Council in April talked about imposing a tax on disposable bags, but that idea appears to have bogged down over concerns about the cost to consumers, The Albuquerque Journal reported.

Duran said he hopes Taos merchants embrace the ban. "We want grocery stores to buy into the idea," he said. Taos is a small town that values local businesses, he said. (Duran once broke another tie vote on whether to allow a Wal-Mart Superstore into the city, killing the measure.) "We don’t want to hurt the retailers," he said.





The Taos News didn’t mention local retailers sounding off on the ban Tuesday night, but did report that Gene Valdez, executive director of the New Mexico Grocers Association, voiced opposition. Valdez suggested a voluntary recycling program by retailers rather than forcing them to buy biodegradable bags, and at least one councilor sided with him, the paper said.



Forcing stores to buy paper or biodegradable bags isn’t the only option for communities hoping to rein in plastic bag use. The Republic of Ireland  in 2002 instituted the PlasTax — almost 35 cents a bag at current exchange rates — and has seen its plastic bag use fall by 90 percent, the Irish government reports. Seattle Mayor Jim Nickels last month cited Ireland’s success when he proposed a 20-cent tax on disposable bags of any type. The Seattle Times wrote:


"The answer to the question ‘Paper or plastic?’ should be ‘Neither,’ " Nickels said at a news conference. "Both harm the environment. Every piece of plastic ever made is still with us in the environment, and the best way to handle waste is not to create it in the first place."

Perhaps the least opposition — at least publicly — to a plastic-bag ban was in China, where the government unilaterally decided it was time the people quit their polyethylene habit cold turkey. The justification was simple, Reuters reported in January:

China uses too many of the bags and fails to dispose of them properly, wasting valuable oil and littering the country, China’s cabinet, the State Council, said in a notice posted on the central government Web site (www.gov.cn).



"Our country consumes huge amounts of plastic bags every year. While providing convenience to consumers, they have also caused serious pollution, and waste of energy and resources, because of excessive use and inadequate recycling," it said.

The government banned the production and distribution of plastic bags less than one mil in thickness — like lightweight garbage bags.



What China, Seattle and some in Taos are proposing is for shoppers to bring their own bags to the store. Larson, whose nonprofit company makes tote bags out of recycled textiles, told the Independent before Tuesday’s meeting that plastic bags are indeed unsightly, but that’s not the real problem. Too many people use something just once before tossing it in the trash, she said. "The problem," Larson said, "is people’s habitual consumption."

But after the city council vote, Larson remained optimistic, The Taos News reported. "Government takes a long time to make these things happen," Larson said. "I think they will do it at the next meeting."