After the complaints — and reusable bags — started piling up, Sen. Bob Smith says he’s tweaking the state’s single-use plastic bag ban. Smith (D-Middlesex) wants to amend the bill, to give grocery delivery services more options to reduce the glut of recyclable bags customers are given with each order.
“I don’t expect to get a pushback from any sensible company. The reason for that is the public is in favor, they’re fully supportive, of getting single-use plastic out of the environment. We’ve only had this little hiccup with the delivery services providing plastic bags endlessly,” said Smith, who would prefer a partial return to paper bags, requiring companies to take back reusable bags, or have the delivery services use the boxes that the goods were delivered in.
John Weber, who is on New Jersey’s Plastics Advisory Council, said any of those solutions would work, except for paper bags.
“Those bags are a lot more expensive. If they would have to bear that cost, they didn’t want to do that. Paper bags are not completely environmentally benign; they’re made from trees, and they weigh more, so they cost more to ship,” Weber said.
