How can a plastic bag be green?
In 2007, the environmental movement began to question the sustainability of the polyethylene plastic bag. This is the ubiquitous bag found in grocery stores around the world; small, crinkly and actually recyclable. The big problem with polyethylene bags is that very few people go to the trouble of recycling them. In the U.S., about 1 percent of the 100 billion polyethylene bags used each year get recycled [source: CSM]. Across the globe, they land on beaches, get trapped on shrubs and provide a general hazard for wildlife. What’s more, when left to degrade in the sunlight, polyethylene bags take around 1,000 years to fully break down [source:
