Environment

Feds set the bar for phase-out of single-use plastics

September 28, 2023September 28, 2023

By David Pendered

Sept. 28 – Governments really do have the ability to phase out single-use plastics, the head of Environment Georgia said Thursday as the U.S. Interior Department announced its new final plans.

“This announcement is proof positive that phasing out single-use plastics is possible,” said Jennette Gayer, Georgia state director of Environment Georgia, an organization that has addressed the issue of single-use plastics for years at the local and state levels.

This sea lion’s snout is stuck inside a plastic container. (Credit: NOAA Fisheries via Oceana)

Federal Interior Secretary Deb Haaland highlighted the new, final 10-year phase-out plans in remarks Thursday at the White House Summit on Building Climate Resilient Communities. The final plans cover all of DOI’s bureaus and departments and continue progress on a secretary’s order Haaland singed in 2022, to “reduce the procurement, sale and distribution of single-use plastic products.”

Haaland said in a statement, “Our Department-wide efforts are inspiring bold action to phase out single-use plastic products as we seek to protect our natural environment and the surrounding communities.”

Gayer said the Interior Department’s model establishes that governments can bend the arc on the use of plastic products that are intended to be used once and discarded. Several local governments in Georgia have committed to phasing out single-use plastics. Proposed statewide regulations have failed to win approval at the state Capitol.

“We have more education to do in this state,” Gayer said. “We have a lot to do when it comes to reducing the size of the ‘Reduce, Reuse, Recycle’ triangle in Georgia.”

Haaland’s fulfillment of the promise of 2022 shows progress is possible, Gayer said.

“DOI made a big, bold commitment in June 2022 and, in following through on that commitment, has found that it is possible to move forward and run a national park without using things like a plastic water bottle and plastic bag,” Gayer said. “This is great news for similar entities in Georgia, whether it’s a state park or local government.”

Oceana is another environmental organization that has campaigned in Georgia for an end to single-use plastics. Oceana’s office in Washington issued a statement commending DOI for the final plans announced Thursday and called for swifter action.

“Oceana applauds Interior Secretary Deb Haaland’s commitment to phase out the sale and distribution of single-use plastic products in our national parks and other public lands and calls on the department to implement the plans more quickly,” Oceana’s plastics campaign director Christy Leavitt said in a statement.

Leavitt helped guide a first-of-its-kind report that detailed the impact of plastics on sea turtles and marine mammals. Titled “Choked, Strangled and Drowned: The Plastics Crisis Unfolding Our Oceans,” the report chronicled the extent of animals that eat plastic or become entangled in it.

In a statement issued with the report, Kimberly Warner, report author and senior scientist at Oceana, observed: “The world is hooked on plastic because the industry continues to find increasingly more ways to force this persistent pollutant into our everyday routines — and it’s choking, strangling and drowning marine life.”