Surfrider Foundation South Jersey Chapter will be at the Brigantine Farmer's Market/Green Fest on Saturday August 16th to educate residents on issues caused by single-use plastic bags. Visit our tent to get a free reusable bag! We encourage you to read this article by Surfrider member and Brigantine resident, Marjorie Preston, to learn more about our Bag It Brig Campaign.
Why I stopped using single-use plastic bags, and support the campaign to ban them in Brigantine by Marjorie Preston
Someone dropped a plastic bag on Brigantine beach today.
Half a century from now, my granddaughter -- who would be nearly my age by that time -- conceivably could walk past that same plastic bag. Though exposure to the elements will likely reduce the bag to tatters, it will not biodegrade. In 2065, that plastic bag will still be among us in some form.
In fact, along with all the plastic bags that get caught in our tree branches and dunes, tumble like tumbleweeds along our beaches, or wash into our streams, rivers, bays and oceans, that plastic bag will last indefinitely -- by some estimates, up to 1,000 years.
If it blows out to sea, the bag may be ingested by a seal, sea lion, dolphin or whale. Again, the bag will last long after the animal that consumes it. An estimated 100,000 marine mammals and up to 1 million sea birds die every year after swallowing or being tangled in plastic marine litter.
If the bag is dropped it at a plastic-bag disposal at the local market, it has less than a one in 10 chance of actually being recycled and repurposed. Surprised? Unfortunately, that good feeling you get when you “recycle” your plastic bags has little basis in reality. The municipal authorities in Atlantic and Cape May counties don’t want them; when plastic bags slip into the stream of recyclables, they get tangled up in conveyor equipment and just generally gum up the works. Fully 90 percent of the bags that are collected end up in landfills, where they will continue to blow around for decades, even millennia.
That’s because plastic is durable. In fact, it’s almost indestructible. And the cumulative impact of disposable plastic on ecosystems and wildlife is not sustainable over the long haul. For all these reasons -- and because seeing all this trash on the island is just plain ugly -- I have joined the effort to support a ban on single-use plastic bags on the island of Brigantine.