SUBRAMANIAN: Focus on banning plastic straws misses bigger, more urgent environmental issues
Column: Whadda I Know
Generation Z cares deeply about the environment. In fact, climate change was the most cited concern this generation has for the future, according to a poll conducted by Amnesty International. Generation Z is also more likely to buy from sustainable brands. As a result, local governments have taken action to address this issue.
One of the most noticeable ways has been through plastic straw bans — for example, in the cities of Santa Barbara, California, and Washington, D.C. In New Jersey, businesses can only give plastic straws to those that request them. Still, the efforts of many of these governments are misplaced and simply not enough.
The ramification of these plastic straw bans can often harm the most disadvantaged in American society. For example, these plastic straw bans tend to hurt members of the disabled community the most. Many disabled people with mobility and/or strength issues rely on these plastic straws readily available.
Getting rid of plastic straws perpetuates the privilege that non-disabled people have when living in a world designed for them. Like the one in New Jersey, opt-in systems can still harm the disabled community disproportionately.
The reason for this is that it increases the burden faced by members of the disabled community, especially disabilities that are not visible. What makes this worse is that it can put power into the hands of the business, which can choose to deny someone with a disability a necessary tool in their life.
Outside of plastic straws, there are not many good options available. The two most common alternative straws presented would be paper and metal straws, but those perform significantly worse than plastic straws. For example, with paper straws, it is no surprise that paper in a liquid usually will disintegrate. As a result, these straws do not last long and can lead to needing more paper straws per drink rather than one plastic straw.
Furthermore, these paper straws are still not very environmentally friendly. These types of straws require deforestation and the expenditure of a considerable amount of energy, which leads to more greenhouse gasses being pumped into the air. Furthermore, these paper straws are still single-use, meaning that once you are done with them, they go into the trash to sit in a landfill until they decompose.
This means that paper straws offer next to no benefit to the environment while not improving the plastic straw dilemma in any meaningful way.
Metal straws are the next most popular alternative to plastic straws. On the surface, there are many benefits. For example, metal straws are reusable, which tackles the biggest problem with single-use plastic straws. But the process of creating a metal straw is intense and quite problematic. The energy to make one metal straw is equivalent to making 90 plastic straws.
Additionally, the metals needed to create metal straws, such as nickel, often require exploitative mining operations, increasing the particulate matter released into the atmosphere and leading to adverse health consequences. Not to mention, restaurants that have been using metal straws report higher rates of theft of these straws, leading to more restocking needed and increasing the environmental cost.
The question does need to be asked: Who benefits from the demonization of plastic straws? It is not the general public, as it makes us contend with worse alternatives and further systemic inequality. The real winners are corporations.
Focusing on plastic straws and chastising members of society for using them leads to less attention being put on these corporations and their negative environmental impacts. Of the 8 million tons of plastic that enter oceans each year, only 0.025 percent of that can be attributed to plastic straws.
This kind of greenwashing forces the solution into the hands of the corporations who now have to innovate us out of the problem when in actuality they are the problem. Encouraging our governments, the most capable force we have to stand up for us, to put pressure and regulation on these corporations in regard to their environmental actions will go a much longer way than virtue signaling on Twitter. But hey, whadda I know?
Kiran Subramanian is a junior in the School of Arts and Sciences majoring in economics and political science. His column, "Whadda I Know," runs on alternate Tuesdays.
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