Aug 9, 2007 3:01 pm US/Pacific
Plastic Bag Makers File Suit Against Oak. Bag Ban
OAKLAND (BCN) ―
A group of plastic bag makers and recyclers has filed a lawsuit seeking to throw out the city of Oakland's new ordinance banning plastic shopping bags.
The group, called the Coalition to Support Plastic Bag Recycling, alleges in its suit in Alameda County Superior Court that the city didn't review environmental impacts before adopting the ordinance in June.
The new law is scheduled to take effect Jan. 17 and will ban the use of non-biodegradable plastic bags at retail stores that gross more than $1 million a year.
It would require such stores to offer shoppers compostable plastic sacks or paper bags that are 100 percent recyclable and contain at least 40 percent recycled material.
After the city runs an education and awareness campaign, violators of the ordinance could be fined $500.
The San Francisco Board of Supervisors approved a similar ordinance earlier this year and other cities are studying similar ordinances as well.
The group claims in its lawsuit that there's substantial evidence that the ordinance "will result in adverse environmental impacts" such as contamination of the process for recycling bags.
The suit says customers will mistakenly try to recycle compostable bags as plastic bags and "this will contaminate the plastics recycling system, causing more wasted energy and resources."
The suit also alleges that the ordinance "will increase greenhouse gas emissions and add more pollutants to water resources by causing a significant rise in the use of other types of bags, including paper bags, which are most costly, generate more pollutants during manufacturing and require more energy to produce and recycle than plastic bags.
Oakland City Attorney spokesman Alex Katz said Thursday that his office is still reviewing the suit and doesn't have any comment.
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