30 ways to make the most use out of disposable plastic bags
Since plastic bags can take 1,000 years to decompose, may as well try to find the best use of them now
Materialism has never been my thing. However, there are a handful of items that I consider prized possessions: one is a class project in elementary school and the other is from high school. They are essays and family tree drawings that I created after interviewing my great great aunt (who lived to be 100 years old) and my grandfather (who lived to be 95 years old). And when I flip through those folders, looking at information about relatives from the 1700s and 1800s, it’s wild to consider that none of these people lived as long as a plastic bag.
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Plastic bags can take anywhere from two decades to 1,000 years to decompose, depending on environmental conditions like sunlight exposure, which causes them to photo-degrade into harmful microplastics.
Recommended Read: “Paper, plastic or package waste ~ What do the triangles mean on plastic and paper containers?”
Yet people discard this invention from 1907 on a regular basis. Meanwhile, when I’m not insisting on making houseguests test out my stainless steel straws (instead of plastic straws), I try to reuse this stubborn piece of material as much as possible. In a Spruce post listing seven things that minimalists are quick to discard, plastic bags made the list. I cringed at that statement.
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I understand why people choose reusable shopping bags over plastic shopping bags. I keep multiple reusable bags folded in the bottom of my purse and my dog-walking bag. But if I happen to be traveling with nothing more than my wallet, I’ll usually end up with one of those disposable plastic bags. And once I get one, I go out of my way to find creative ways to use it until it completely falls apart.
30 ways to reuse disposable plastic bags
Ditching the bags at department stores like Kohl’s is the easy answer, but there are also 30 ways I can use these bags at home or traveling — and not just one time.