1 hour ago, Oxx said:

 

The scientific geniuses in the Thai government do know, however, and have decided to ban biodegradable bags.

 

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-thailand-plastic/major-thai-stores-to-stop-giving-out-plastic-bags-by-2020-minister-idUSKBN1W915E

Not strictly true.  They have banned oxo-degradable bags which are very different. 

 

Quote

DEFINITION. Oxo-degradable plastics are conventional polymers (e.g. LDPE) to which chemicals are added to. accelerate the oxidation and fragmentation of the material under the action of UV light and/or. heat, and oxygen.1 The oxidation process enables a faster conversion of polymers into fragments.

 

20 minutes ago, HHTel said:

Not strictly true.  They have banned oxo-degradable bags which are very different. 

 

In what way are such bags not "biodegradable"? How are they "very different" from "biodegradable"?

I'll do the google for you.

 

Quote

Oxo-degradable:

To add to the confusion, a similar term “Oxo-Biodegradable” is often slapped on some products. People mistake the two terms for being one and the same thing. “Oxo-Biodegradable plastic uses metal salts to start degradation and to speed up the process, which result in extremely small fragments of plastic that no longer “visually” pollute the environment”. Further degradation depends on living organisms and bacteria. Products using this plastic typically don’t break down fully in normal landfills. This may be due a lack of oxygen. Also, as another negative, some oxo-biodegradable plastics use Cobalt and carries the risk of further environment pollution.

 

Bio-degradable:

Biodegradability is an end-of-life option that allows one to harness the power of microorganisms present in the selected disposal environment to completely remove biodegradable plastic products from the environmental compartment in a timely, safe, and efficacious manner.

“Biodegradable means that a certain object or product has the ability of being decomposed by living things or bacteria.”

 

57 minutes ago, HHTel said:

I'll do the google for you.

 

Thank you.  That spiel is widely reproduced on various websites.  However, none of them seems to provide any link to actual evidence.  Perhaps you'd be so good as to google the original source of the ascertation? It is tenable? Backed up by peer reviewed scientific paper(s) published in reputable journals?

Wikipedia references several universities and scientific studies.  It also produces sources of contradictory reports.  Have a read through that:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OXO-biodegradation 

10 hours ago, unblocktheplanet said:

Oh, come on! ALL plastic starts with petrochemicals. There are a limited number of times they can be recycled. And, as an OP has said, what do we do with our rubbish?!?

 

I'm not enough of a scientist to know if biodegradable bags help at all. There's only one Greta Thunberg & billions of selfies!

Is that a fact?  How many times can plastic be recycled then before the process has to stop?  

 

What do we do with our rubbish?  I don't know, I really don't care what you do with your rubbish and I didn't say that I did.   That was not something I expressed an opinion about!

 

What does there "only being one Thunberg" mean?

I was just in Tesco Lotus, no mention of bag for life, no one bothered to tell the staff TiT