24/05/2017

Moths

When the 5p charge on bags came in, I have to admit I wasn't a supporter. I worried that this would be the end of the carrier bag and if you didn't have your bag-for-life with you your only option would be to fill your pockets and try to juggle the rest.

My fears only partly came true. Sometimes in a shop you want to use a bag and they have a member of staff handing them out. They're 5p. I don't think they need personally guarding. Everything else in the supermarket is just left on shelves but those 5p bags get a guard.

In general the plan worked, there has been a reduction in the number of plastic bags used and therefore sent to landfill. However, the bags-for-life we use are thicker and they go to landfill too. Either the shops are selling us something that isn't fulfilling it's promise or they don't think we're going to live that long, which is a worry because they know what we've been eating.

This week science may have found an answer. They have discovered a moth that eats plastic. Wax moth larvae enjoy nothing more than munching on a plastic bag so we could use them eat the bags instead of sending them to landfill.

If we learned nothing else from the old lady who swallowed a fly it's that some solutions lead to bigger problems. We'd have loads of wax moths everywhere. Eventually we wouldn't be able to keep up with their hunger, we'd couldn't feed them more bags, they're 5p each now. They'd eat anything plastic and pretty soon that will include the £5, £10 and £20 note.

Pretty soon we won't be able to afford to buy things. That'll save even more carrier bags, I suppose.
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