Never let a crisis go to waste, even, or especially, if it’s a manufactured one. It’s “plastics versus our planet,” California Environmental Protection Agency secretary Yana Garcia tells the camera. Secretary Garcia invoked the memory of the first Earth Day commemoration to announce California’s new regulations on . In doing so, she mixed politics with science.
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsThis #EarthMonth🌎, we're focused on the plastics pollution crisis. The 1st Earth Day was created in response to oil spills + toxic waste impacting communities + our planet. 54 years later, CA is working to implement the nation's most ambitious plastic pollution reduction agenda. pic.twitter.com/gTn8rydIsy
— Secretary Yana Garcia (@CalEPASecretary) April 2, 2024
Wearing a nylon jacket, Cal-EPA Secretary Yana Garcia came out into the courtyard of the Cal-EPA building complex to warn us of the dangers of “plastics pollution crisis.” As I noted in “It’s a plastic world. Part 1” plastics are ubiquitous and nanoplastics have been detected in our arteries. That Ms. Garcia somewhat ironically wears a plastic jacket, holds a plastic microphone while being video recorded by, most likely, a camera made at least partially of plastic, illustrates that plastic products are so much a part of life that we are oblivious to them.
On March 8, 2024 California’s Governor released this statement:
SACRAMENTO – California today took another step in implementing the nation’s most comprehensive measure to tackle the rise in plastic waste polluting our communities and ecosystems.Plastic waste is a major contributor to climate and trash pollution, with less than 9% of plastic recycled in California and the rest of the U.S.
Governor Gavin Newsom signed the Plastic Pollution Prevention and Packaging Producer Responsibility Act (SB 54) in 2022, which requires producers to cut single-use plastic waste and ensure the packaging on products they sell is recyclable or compostable. The state today released draft regulations for the measure, kicking off the formal rulemaking process.
“For too long, plastic polluters have passed the buck on the growing burden of plastic waste contaminating the air we breathe, the water we drink and the food we eat,” said Governor Newsom. “California is leading the way to hold producers responsible, drive sustainable innovation and green jobs, and support the most impacted communities. We have to act now, with urgency, to give our kids a future without plastic pollution.”
https://www.gov.ca.gov/2024/03/08/californias-landmark-plastic-pollution-law-moves-forward/
We have seen this movie before. The ending just too hard to take.
Moreover, banning plastic bags can have unexpected, inconvenient results. A new study shows California’s ban eliminates 40 million pounds of plastic annually. However, many banned bags would have been reused for trash, so consumption of trash bags went up by 12 million pounds, reducing the benefit. It also increased consumption of paper bags by twice the saved amount of plastic – 83 million pounds. This will lead to much larger emissions of CO₂.
Opinion: Sorry, banning plastic bags won’t save our planet by Bjorn Lomborg https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-sorry-banning-plastic-bags-wont-save-our-planet/
Secretary Garcia’s agency, Cal-EPA, is tasked with writing regulations and enforcement of the Plastic Pollution Prevention and Packaging Producer Responsibility Act. Cal-EPA also writes and enforces California’s Proposition 65, The Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act, the law which places warning labels on coffee and baked bread. “California’s Proposition 65 list is a quintessential example of government bureaucracy gone berserk. It contains 900+ chemicals that the state declares are carcinogens or reproductive toxins. Anything that is made with, or contains any of these, now carries a ridiculous warning sticker.” American Council on Science and Health points to Prop 65, which is a political stunt more than anything, as one reason Americans have lost faith in science.
Given these bona fides, I expect little in the way of science to be employed in the Cal-EPA regulations. They are self-anointed experts. This is not science; it’s politics. It is forcing us to behave like obedient children.
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsCalifornia's progressive government has "The vision of the anointed": https://t.co/jgABn7IWZA
— Boomertarian Norm (@BoomertarianN) April 3, 2024
As Alabama’s state meteorologist testified to congress,
“’Science’ is not a set of facts but a process or method that sets out a way for us to discover information and which attempts to determine the level of confidence we might have in that information.”
https://science.house.gov/_cache/files/5/6/56b2c90e-acc2-4cab-bb10-a510d3cb43ac/AD54FE912F5E3094C8B391DA314D1E4C.hhrg-115-sy-wstate-jchristy-20170329.pdf
What is missing in our scientific knowledge vis-Ă -vis plastics is harm. Political action short circuits most or all gathering of information, employing the precautionary principle and simply assuming harms. This politicization of science has lead many in our state and country to lose confidence in science. It seems that politics treats science as a religion to believed, when science is a culture of questioning all belief. Even where something has proved itself to be “true,” science looks for gaps in the thing.
Liberalism’s great contribution to civilization is the way it handles conflict….The liberal innovation was to set up society so as to mimic the greatest liberal system of them all, the evolution of life. Like evolutionary ecologies, liberal systems are centerless and self–regulating and allow no higher appeal than that of each to each in an open-ended, competitive public process (a game). Thus, a market game is an open-ended, decentralized process for allocating resources and legitimizing possession, a democracy game is an open-ended, decentralized process for legitimizing the use of force, and a science game is an open-ended, decentralized process for legitimizing belief. Much as creatures compete for food, so entrepreneurs compete for business, candidates for votes, and hypotheses for supporters. In biological evolution, no outcome is fixed or final—nor is it in capitalism, democracy, science. There is always another trade, another election, another hypothesis. In biological evolution, no species, however clever or complex, is spared the rigors of competition—nor are the participants in capitalism, democracy, science. No matter who you are, you must conduct your business in the currency of dollars, votes, or criticism—no special fiat, no personal authority.
Jonathan Rauch, Kindly Inquisitors: The New Attacks on Free Thought (emphasis mine)
There are debates to be had in the public square about the costs (downsides) and benefits of plastics.
High-density polyethylene is a miracle of materials science. Despite weighing less than 5 grams, one bag can hold 17 pounds, well over 1,000 times its own weight. At about a penny apiece, the bags are cheap enough for stores to give away and sturdy enough to carry home two gallons of milk in the evening and still be up to the task of scooping Cujo’s poop the next morning.
Yet almost as soon as grocers started offering their customers the choice of “paper or plastic?” these modern marvels became a whipping boy for environmentalists, politicians, and other well-intentioned, ill-informed busybodies.
Plastic Bags Are Good for You
What prohibitionists get wrong about one of modernity’s greatest inventions
Katherine Mangu-Ward from the October 2015 issue of Reason magazine
Yet much research indicates that politicians and regulators are exceptionally bad at these types of analyses. In this case, rather than start with a null hypothesis that plastics are beneficial, they go by gut that plastic is a net harm and use state force to achieve their required result.
Science comes in various shades of grey, with the hues shifting as new information comes to light. Risks, and there always are some, have to be evaluated in relation to benefits.
Joe Schwarcz is director of McGill University’s Office for Science & Society, “The Right Chemistry: Ban plastic bags? It’s not so simple” | Montreal Gazette
In my humble opinion, California’s actions are premature. They assume harm and that their “doing something” will help lessen what they see as a crisis. Mandates and regulations ought to be the port of last resort, with our present government, the default is to make it the first.
“Every government law, or regulation is a demand that someone do what he doesn’t want to do, refrain from doing what he does want to do, or pay for something he doesn’t want to pay for, and those demands are backed up by police with guns.”
Harry Browne
What might government do instead of using a stick? It might try incentivizing innovation. How about an X prize to the person(?) who can develop a market for cost effective recycling? Or who can return plastic to its component parts? If plastics are worth the panic, then focusing on single use plastic is focusing on less than one percent of the problem and bigger and better ideas are needed.
Nullius in Verba 