An easy way to cut down on waste is by only using reusable grocery bags. Though some grocery stores do offer these, I have never actually seen anyone bring one back to the store to reuse. This idea could be much more effective if grocery stores offered rewards for reusing bags, like a punch card system. For example, a shopper could receive 10% off for every 10 times they reuse a bag. This could potentially turn plastic bags obsolete, which also saves money for the stores since they'd give out bags less frequently. According to the Plastic Pollution Coalition, "...plastics are made from fossil fuels like oil and natural gas, which release toxic emissions when extracted from the earth. Drilling puts pollutants such as carbon monoxide, hydrogen sulfide, benzene, ozone and others into the air." Eliminating the need for plastic bags could have an immense benefit on the environment. source: http://www.plasticpollutioncoalition.or … ate-change

I agree with your innovative suggestion, Sydney. A punch card system would be a great way to motivate customers to reuse bags and minimize the environmental impacts of plastic bags.

Your idea on reusable grocery bags is quite intuitive. In my experiences, I actually see more and more people bring reusable bags to stores, over and over again. In the Bay Area, it does not seem like a problem in regards to plastic bag usage. However, discouraging plastic bags will continue to lower our carbon footprints. CBS released an article talking about the cons of plastic bag use. They stated that plastic bags photo-degrade over a 1,000 span in landfills, and break into toxic pieces. Using reusable bags will, of course, reduce the number of plastic bags in our landfills. In one year, 100 billion plastic bags are thrown out, according to Google. That's a whole lot of trash, and if we can cut that down marginally each year, our carbon footprint and landfills will decline. This leads to positive impacts on marine ecosystems, in which today organisms die due to plastic consumption. Finally, using reusable bags saves us in Alameda County in the California Bay A rea money, because stores must charge consumers 10 cents per plastic bag. If money isn't an incentive to be more environmentally friendly, what is?

Hello there Sydney! I love your idea on how to cut down on waste! It is no secret that money makes the world go round and that some people will do just about anything to spend less and make more. The discounts you are talking about for people who use reusable grocery bags is genius. However, I wonder if we could translate this to another huge waste producer such as transportation? Let us take a look. According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, "cars and trucks account for over one-fifth of the United States' total global warming pollution". Transportation is a huge pollutant in America. Maybe a way to promote less vehicle transportation is by creating more carpool lanes than single driver lanes on highways, and for every person (other than the driver of course) in a vehicle, there is a discount off a tank of gas or off the cost of driving in the carpool lanes.

Here is the link to the article on transportation pollution that I referred to http://www.ucsusa.org/clean-vehicles/ve … dKQr1tSzIU

The punch card system is a great idea to help reduce the waste from plastic bags used for groceries. I know from personal experience that many Whole Foods stores in Austin, Texas have stopped using plastic and paper bags completely. Shoppers may either bring reusable bags or carry their groceries out to their car with no bag. I live in Houston, Texas, however, and here the Whole Foods stores only use paper bags but highly encourage the use of reusable bags. It's great to see a major grocery store such as Whole Foods take part in the effort to reduce waste.