Non-woven bags questioned, ineffective environmental protection? !

Under the requirements of the "Plastic Restriction Order", non-degradable disposable plastic bags have gradually withdrawn from the market, and reusable non-woven bags have become one of their main substitutes, and are widely used in supermarkets, catering, takeaway and other fields.

But in fact, non-woven bags are not "cloth" bags. Their main raw material is polypropylene (PP), which is still plastic product in essence. Moreover, in order to reduce the cost, some merchants use non-woven bags that are thin, easy to break, and cannot be reused.

For these "disposable" non-woven bags, experts said that this is not only a waste of resources, but also violates the original intention of the "plastic restriction order", and instead aggravates plastic pollution in disguise.

Non-woven fabric is not "cloth"

In January 2020, the National Development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of Ecology and Environment jointly issued the "Opinions on Further Strengthening Plastic Pollution Control", which was called "the strictest plastic restriction order in history" by the industry. Among them, plastic products that are explicitly prohibited from being produced and sold include "ultra-thin plastic shopping bags with a thickness less than 0.025mm", and the prohibited and restricted plastic products include "non-degradable plastic bags".

Therefore, people began to search for alternatives to plastic bags. At present, the more popular ones include non-woven bags, paper bags, and biodegradable plastic bags. Among them, the non-woven bag has the characteristics of toughness and durability, beautiful appearance, good air permeability, reusable, washable, and printable advertisements. It has become a landscape on the street for a while.

However, as the types and quantities of non-woven bags on the market increase, people find that the material of some non-woven bags is getting thinner and thinner, and the number of times they can be used is gradually reduced, and even become "disposable" non-woven bags. bag.

So what is a non-woven bag?

Non-woven fabric is a type of non-woven fabric whose raw material is PP. It directly uses high polymer slices, short fibers or filaments to form a new type of soft, breathable and planar structure through various web forming methods and consolidation techniques. Fiber products, often used in home shopping bags.

"Non-woven bag is not a 'cloth' bag". Its standard name is 'non-woven fabric'. The word 'cloth' may make people think that its raw material is a natural material, but in fact, its main raw material is PP (accounting for 62%), which is also the main polymer component of synthetic plastics, and its essence is still non-degradable plastic Products, in the natural environment, its degradation process is as slow as traditional plastic bags. Therefore, these bags named "cloth" neither belong to the "cloth bags" mentioned in the original plastic restriction policy, nor can they be called "non-plastic products". " said Zhi Zhaohui, general manager of Changzhou Longjun Tianchun Environmental Protection Technology Co., Ltd.

Although the essence of the non-woven bag is still a plastic product, if it can be effectively reused and properly disposed of after being discarded, it can also reduce environmental pollution to a certain extent. However, during the investigation of China Business News, it was found that although many businesses use non-woven bags as substitutes in take-out packaging services, and many consumers use these packaging non-woven bags as shopping bags, these non-woven bags Cloth bags are prone to breakage, open lines, etc., and cannot be reused.

A few days ago, a professional organization tested the non-woven bags in circulation. The results showed that the thickness of some non-woven bags is between 0.1mm and 1.0mm, and the texture is light and thin. There will soon be problems with the bag body being damaged and the bottom opening. In addition, most of these non-woven bags are customized for brands, with different sizes and specifications. The common size is the size of A4 paper. They can only uses for takeaway lunch boxes. They can neither be used when shopping, nor can they be used as garbage bags. They can only be accompanied by lunch boxes are discarded together.

Zhi Zhaohui said that since take-out catering packaging bags do not have high requirements for load-bearing, carrying, waterproof and puncture-proof performance, many merchants have made non-woven bags thinner and lighter in order to save costs. Poor, it can't carry liquids, spiked items and overweight items at all. This has led to the fact that non-woven bags cannot be reused at all, and is usually discarded in the natural environment after being used once, which is not fundamentally different from traditional plastic bags.

First Finance and Economics found from the website of customized non-woven bags that the use of non-woven bags has spread in diverse fields, such as exhibitions, supermarkets, catering and takeaway.

A staff member of an enterprise specializing in the production of customized non-woven bags said: "No matter what specification non-woven bags can be customized, as long as we can tell the requirements, we can produce products. It can uses for any purpose, and the quantity is large.” But the customized did not disclose how much the quantity is.

"Disposable" non-woven bags add to plastic pollution

An expert in the field of plastics said that if a large number of such non-woven bags are used in the field of take-out and catering, it is not only a waste of resources, but also violates the original intention of the "plastic restriction order", and instead increases plastic pollution in disguise.

The expert said that compared with plastic bags, non-woven bags are higher than plastic bags in terms of weight, and their use is no more environmentally friendly than plastic bags. To say that non-woven bags are environmentally friendly means that they can be used numerous times. If non-woven bags also become disposable, the pollution it brings is more important than that of plastic bags. Therefore, to limit plastic bags, you should limit "disposable" non-woven bags.

The results of a study published by the British Environment Agency in 2011 showed that non-woven bags need to be reused at least 11 times to comp the pollution it brings. If the non-woven bag is used once, the energy consumption of a single non-woven bag is 17.8 times that of a disposable plastic bag, and the carbon emission is 16.7 times that of a disposable plastic bag. Assuming that the non-woven bag can be used for more than one year (according to one time/week calculation), the energy consumption of the non-woven bag is only 34% of the disposable plastic bag, and the emission is 32% of the disposable plastic bag. Therefore, non-woven bags need to be reused for a long time to achieve the purpose of environmental protection, otherwise it will cause greater environmental pollution.

It can be seen that these thin non-woven bags with low usage rate and high discard rate are not environmentally friendly, and the pollution they bring to the environment is no less than that of traditional plastic bags.

At present, the common non-woven bags in foreign countries are usually coated PP non-woven fabrics with a high thickness (up to 4mm ~ 10mm), while the non-woven bags common in domestic supermarkets are relatively thin (about 0.1mm ~ 1.0mm) , although the cost is much lower than that of foreign supermarket non-woven bags, but the durability is poor and the use time is short, resulting in higher energy consumption and emissions, which is not conducive to environmental protection.

The above-mentioned experts in the field of plastic believe that the original intention of the "Plastic Restriction Order" is to effectively, orderly and effectively control plastic pollution by restricting and prohibiting the production, sale and use of non-degradable plastic products. However, some brands take advantage of consumers' ambiguity about environmentally friendly alternatives, and use a large number of such ultra-thin non-woven bags to play an environmental "edge".

In response to this situation, he suggested that relevant departments should improve industry standards, strengthen environmental protection supervision, and formulate more specific management and guidance measures for non-woven bags. For example, non-woven bags that meet the standard thickness can be circulated in the market. Consumers are encouraged to recycle, and non-woven bags with a thickness below the standard are punished the same as traditional plastic bags; in the field of food delivery, manufacturers should strengthen the general design of non-woven bags to meet the use of non-specific scenarios need.