By Bob Lebeaux, President, The Plastics Group of America
March 4, 2013
Last year the City of Austin, TX voted to put a ban on single use plastic bags. The ban is scheduled to go into effect today. The “Texas Retailers Association” is seeking an injunction to keep the ban from going into effect. The lawsuit points to a state health code that prohibits local governments from banning or restricting the sale or use of a containers or packaging without state approval.
By Bob Lebeaux, President, The Plastics Group of America
January 21, 2013 in Polypropylene
After a fairly quiet 6 months or so, the polypropylene market is taking another ugly spike upwards. In the past few weeks alone, prices have increased 13-16 cents. This is the 8th time in the past 2 years there has been a double-digit change in average pricing. The market’s volatility, that everyone hoped was short term and a fluke, now seems to be the norm.
Will these increases continue? Will the volatility continue? Will it be similar to last year when a 15-20 cent increase occurred in the market through the first quarter, only to disappear about as quickly as it was implemented?
By Bob Lebeaux, President, The Plastics Group of America
December 13, 2012
Add me to the list of incredulous readers who were startled by the story that appeared Plastics News last month with a headline linking breast cancer risk to employment in the Plastics Industry.
A closer reading of the article revealed how bogus a headline it was (not to mention the conclusion that most readers probably jumped to). The sample size was small and the link between the disease and the work environment was questionable at best, unproven at worst.
By Bob Lebeaux, President, The Plastics Group of America
December 4, 2012
A small victory for the bag industry just occurred. It was recently announced that Toronto will NOT ban single use plastic bags. The decision to withdraw the ban seems to have been driven by a couple of lawsuits from 2 industry trade groups (Canadian Plastic Bag Association & The Ontario Convenience Store Association).
Based on a Plastics News Article, “Toronto Rescinds Plastic Bag Ban,” an additional factor that may have played a role in the reversal was the apparent confusion regarding the ban in recent months. Whatever the deciding factors were, it is a good win for the bag industry. We at the Plastics Group hope other cities will follow suit.
By Bob Lebeaux, President, The Plastics Group of America
November 6, 2012 in Reprocessing
The UK government’s Environment Agency conducted a report that was published last year on 4 popular alternatives to single use HDPE bags. The Plastics News mentioned the report recently, which prompted me to look into it a little. The Environment Agency published their findings to try and demonstrate positive impacts of alternative options to the single use HDPE bags. Here is a brief summary of what they found:
In my eyes, it proves the exact opposite and raises a number of questions.
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