planted city

From Business Insider:

Figures from China’s National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) regarding the impact the 4-year plastic bag ban came out earlier this week, and frankly they’re incredible.

China Daily cites a government official who says the ban has saved 4.8 million tonnes of oil (the equivalent of 6.8 million tonnes of standard coal), not to mention 800,000 tonnes of plastic.

If these figures are true, it’s not only a remarkable success for China’s environmental policy, but also a strike for international effort to ban plastic bags.

Check out the rest of the article here.

Related:

• ‘The Plastic Bag Wars’ (Rolling Stone)
• ‘Phase-out of lightweight plastic bags’ (Wikipedia)
• ‘Great Pacific Garbage Patch a bigger worry than tsunami debris’ (Los Angeles Times)
• ‘10 Things You Should Know About the Great Pacific Garbage Patch’ (Greenbang)

(Photo credit: Treehugger)