Santa Monica Plastic Regulations
The city of Santa Monica has a longstanding commitment to the environment, and it’s set a goal to achieve zero waste by 2030. It plans to do this through regulations promoting various sustainable methods, including diversion, composting, and recycling.
Why Plastic Regulations Are Necessary
Single-use plastics pose dangers to our health and the ecosystems we rely on for survival, with microplastics seeping into our drinking water and food over time. Current plastic manufacturing and consumption are unsustainable, and at the current rate, we are facing an environmental collapse in the coming decades. Regulations can help curb this over-reliance on disposable plastics and stabilize our environment.
What Is the Santa Monica Plastics Ban?
Santa Monica is a beach city, so it’s easy for single-use plastics to find their way into the ocean, posing severe risks to the local marine wildlife and people’s livelihoods. Santa Monica has been consistently breaking ground by being one of the first cities to start the battle against plastics, forbidding polystyrene food containers and single-use plastic bags in 2011. In 2018, the city changed regulations to include all single-use plastics for prepared foods. The council ensured the regulations restricted items such as straws, utensils, plates, bowls, stirrers, and cups.
The city council made these decisions to protect Santa Monica Bay from plastics and decrease landfill waste, moving closer to its zero waste by 2030 goal.
Who Does the Ban Affect?
The ban will apply to all food and beverage providers to help ensure Santa Monica’s plastic reduction. Any individual, business, organization, or group providing prepared food and beverages within the city must abide by these regulations or face fines.
A key point to remember is that providers must make marine-degradable disposable straws and utensils available only on demand to further reduce the consumption of single-use products.
Greenprint Solutions
Greenprint aims to ease this transition to sustainable prepared food and beverage packaging by offering effective alternatives like agave and sugarcane fiber takeaway packaging, which is biodegradable, heat- and leak-resistant, and sturdy.
Tell your friends about the sustainable single-use alternatives available to them, and if you are a business owner, ensure you’re up to date on the plastic regulations in your area. Schedule an appointment with our sales team for more information, or check out our compliant marine products that easily decompose in water.
What Does Compostable Mean? Compostable products are products that can undergo aerobic biological decomposition. In other words, they decompose naturally over time in the presence of oxygen. This process can occur in a compost system where all the material breaks down into the basic parts—biomass, water, carbon dioxide (CO2), and inorganic compounds—which are all nutrients the […]
Of the nearly eight million tons of plastic waste, plastic straws make up about 4% of that total . They are also among the top 10 contributors to ocean marine debris. Plastic straws are not recyclable, partly because of their size but also because most are tossed into the trash and end up in a landfill.
If you’re a restaurant owner still using polystyrene containers for takeout packaging, you likely already know it’s not sustainable. Polystyrene has long been known as one of the most environmentally harmful materials out there—and yet some still use it because it’s also the cheapest.
As society becomes increasingly aware of the impact of human activities on our environment, we must make conscious and informed decisions about our consumption patterns. With this in mind, examining what we already consume can help guide future behavior.
Agave straws are made from agave fibers and are eco-friendly alternatives to plastic straws. They are one of the many types of sustainable straws designed to help reduce single-use plastic waste. Compared to other sustainable straws, agave fiber straws are known for their sturdy and natural composition and aesthetically pleasing look that can enhance beverage […]