San Francisco Bans Styrofoam for To-Go Containers
by Kara DiCamillo, Newport, Rhode Island on 04.13.07
San Francisco does it again. A few weeks ago the city banned the use of all plastic shopping bags other than biodegradable and recyclable ones. Now, effective June 1, 2007, the law will require San Francisco food vendors who sell prepared food to use compostable or recyclable to-go containers as well. “San Francisco food vendors may no longer use polystyrene foam otherwise known as Styrofoam™ and must use compostable or recyclable disposable food service ware or to-go containers unless there is no suitable product that is within 15% of the cost of non-compostable or non-recyclable alternatives,” an article said. Compostable products include coated and uncoated paper or other natural fiber products and plant-based plastic-like products that are clearly labeled. We know several restaurants, like Mixt Greens, who already uses the products, but we’re interested to see if more cities will take San Fran’s lead. ::SF Environment Related ::Eco-To-Go ::What to Do with Used Styrofoam
Oakland passed a similar law that went into effect at the beginning of the year, so SF is actually the follower on this one.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/06/28/MNG65JLQJ411.DTL
Isn't polystyrene/ Styrofoam, #6 plastic, and thus recyclable?
Personally I believe in bringing my own reusable food containers to a restaurant - but this initiative seems a little bit arbitrary.
hi pink,
that's great news - thanks so much for letting me know.
- kd
Portland, Oregon banned styrofoam way back in 1990. It's nice to see San Francisco finally following OUR lead. ;-)
San francisco didn't actually ban ALL plastic grocery bags, just those coming from major grocers and pharmacies. if you shop at one of the many local grocers, you can still get your plastic bag fix.
digraph,
I believe it is recyclable but most people don't know about it. So it just ends up in landfills.
I live in the SF bay area and I am an environmentalist, but I'm a little hesitant about some of SF's latest policies. It would have been better as an bay area wide initiative (or best of all, a state wide regulation since I've lost hope about the federal government doing anything). As is, people can just go to other cities around the bay to eat and SF loses business.
Since San Fran is sort of the most famous city right now for taking Environmental initiatives, I'd actually like to see them to the be first city in America to ban SUV's. I know that is a bit of a pipe dream and in a city like San Fran where people don't drive all that much it may be a silly aspiration, but it would be nice to see even if it was a symbolic gesture.
Up in Canada, we have a town in Manitoba that banned plastic bags, and the residents were up in arms over it.
@ Stacy,
Wow...even cooler!! I kinda remembered mention of other cities with long-standing bans when Oakland passed it, but couldn't remember specifics! =D
Old news. Both Portland and Oakland have banned styrofoam food containers since at least 1990!
Finally San Fran is trying to make up for lost time... that's a lot of foam containers they could have kept out of the landfill (17 years' worth)!
Gal, you think people are going to boycott SF restaurants simply because their to go container will be made of paper/recyclable plastic/bamboo/other?! This is a great initiative - regardless of where it started first - because there is zero negative impact on the consumer.
As for impact on the consumer..yes there is. One thing i have noticed in the foodservice business is that people DO want environment friendly items but they do not want to Pay for the difference in the cost for the food. Right now at the U of M (University of Montana) we are researching on switching our To-Go Containers to bidegratable products BUT the problem is that most students/parents do not want to pay more tuition. The overhead for the food/equiptment rental/space rental is already a problem now we have to pay on average $0.25 more for each container if we go to biodegratable. Without a raise in tuition then the quality to the guests/students would have to go down. So the business is in a predicament how do we get what our guests want and still be able to run the operation without them losing out on quality. Sure the prices might go down for the biodegratable items..eventually but the products are still to new to deal with some foodservice regulations i.e. Hot foods/drinks at the 145 degree range, drinks not so much though. Either way food costs are up and adding another 0.25 is hard to deal with. Paper is great but then you run into the wax coating in the food..accepatable? Willing to pay the health issues if any? Things are on their way but are you willing to pay the price for it now? If the price goes up at your favorite restaurant and you have asked for the biodegratble product do you complain about the hike? Remember the saying " Be careful what you wish for you might just get it."
Dragonrain
I work as the Recycling Coordinator for the City of Santa Barbara, and I often have to answer the question of whether Styrofoam is recyclable.
The absolute answer is yes, but it never will be!
One of the reasons Styrofoam is so popular is that is takes very little material to make (cheap) as air is the principle component in the product (by volume). This also means it is light, and thus cheaper to transport (mail, truck, etc.). That's the bummer though, because for recycling to work you have to be able to make money off the resale. There simply isn't enough material in Styrofoam for any collector to bulk and sell. Think about how much a whole truck of the material would weigh?! To compound the problems, most Styrofoam is contaminated with food which further degrades its ability to be reused.
The only situation you would ever see Styrofoam recycled might be in a factory setting where you have clean industrial waste, and it would go back into the process. Otherwise, it's trash. Bring your own to-go Tupperware and mug as one way you can make a difference every time you take food to go!
;-)
My school uses styrofoam lunch trays in which they throw out every day. My school is of decent size, about 500 students buy lunch every day. I did some research about the harms of stryofoam and decided to talk to the lunch ladies about it. They said it was the only thing the school could use because they were so cheap. We don't have enough money to have permanent trays, because of the cost to wash and louse them. I have two questions for anyone who can spend the tome to help; What can we use that's a cheap alternative, and where can i get information from studies directly so when i think about bringing it in frount of the school comittee I have some valid information to back me uo?? Thanks !
Any help would be great
Gianna
"This is a great initiative - regardless of where it started first - because there is zero negative impact on the consumer."
What?
200 of the "green" containers costs $48 versus $26 for the styro ones where I buy my restaurant supplies.
That will have to be passed on to people who buy take out food at my restaurant.
Living in San Francisco,
It's my opinion that this totally sucks. I know we're trying to make the world a better place, but this small step is just annoying. Good luck trying to contain anything with juices or sauce. I recently had one of these fall apart on my with my salisbury steak, mashed potatoes, mushrooms, and gravy soaking the thing into oblivion. Not cool.
Just one more thing to worry about. We have to use something inferior because of this. Uncalled for.
Palm trees destroying the ozone.
Whatever.
Despite the cost differences someone please confirm for me which product is more harmfull to the environnment, styrofoam or plastci, if it is simply trashed. I thought I remember reading quite some time ago that the decomposing of styrofoam is very harmful.
I'm all for helping out where we can but paper is not the way to go. They do not work. My food cannot be kept in these containers for long and most people won't try to recycle sauce soaked paper containers.
strangely enough i have ties to the manufacturing community with regards to polystyrene beads- the building blocks of this stuff. heres what i know- the environmental harm is more related to who's making it than what it is.
Firstly Styrofoam is not one of these containers, StyroFoam is the trade mark name for a particular type of foam made by Dow Chemical. Restaurant foam is high density polypropylene that more resembles shipping foam. If the foam is made in the USA it will conform to all EPA standards for emissions and chemical make up.
ie you can eat it and it wont give you cancer.
Moreover, its mostly recyclable and biodegradable to some extent. all Foam due its base chemical make up actually rots over time. Exposure to heat and sunlight degrades the heck out of it. Time is also an enemy as naturally the foam will break down on its own.
Now on the flip side most foam, containers cups and what not, are actually produced in china. and if its made in china it may or may not conform to anything. some foam containers from china are produced using the most hazardous chem's on the market. and there chem makeup is also insanely toxic. IE eat it or chew on enough of it and congrats you got cancer!... BUT granted they get away with this as theres no real testing body for the products, no joke. also its impossible to tell the good USA foam from a toxic china one, will look exactly the same, the killer is when you flip it over and read who makes it. if even thats listed at all. most cups will bear a logo, most food containers will not. unless there custom produced.
as for biodegradability as the toxic stuff degrades the chems from it will seap into the surrounding trash but it does break down into goo.
other than that i will have to say while it sounds like a nifty idea the reality is that SF's ban will probably only have an effect on SF and only minimally to the environment, as most of your "foam waste" is actually in the form of product packaging. individual Retail Receiving Boxes by the 10's of billions contain several blocks of this stuff per box. and thats not counting the foam thats in the product packing it self.
its like trying to sink an aircraft carrier using rocks, at best your scratching the paint.
It may seem arbitrary but polystyrene is the worst of them all from a health stantpoint. As for keeping this junk from piling up, it's all bad. I clipped this information from another site:
#6 PS (polystyrene): used in foam "clam-shell"-type containers, meat and bakery trays, and in its rigid form, clear take-out containers, some plastic cutlery and cups. Polystyrene may leach styrene into food it comes into contact with. A recent study in Environmental Health Perspectives concluded that some styrene compounds leaching from food containers are estrogenic (meaning they can disrupt normal hormonal functioning). Styrene is also considered a possible human carcinogen by the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer.
Hi all, I'm sorry every one seems to be getting on the wrong green train, Americans tend to do first and think later. Unfortunately yes, Portland did ban EPS for food first and it was a huge mistake, produced more trash and toxins than just leaving things alone, too bad they didn't invest tax money in developing a recycling system instead. Anyway, you can read and laugh about the facts on cascadiapolicy.org. EPS is very, very easy to recycle even with the food waste on it and is in demand, provides a profitable and sustainable business, see my website pcplastics.com. We had so much demand that we needed to build a bigger process! Our customers offer YOU a 10 pound carbon offset for every pound they buy and they save money!
Maybe include your local physics or chemistry teacher before making another mistake?
John Gogol
Portland, Oregon
Hi all, I'm sorry every one seems to be getting on the wrong green train, Americans tend to do first and think later. Unfortunately yes, Portland did ban EPS for food first and it was a huge mistake, produced more trash and toxins than just leaving things alone, too bad they didn't invest tax money in developing a recycling system instead. Anyway, you can read and laugh about the facts on cascadiapolicy.org. EPS is very, very easy to recycle even with the food waste on it and is in demand, provides a profitable and sustainable business, see my website pcplastics.com. We had so much demand that we needed to build a bigger process! Our customers offer YOU a 10 pound carbon offset for every pound they buy and they save money!
Maybe include your local physics or chemistry teacher before making another mistake?
John Gogol
Portland, Oregon