How Many Plastic Bags do we Use Each Year?
I was quite amazed to read the figures about how many plastic bags are used around the world each year. Actual numbers can only be estimates, but either way you look at it, we’re using a hell of a lot of plastic bags these days. One can only wonder about the damage this is doing to the natural environment.
Also, the figures vary depending on the source, but here are some figures I’ve seen from various sources.
A common estimate is that global consumption of plastic bags is over 500 billion plastic bags annually. Yes that’s 500,000,000,000 plastic bags used per year. In other words, that’s almost 1 million plastic bags used per minute.
As if that’s not enough, some environmental groups have estimated that up to 1 trillion plastic bags are used worldwide each year. Now, depending on your definition of the word “trillion”, that would be either 1,000,000,000,000 plastic bags or 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 plastic bags each year!
For arguments sake, let’s say it’s somewhere between 5 billion and a trillion plastic bags per year.
That’s a lot of plastic bags.
Tags: environment, plastic bags
January 25th, 2008 at 10:24 pm
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April 4th, 2008 at 7:44 am
[...] the sheer number of plastic bags being used around the world each year and their impact on the environment, it’s great to see a major store like IKEA setting an [...]
October 11th, 2008 at 4:14 am
[...] we’ll need to figure out how to get rid of the other 999,999,991,000,000,000 plastic bags that we use each year!Wal-Mart to Reduce Plastic Bag Waste by 33 [...]
December 5th, 2008 at 8:28 am
i think going green is importent very importent
June 15th, 2009 at 2:39 am
OMG! how many do we use a year?!?!
that stupid we are very silly people
shame on the world!
humph made me mardy now.
June 18th, 2009 at 5:09 am
is this information about world wide orjust in Australia??
:S
June 19th, 2009 at 4:57 am
This is world wide.
July 13th, 2009 at 7:18 am
Trillion is 1,000,000,000,000
Trillian is 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 aka quintillion
They’re not the same word, so it’s not depending on one’s definition.
If we can have manufacturers that keep up with 1,000,000 bags per minute usage, then how big are those plants anyway? And why aren’t we running out of resources more quickly? And these are estimates.
Most of you people here are probably too young (or too forgetful) to remember a time when the people shoving green down your throats were the same people that said we needed to begin using plastic bags nearly 30 years ago, because it would save the trees and would be “green.”
Effing bunch of hypocrites.
July 13th, 2009 at 10:31 pm
Actually, the word “trillion” does depend on one’s definition - depending on where you live.
According to the dictionary, a trillion is:
“a cardinal number represented in the U.S. by 1 followed by 12 zeros, and in Great Britain by 1 followed by 18 zeros.”
October 1st, 2009 at 1:35 pm
That’s horrific! I have a website, http://www.freewebs.com/igetgreen about going green and saving the envirnoment. Please check it out and save the earth!
February 1st, 2010 at 8:30 am
we are horrible to this world
May 2nd, 2010 at 2:26 pm
would love to see some references on this.
June 9th, 2010 at 9:11 pm
good article
June 24th, 2010 at 7:21 pm
I think this is a good theme article .
In fact , wo should do our best to make out environment better.
June 30th, 2010 at 2:26 am
There is one world , we should do our best to protect it !
July 19th, 2010 at 5:42 am
I bookmarked your blog, thanks for sharing this very interesting post
September 3rd, 2010 at 2:07 pm
Ian must have a very old dictionary.
When I were a lad in the 1950s an English billion was a million million 1,000,000,000,000. But the American billion has taken over and in UK a billion now means 1,000,000,000. So when the Government talk about governmebt borrowing of £160bn they mean 160,000,000,000.
How big is a billion? Best way of grasping it is think of a million pound house, then think how much it would cost to buy 1,000 of them. Answer, £1bn. And a million houses would cost you £1trillion.
Similarly, mid 20th century and English trillion was a million million million 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 but here too the American billion is now what we mean when we say a trillion: 1,000,000,000,000.
1 trillion plastic bags (1,000,000,000,000) is only twice as many as 500,000,000,000 (500 billion) plastic bags.
But a much more revealing question is how many barrels of oil does it take to make that many plastic bags, and what percentage a annual oil production does that represent?
Actually if you really want to be green forget about tiny irrelevances like plastic bags. The greenest thing we, the human race, can do is have fewer children.
September 3rd, 2010 at 2:09 pm
Oops typo: shoudl be “Similarly, mid 20th century and English trillion was a million million million 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 but here too the American trillion is now what we mean when we say a trillion: 1,000,000,000,000.
September 3rd, 2010 at 8:00 pm
Thanks for the explanation Mike!
I have again checked my dictionary (didn’t think it was THAT old!), and also several online dictionaries and resources. While not all dictionaries state what you’ve explained, some do (kind of). So I concur with your statement.
Still, my post still stands. The word trillion is still subject to one’s definition, depending on whether you’re in a long scale country or short scale country:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trillion
and
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_and_short_scales
It appears that UK used to be a long scale country but is now a short scale country…
Maybe I should change the title of the post to “What is the definition of the word Trillion?”!
September 6th, 2010 at 4:24 am
our earth is finite, so we should protect it with our hearts
December 27th, 2010 at 10:03 am
I have a solution to recycle plastic if you want to know contact me
January 4th, 2011 at 5:14 am
I was posting on my blog a news report about Italy’s ban of plastic bags. I make a reference to your blog in my posting. Found it by Google. Thanks for helping this planet. Keep up the good work.
gdw
January 19th, 2011 at 6:32 pm
these are all big fat lies. paper bags are reused 100 % of the time !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
January 26th, 2011 at 1:50 am
Oh my word just trying to grasp a billion is hard enough now you want to bring in the word or number trillion I don’t think anyone has seen what a trillion anything thing is, but if thats what we are using around the world things have to change, people have to get in the habit of recycling no matter what. It just takes 7 days to start a habit and this can become a good one to have.
March 29th, 2011 at 1:02 am
Really good point, i couldn’t believe my eyes wheni saw all the zeros. Wow.
April 22nd, 2011 at 10:48 am
THIS IS SERIOUS WE BETTER STOP
April 22nd, 2011 at 10:49 am
TODAY IS EARTH DAY
July 22nd, 2011 at 1:07 pm
I think in U.A.E. People are using Most no of Plastic Bags. & NOT re use also.
September 29th, 2011 at 8:03 am
using cloth bags or reusable bags is the best option and if each person uses them then it can prevent 1000s of plastic bags from being produced.
December 27th, 2011 at 6:09 am
if the enviornment is damaged then michael jackson’s song earth song is needed
March 27th, 2012 at 5:29 am
Cool fact. Sorry I copied u but hey look at the bright side. More people will know about it and you can (maybe) be famous for doing that! Cool Fact (serious).
March 27th, 2012 at 5:36 am
I think I spelled my name wrong at my last comment. Cool Fact.
March 27th, 2012 at 5:39 am
Shame on the world (not u. Or anyone that is trying to save it).
:(
May 4th, 2012 at 2:10 pm
oh we are so mean to the earth. shame on humans
June 7th, 2012 at 7:54 pm
humans suck!!!!! we are soooooo cruel to earth
August 24th, 2012 at 3:15 am
hereafter i won’t use plastics. i would also advice everyone to do the same