Representative Ted Koffman, a Democrat and co-chairman of the Legislature’s Natural Resources Committee has a mission, to decrease the amount of plastics used and disposed of in the State of Maine. Everything from plastic shopping bags to plastic diapers is up for debate.

Mr. Koffman, has a long up-hill battle, although Maine and is a rather progressive place, getting people to change habits is almost impossible. Well almost – enter legislation. San Francisco banned plastic shopping bags and banned City departments from purchasing bottle water, Denmark charges a fee on plastic bags and even Boston and London are on track to adopt similar legislation. So at least Maine is not alone.

Plastic is among my top ten worst overused materials. It is nasty to produced, can be found in every body of water across the country and has the potential to be cancer causing. Mr. Koffman had this to say,

“if we can’t stop using oil to make grocery bags when there are alternatives, how will we ever stop using it to fuel our cars and heat our homes?”

Good Question. Do your part - use glass water bottles instead of plastic, use cloth bags and cloth diapers, avoid products and especially produce with plastic packaging.