Good Intentions...

A slightly different post this week, inspired by three recent government actions that, while born of good intentions, probably needed more upfront thought.

The first is New Jersey’s plastic bag ban. For those of you outside the state, or somehow in NJ but unaware, the state banned “single-use” plastic bags as well as paper bags in all stores of certain size. The law was passed 18 months prior to implementation. With that lead time, one would expect a smooth transition with systems in place at the store and government level. Quite the opposite occurred with stores scrambling at the last minute to implement plans and the government doing nothing to anticipate potential issues with the ban.

We use Shop Rite’s shop from home service, place our orders via the local store’s website, and pickup our groceries at the store – resulting in 4-8 new “reusable” bags EVERY week. Previously we got 6-12 plastic bags each week but those were great for cat litter bags and for our small garbage cans. And when we had an overload, we dropped them in a bag recycling bin at a local store. Can’t do that with these cloth bags, and once we had 6 or so for each vehicle (so we could use them when we shopped in person) we didn’t need any more. For you purists, yes, we could volunteer to bag our own groceries upon pickup, but that kind of defeats the whole purpose of “shop from home”.

Even with that 18-month lead time there is not a single store, company, or government agency with a recycling process to clean the bags and put them back into circulation – thus making them truly reusable. The excess bags can be dropped into clothing recycling bins, likely to be shredded into rags, but otherwise are just taking up space. I wonder if anyone calculated the energy and resource costs for these excess bags vs the evil plastic ones they replace. My guess is that when everything is totaled up, we are doing more damage with the cloth bags, at least until there is a viable way to keep them ALL in use and out of landfills.

Another unanticipated consequence is people stealing those nifty plastic shopping baskets instead of bringing bags to the store. Thefts are so prevalent that some supermarkets are eliminating the convenience altogether. Once again showing how a few idiots can ruin things for the rest of us. But seriously, did no one see that coming?

Last week two things occurred that emphasize my points above. First, an article in our local paper – yes, we still read a real newspaper – reported that NJ is now considering allowing paper bags to alleviate the fast-growing glut of “reusable” bags in people’s homes. But still no serious talk of getting them back into circulation to reduce the number of new bags needed. Next, I saw a dozen or so of those “reusable” bags tumble from our neighbor’s garbage can into the back of the trash truck on garbage day.

The second well-intentioned government action is California’s ban on gas powered vehicles by 2030. This one was timed perfectly as just days after announcing the landmark law, state residents were warned not to charge their electric vehicles over the Labor Day holiday weekend due to power grid limitations during a heat wave. So, the power grid can’t handle the current load and the government wants to add to it with no real plan to expand capacity – genius.

How much will it cost to upgrade the power gird, what sources will be used to provide all the required electricity, and even if it is from “green” energy what will the impact be to the environment for all the new clean energy producing devices? What does the cost/benefit analysis look like?

What about all the batteries that will need to be disposed of and replaced – at least until battery technology improves. Toxic waste in convenient plastic and metal containers. That doesn’t even touch on the cost and feasibility of placing enough chargers to accommodate all the travelers who will need to recharge enroute due to limited battery ranges. And how will those batteries hold up sitting in LA traffic for hours with the a/c blasting? Better get those electric tow trucks ready.

A third well-intentioned but at this point not yet fully thought-out idea is New Jersey’s Master Plan calling for 100% clean energy by 2050. Natural gas appliances and oil burning furnaces would be banned. The state would be all electric.

Sounds good on paper but how will it work? Requiring retrofitting to existing homes and businesses will be out of financial reach for most. If only required when selling a home or business, how does the seller get government funding, or is he/she expected to shell out of pocket? State agencies won’t release the projected costs or impact details, let alone discuss proposed government-sponsored programs to pay for all this.

Next, where will all the electricity come from? The power grid will need significant upgrading to handle the exponential increase in load. All the same questions above for CA apply here in NJ. And what is the environmental and economic impact of such expansion? What’s the payback period and what happens when the power goes out due to one of the increasingly strong storms NJ gets hit with more and more often?

Electric on-demand water heaters sound great, but in a power failure there’s no hot water. At least with a gas water heater, hot water is available. That and our gas stove saved us during 10 days without power after Sandy hit. With hot water, the ability to cook food, and our fireplace, we were able to ride it out in our house. I had been thinking of replacing our aging water heater with a tankless electric model but that experience changed my mind.

There is also the need for heat in winter, and without gas or oil, we would be forced to rely on electric heat pumps. These are far less efficient and effective than gas furnaces or oil burners during extreme cold – like February in northern NJ. This would mean they would run longer, thus using even more electricity. And with the increasing occurrence and ferocity of storms across the region wouldn’t it be ironic if homes needed gas generators to provide the needed electricity when the power gets knocked out.

Please don’t take the above for an anti-green tirade. I am all for protecting the environment and combating climate change (for those of you still in doubt, it IS real). However, too often, ideas that are popular are implemented without deep analysis of the impact they will have in the long term. On the surface these 3 examples appear as viable solutions (and they may yet be proven to be) but taking a closer look at the wide-ranging impact of these programs, their real-world worth comes into question. The next time you hear someone talking about a well-intentioned plan, ask a lot of questions about how that plan will be implemented and what the long-term benefits and consequences really are. Force them to fully think through the impact before their good intentions lead to a potentially bad policy.

Note: If any of you have additional information that would clarify or correct any of the above, please let me know.

www.RetiredandInspiredat55.com 9-19-2022