Cotton Tote Bags – Waste, Politics, and the Environmental Crisis (Fall 2022) (2024)

FAQs

Are cotton tote bags bad for the environment? ›

When you pit plastic and cotton bags against each other one-to-one, it appears that cotton bags are in fact, less sustainable. Cotton bags require more material and more energy to create than a plastic shopping bag. However, you must consider how often cotton bags and plastic bags are used.

The Danish and U.K. studies and several others found that cotton totes have the worst environmental impacts of all bags. Cotton requires land, huge quantities of water, and chemical fertilizers and pesticides to grow. The use and production of fertilizer contribute significantly to eutrophication.

The Issue with Cotton Totes

It's also difficult to dispose of cotton totes once you're done with them. Many have logos or graphics printed on them with dyes that are PVC-based (aka polyvinyl chloride, a synthetic plastic polymer), which isn't recyclable. You also can't put them in your backyard compost heap.

The study estimated that a cotton tote bag's total carbon footprint was 598.6lb of CO2e. This compared to 3.48lb of CO2e for a standard plastic bag. That means that you would need to use the tote bag 172 times for every 1 time you used the plastic bag.

Runoff of pesticides, fertilizers, and minerals from cotton fields contaminates rivers, lakes, wetlands, and underground aquifers. These pollutants affect biodiversity directly by immediate toxicity or indirectly through long-term accumulation.

Canvas is a thick, durable fabric that's usually made from cotton or hemp. Cotton canvas requires a lot of water and energy to be produced, and non-organic cotton creates harmful pesticide pollution. However, reusable products like canvas bags help keep plastic out of landfills and oceans.

Biodegradable Sustainability

In addition, no harmful chemicals are released into the environment during decomposition, making jute bags a much more environmentally friendly choice than plastic bags. Cotton, on the other hand, takes between 6 months and 5 years to decompose, depending on the circ*mstances.

Cotton tote bags have a massive carbon footprint because of the energy and fertilizers used to produce cotton yarn (and this also applies to our clothes). However, you can reduce the negative impact by using organic cotton & canvas bags and reusing the bag as many times as possible.

How do tote bags save the environment? ›

The primary reason tote bags are good for the environment is that they reduce plastic waste. Plastic bags take hundreds of years to decompose and can cause significant harm to wildlife and ecosystems. Moreover, plastic bags take up a lot of space in landfills and are often not recycled properly.

Reusable shopping bags are typically washable and can be reused hundreds of times…but when they are ripped or unusable, they need to go in the landfill cart. Cotton or other cloth bags can be included with textiles in the Recycle More program.

Cotton is resilient and durable, becoming a good choice if you want products that can resist wear and tear; however, make sure you buy premium quality 100% cotton tote bags for daily uses and heavy carrying.

The verdict? A cotton tote bag needs to be used whopping 131 times to beat a plastic bag in the eco-friendliness department, according to the experts. But don't worry: if you happen to have a tote made from organic cotton or actual jute, you're in the clear. Jute requires far less water and chemicals than cotton.

Non-woven polypropylene bags use about the same amount of resources as 11 plastic bags so as long as you continue to use them more than that they are the most environmentally friendly bag.