By Sagar Ram Rane 
California has taken a big step to control plastic pollution. Governor Gavin Newsom signed a new law on September 22, 2024 that will ban all plastic shopping bags at grocery store checkouts by 2026. This means that if you don’t bring your own reusable bag, you will only get paper bags at the checkout. Whatever plastic bags were used before (whether they were thin or thick bags), now both are being banned.
California previously tried to ban single-use plastic bags in 2014, but people were getting thicker plastic bags that are supposedly reusable. But the truth is that these bags are rarely reused or recycled and create more waste. According to the report, by 2022, plastic bag waste in California has increased to 231,072 tons.
The average life of a plastic bag is just 12 minutes and then it either goes to landfills or oceans. And from there it becomes microplastics, harms the environment, creates pollution that lasts for 1,000 years.
Environmental groups like Oceana have supported this law, they said that this ban is an important step in the fight against global plastic pollution. Now when this law is implemented in 2026, people will not be asked the question of “paper or plastic”, they will just have the option of buying reusable bags or using paper bags. This move will take California towards a cleaner and sustainable future (California Senate District 38)(ScrapMonster).
The goal of this new law is to reduce plastic waste and protect California from plastic pollution.