I don't know about you but I do re-use my plastic bags as garbage bags for my small garbage cans at home, I also use cloth bags when I shop.

So my question to you is paper, plastic or cloth bags?

Coming up on Jan. 23 a petition to ban single-use plastic bags, originally filed in 2013 by Rinaldo Del Gallo, will once again appear before councilors of Pittsfield.

This time, it has backing from the city's Green Commission, which also reviewed other policies adopted in some 60 Massachusetts municipalities and drafted an ordinance for the council's consideration.

One of the key issues surrounding plastic bags are that they take hundreds of years to degrade, and many are only used once.

Currently, seven other towns in the Berkshires have adopted bans on single-use plastic bags: Great Barrington, Williamstown, Stockbridge, Adams, Dalton, Lee and Lenox.

The Sierra Club says that, Plastic is versatile, lightweight, aerodynamic, inexpensive, and waterproof. These qualities explain why plastics can be found in such a wide variety of products we use every day.

Courtesy of YouTube/Sierra Club

Unfortunately, the flip side of these attributes cause major problems. Low cost leads to overuse.

Massachusetts residents are estimated to use more than 2 billion bags per year (about a bag per person per day). Lightweight leads to pervasive litter. This synthetic material does not biodegrade, which means it lasts forever in the environment, also in landfills.

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