When I wrote about a clothing company that has removed 1,000,000 lbs of trash from our waterways, some commenters argued that it was a band-aid solution.
We need to stop producing the trash in the first place.
They were right, of course. While I don't see it as an either/or question—we can remove trash from rivers AND work to eradicate it at source—we do need to focus much more of our energy upstream. Until recently, however, that felt very much like an uphill battle. As we've noted already, however, the tide does seem to be shifting on this issue. And it's encouraging to see the momentum on ending plastic waste continuing, with the UK making a particularly concerted efforts.
Among the latest announcements from my homeland that are worthy of note:
—London City Airport is ditching plastic straws from all of its restaurants.
—NorthLink Ferries is ditching plastic straws for paper ones, and also looking at replacing plastic bags, cups, plates and sauce sachets too.
—A whole host of restaurant chains including Rick Stein's Fish, JD Wetherspoons and Costa Coffee are all getting rid of straws.
—Costa Coffee is also teaming up, by the way, with water utilities to offer free drinking water refills at its 3,000 high street coffee shops as part of a broader nationwide drinking water refill network.
Let's hope these are signs of even bigger, more ambitious efforts to come.
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