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DOVER — Plastic grocery bags have been getting a bad rap. They're banned in San Francisco, taxed in Ireland, and were known derisively as the "national flower" in South Africa because so many littered the streets.

New Hampshire residents alone go through 74 million of the easy-to-produce but hard-to-dispose-of nonbiodegradable bags a year, according to one estimate.

Under pressure from environmental groups, grocery stores in recent years have moved to limit the use of plastic bags by selling reusable tote bags.

The trend has caught on — major grocery chains like Hannaford, Shaw's, Stop & Shop, and Market Basket, as well as independent stores like Fiddlehead Farms, now sell reusable bags.

"I love them," said Linda Hamilton, of Rochester, as she stood at the checkout counter of Fiddlehead Farms Tuesday morning, reusable bag in hand for her purchase of meat, vegetables, and bakery items.
Fiddlehead started selling $1.99 reusable bags a year ago. General Manager Thomas Dick said about 40 percent of customers now use them instead of paper or plastic.

"We feel they're more environmentally friendly," Dick said.

Reusable bags are by far the most environmentally conscious option over paper or plastic, according to Jenna Jambeck, of the University of New Hampshire's Environmental Research Group. She said that of the estimated 74 million plastic bags Granite Staters use annually, only a small percentage are recycled.

Plastic bags don't biodegrade, and while paper bags do, they require energy to recycle, Jambeck said. She added animals can get caught in plastic bags, and turtles sometimes mistake them for food and ingest them.

To encourage the use of reusable bags, several municipalities across the nation are considering bans or taxes on plastic grocery bags. Ireland instituted a plastic bag tax in 2002 and reported a 90 percent drop in their use. San Francisco banned them in 2007, becoming the first city in the U.S. to do so.
But a ban could have "unintended consequences," according to Jambeck. People use plastic bags to line trash containers, carry their lunch to work, and clean up after pets. A ban could force them to simply buy more bags at another location — an inconvenience that also may not result in a net decrease in plastic bag use, Jambeck said.

Further complicating things is some reusable bags are imported from China and made from #5 plastic, which isn't recycled as much in the U.S. as the #2 plastic that plastic grocery bags are made of.

"It's not a black-and-white issue. It has multiple layers of complexity," Jambeck said.

Jambeck said more research is needed on the costs and benefits of plastic bag bans.

New Hampshire doesn't have any pending legislation for the regulation of plastic bags.

Customers who purchase reusable bags are typically enthusiastic about the prospect of using them instead of plastic ones, but actually doing so is another thing.

Dover resident Michelle Spinazolla, who also shopped at Fiddlehead Tuesday morning, said it took her a few weeks to get used to them. She would forget them at home, or in the backseat of her car. Now she makes sure to place them in her passenger seat so they're in her view during trips to the store.

Fiddlehead clerk Irene Hunter said she often sees people run out of the checkout line to retrieve bags they forgot in their car.

As an incentive, some stores offer a 5- or 10-cent credit for each reuseable bag a customers brings when they shop. Dick, the Fiddlehead manager, said he usually gives out free bags to customers who spend more than $100 a visit. This Saturday, the store is giving away free bags filled with prizes during its annual Family Food Festival.

Fiddlehead, like other independent and chain grocery stores, still uses plastic for the majority of its sales. While those bags sometimes see a second life as trash liners or pet waste containers, reuseable bags remain the best option for the environment, according to Jambeck.

"From an environmental standpoint, it is black and white," she said