The big problem with dog poop bags

We have already managed to reduce the number of plastic bags we use when we go to buy food, but have you considered how many bags you use to collect your furry dog's excrement??? An average dog uses between 2-3 bags of excrement per day, this means about 90 bags per month and almost 1,100 bags per year. If the average life expectancy of a dog today is between 10 and 13 years, that is between 11,000 and 14,000 bags throughout its life that, in the best of cases, end up in the trash. It is estimated that 97% of these bags are conventional plastic , non-biodegradable and made from petroleum. Furthermore, many end up abandoned in nature; in parks, forests or other green areas; hidden among bushes, in rivers, lakes,... where it is even more difficult to collect them for correct processing. These bags take hundreds of years to degrade and break down easily outdoors due to their low thickness. This increases the problem of microplastics in the ecosystem and has a great ecological impact. The use of biodegradable and compostable bags would reduce this problem , although you should never abandon your furry dog's excrement in inappropriate places as they may contain eggs or larvae of parasites that also harm the local fauna. If these bags are also made from renewable raw materials such as corn starch, by-products from paper manufacturing, etc. that reuse leftovers from other industrial or livestock activities, the savings in CO ₂ and oil for their production are much greater. When talking about compostable bags we must keep in mind that they must be compostable under real conditions , not requiring an industrial composting plant for this. The energy expenditure invested in these plants reaching the 70°C necessary to process certain “compostable” bags. Ideally, the bags should be compostable at between 20 and 30°C, with oxidation and hydrolysis of the materials occurring at this temperature until they become H ₂ O, CO ₂ , mineral salts and biomass. This way they can be composted at home or disposed of in the brown (organic) container so that they are processed correctly. Furthermore, if they end up in nature, they can degrade within a few years and without the production of microplastics. But what other options are there to conventional plastic and what drawbacks do they have compared to biodegradable and compostable bags ?

• Recycled plastic : Manufactured from existing conventional plastics. Although their use can lead to considerable savings in CO ₂ production, they continue to generate microplastics when they degrade.
• Bioplastic : These are plastics made from renewable materials, so the savings in CO ₂ can be up to 70% compared to conventional plastics. But they are still not biodegradable and their decomposition is as slow as that of conventional plastics.
• OXO Plastics : These are plastics made from conventional plastic and metal salts. They are biodegradable but have been banned in the European Union since this year, 2021, since although they were sold as an ecological option, the production of microplastics resulting from their degradation was equal to that of conventional plastic.
• Polyvinyl alcohol bioplastics : They are soluble in water, which reduces their ecological impact. The problem with these bags is that they are difficult to transport since they fall apart in rain or sweat. In addition, once full, feces can also partially dissolve the bag causing leaks and bad odor.
• Paper : They are clearly biodegradable, but they involve a large expenditure of raw materials and have the same problem as polyvinyl alcohol bioplastics in terms of humidity.

Trying to help with this problem that concerns us all, at CRU we bring an option of biodegradable and compostable excrement bags. The lives of furry ones will be better if we all do a little bit of our part. Share: