Lake Tahoe has a plastic problem (see RGJ oped). The Tahoe Area Group of the Sierra Club believe that TRPA must enact ordinances to protect the health, safety, and welfare of the community, including the ability to protect and enhance the natural environment.

Several research studies done by the UC Davis, TERC, DRI, UNR, and Clean Up The Lake show that: 

• Most of the plastics come from food containers, bottles, plastic bags, toys, and other items deemed as uncategorized.
• Most of the chemicals found in these plastics are typical for plastic bags, foodware items, and toys.
• The highest amount of plastic in the lake came from popular beach sites.
• Clean Up the Lake’s 72 mile clean up picked up 25,281 lbs of litter with 1924.62 lbs of this being plastic making it the 4th most common item pulled from the lake.

Towns around the Tahoe are enacting ordinances to control plastic. For example, the City of South Lake Tahoe has implemented a single-use plastic water bottle ban and the Town of Truckee has a single-use plastic water bottle and a single-use foodware reduction ordinance which banned polystyrene foam and levied an extra charge for each disposable cup/takeout container. Businesses must provide reusable foodware for customers that dine in.

It is time that TRPA does the same in all the counties around the lake. A single use plastic ban should be implemented for the Lake Tahoe basin and only TRPA can do that. It would be difficult for Counties to enact bans in just the Basin.

The production and disposal of disposable food and beverage packaging has significant environmental impacts, including the contamination of the environment, the depletion of natural resources, use of non-renewable fossil fuels, and greenhouse gas emissions.

Food and beverage packaging makes up 25% of all waste produced in California and comprises most of the street litter. Disposable expanded polystyrene products and packaging are a distinctive concern because this type of litter is lightweight and can easily break down and spread into the natural environment.

Most disposable foodware is not recyclable after use. Reducing disposable packaging by eliminating unnecessary items and transitioning to reusable products provides greater environmental benefits than managing the products that become waste, even when recycled or composted.

It is in the interest of the health, safety, and welfare of all who live, work, and recreate in the Tahoe basin to reduce the amount of litter on public streets, parks, outdoor recreation areas, and other public spaces.

Due to the following: 

• The drinking water for many people around the lake is directly out the lake without filtration of any kind, leaving them vulnerable to the health effects noted in this article in the NYT;
• The production and disposal of single-use foodware has major environmental impacts, including street litter, water pollution, wildlife harm, depletion of resources, greenhouse gas emissions, and clean-up and end of life management costs; 
• Food and beverage packaging comprise approximately one quarter of California’s disposed waste stream annually, according to CalRecycle, and an estimated 67% of street litter, according to the Clean Water Fund;
• Expanded polystyrene products are of distinctive concern because they can break into small pieces and may easily be picked up by the wind even when they have been disposed of properly, making it extremely difficult to recover as litter, polluting the environment and waterways;
• Regulating the use of disposable foodware products will minimize greenhouse gas emissions from production, transportation, and packaging of those disposable products, maximize the operating life of landfills, and reduce impacts to the environment and wildlife;
• Reusable foodware products are more environmentally sound because their multiple uses reduce the upstream impacts per item, and can save businesses money; and
• Single-use foodware accessories, including napkins, straws, condiments, forks, spoons, sporks, knives and other disposable flatware create waste and environmental hazards

We ask that the following minimal standards be enacted:

1.  No single-use plastic water bottles are sold in the Lake Tahoe region.
2.  All single use polystyrene products are banned and are replaced with environmentally favorable products. No restaurant, retail store, food vendor, or other business or person shall sell, distribute, or provide to customers expanded polystyrene, including without limitation by selling food which is packaged partially or entirely in expanded polystyrene, nor shall any business purchase, obtain, keep, or otherwise use in its business any expanded polystyrene product.
3.  Prepared food served for consumption on the premises of a prepared food vendor shall only be served using reusable foodware.
4.  “Single-use foodware accessory” means single-use items provided along with ready-to-eat food, including without limitation napkins, forks, knives, spoons, sporks, chopsticks, condiment cups and packets, straws, stirrers, splash sticks, cocktail sticks, cup sleeves, and cup lids. 
5.  A restaurant or other food vendor shall not provide any single-use foodware accessory to a customer unless the single-use foodware is requested by the customer and it is a compostable product. 
6.  A food facility that offers standard condiments is encouraged to use bulk dispensers for the condiments rather than condiments packaged for single use. A single use condiment package may be available but only supplied at the request of a customer. 

Carolyn Willette

Tahoe Area Group Sierra Club Chair