The picture shows a turtle with a plastic straw stuck in its nose (You can watch the video in full here). Every years hundreds of thousand plastic straws end up polluting the environment. Ecocycle estimate that 500 million straws are used in the US every day alone.
If you must have disposable straws, (and none of these great reusable options suit), then why not try these compostable ones made from cornstarch. They look and act just like plastic straws… but they are made from PLA cornstarch and are certified compostable.
Find out more about compostable plastic here.
You can buy them from Vegware. They do everything from black cocktail (1000 for 10.00) to jumbo smoothie.
I have seen paper straws on ebay but (as far as I know), they are not certified compostable and may be plastic lined. They certainly are plastic packed.
Any one know any more?
Composting
One type of certified compostable plastic is Poly Lactic Acid (PLA) plastic.
Some say that PLA plastics do not break down in home compost bins. THEY ARE WRONG. We have used and composted a number of PLA plastic products.
You can see the PLA products we have used here.
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Or you can try these reusable stainless steel beauties or glass straws.