Gov. Newsom signs California ban on all plastic grocery bags by 2026

All plastic shopping bags at California grocery stores will be banned by Jan. 1, 2026. Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law Sunday, Sept. 22, that will eliminate all plastic bags at grocery checkouts.

In 2014, the California Legislature passed a statewide ban on single-use plastic bags. However, shoppers were still able to purchase “thicker” plastic bags they could reuse. Advocacy groups said the law “needed a re-do.”

“Unsurprisingly, people were just not really reusing these,” Jenn Engstrom, the CalPIRG state director, said during an interview with CBS. “So we actually did a survey where we stood outside grocery stores and counted how many people walked into the store with one of these bags to re-use them and we found only 2% of the people we counted actually brought one of these bags back.”

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Environmental groups support the ban, while critics express concerns about consumer costs and excessive regulations.

State data shows per capita plastic bag trash increased from eight pounds in 2004 to 11 pounds in 2021, highlighting the growing problem. Despite previous efforts, California experienced a 47% increase in grocery and merchandise bag waste from 2016 to 2022, rising from just over 157,385 tons to 231,072 tons annually.

Coastal cleanup efforts have collected more than 300,000 plastic grocery bags in the last three decades.

Oceana, a nonprofit ocean conservation organization, emphasizes that plastic is deadly to ocean wildlife and threatens marine ecosystems.

Starting in 2026, California shoppers must bring reusable bags or purchase paper bags at checkout, typically costing between 10 to 25 cents each.

Twelve other states have implemented similar restrictions, indicating a growing national trend towards plastic bag bans.