Guest Commentary

To stimulate discussion and debate, Coastal Review welcomes differing viewpoints on topical coastal issues.

For the past two weekends, I spent hours pickling okra and beets in the same sturdy glass jars my grandmother once reused season after season. As Granny Jean liked to say, “A good Mason jar never goes out of style.”

Today, that tradition of reuse has been replaced by a throwaway economy built around single-use plastic. If you want to appreciate the sheer absurdity of single-use plastic, try keeping count of every piece of plastic that passes through your hands on a random day. I did it once, and it was eye-opening.

You wake up, use toothpaste out of a plastic tube, squeeze shampoo out of a plastic bottle, pump hand soap from a disposable container, tear open a plastic seal on a coffee bag, and pop a plastic cap off a milk carton, all before 8 a.m. Exhausting just to read, isn’t it? Yet, every day, we use a material — refined from fossil fuels and engineered at a molecular level to last for years and years — for mere seconds, throw it in a bin, and treat it as if it just vanishes.

It doesn’t vanish. Approximately 40% of the plastic produced worldwide each year is for single-use plastic and packaging. Less than 6% of plastic waste in the United States gets recycled, leaving the rest to clog landfills, burn in incinerators, or drift down our waterways. Once in our environment, large plastic packaging bakes in the sun, gets battered by wind and waves, and breaks up into microplastics and nanoplastics. These tiny fragments flood our rivers, seep into our estuaries, and contaminate our drinking water.

The physical toll on marine wildlife is severe. An Oceana evaluation documented nearly 1,800 marine mammals and sea turtles that had swallowed or become entangled in plastic debris in U.S. waters between 2009 and early 2020, the vast majority from species listed as endangered or threatened under the Endangered Species Act. Even when ingestion isn’t immediately fatal, plastic can block digestive systems, suppress reproductive hormones, and leave marine life vulnerable to disease.

Continuing down this path comes with a staggering price tag. A landmark report from the Nicholas Institute for Energy, Environment & Sustainability at Duke University found that the “social cost” of plastic to the United States, including healthcare expenses, environmental cleanup, and lost productivity, reaches up to $1.1 trillion annually. Between microplastics contaminating our local waterways and toxic additives in packaging, single-use plastics aren’t cheap; their true costs are quietly passed on to American consumers.

It’s easy to look at the sheer scale of the problem and feel like we’re trapped in a cycle of waste. But we don’t have to live like this. Before plastics dominated the market, people relied on a system built around durable, long-lasting materials and repeat use, just like Granny Jean.

The nostalgic comeback of reuse and refill

Throughout the early to mid-20th century, glass and metal were the gold standards for everyday packaging. Milk bottles and other containers for household staples were routinely returned to local producers, sanitized, refilled, and sent right back to consumers.

Returnable commercial packaging operates on that exact same principle, and it’s making a comeback.

Across North Carolina, we are already seeing reuse systems begin to resurface. On college campuses, dining centers use returnable container systems for meals to eliminate thousands of disposable boxes every semester. Local craft breweries from Wilmington to Asheville have long relied on refillable growler stations, while a growing number of refill shops are bringing the same approach to everyday products like soaps, cleaners, and shampoos.

Because these products require far fewer raw materials and water throughout their operational lifespan, they offer a sensible, profitable path forward. Global economic projections indicate that replacing just 20% of single-use plastic packaging with reusable infrastructure represents a $10 billion business opportunity with major cost-saving benefits for consumers.

Coastal Carolinians have long been ready to address this issue locally. Years ago, Dare County successfully demonstrated that businesses and residents could adapt to a plastic bag phase-out along the Outer Banks to protect their home waters. However, local momentum was forcibly halted when language tucked into a previous state budget effectively handcuffed our cities and towns, barring local governments from enacting ordinances to curb single-use containers and retail packaging.

Phasing out single-use plastic isn’t speculative theory: 15 states and more than 400 counties and cities across the country have already enacted policies to tackle this issue. However, state and local actions alone cannot build out the large-scale system needed to make reuse an accessible option for every business.

Federal action naturally complements the groundswell of local momentum. National infrastructure can make returnable packaging and refillable products viable everywhere.

A pragmatic, bipartisan path forward

Fortunately, the public is ready for a change, and lawmakers are beginning to catch on. According to a nationwide poll conducted for Oceana in 2024 by the nonpartisan polling company Ipsos, 85% of registered U.S. voters support increasing the use of reusable packaging and foodware, while 88% express concern about microplastics in our food, water, and bodies.

Congress has an opportunity to help scale these solutions nationwide through bipartisan legislation like the Research for Environmental Uses and Sustainable Economies (REUSE) Act (House Resolution 7370, Senate Resolution 2110).

The REUSE Act takes pragmatic, evidence-based approach to the plastics problem: it would direct the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to create a report on reuse and refill systems in the U.S in various sectors, such as consumer packaging, personal care products, and wholesale shipping of retail goods. The study would explore viable reuse and refill strategies, the potential of this sector to create jobs, and barriers to implementing reuse and refill infrastructure.

By requiring the EPA to deliver a report within two years after the bill is enacted, the REUSE Act is an opportunity to highlight and expand proven solutions to the plastic pollution crisis. The U.S. Senate has already passed the REUSE Act, and this fall, the House of Representatives must follow suit.

As I sat in my kitchen listening to the satisfying pop of those Mason jar lids sealing one by one, with fingers tightly crossed in hopes that my very first solo batch of pickled okra is actually edible, it hit me just how natural reuse really is. We don’t need to reinvent the wheel to protect our coastal waters and human health; we just need to nationally implement systems that last. Supporting the bipartisan REUSE Act is a straightforward, commonsense step toward building a future that values durability, protects our health, and leaves the throwaway economy behind.

Take action for our coast

Our elected officials need to know that coastal North Carolinians expect plastic-free waters and healthy ecosystems:

• Contact Your Lawmakers: Call or write your U.S. Representatives and urge them to cosponsor the bipartisan REUSE Act.
• Join the Movement: Sign the petition to help reduce plastic pollution in our ocean.

Guest Commentary

To stimulate discussion and debate, Coastal Review welcomes differing viewpoints on topical coastal issues.

When I was a little kid, my aunt used to point to the foam washing up on the beach and tell me it was whale poop. I wasn’t sure I believed her. I kept a cautious distance from the foam, just in case, but the idea stuck with me.

Sea foam, of course, isn’t whale poop. She knew that. But years later, I learned that my aunt wasn’t entirely off in spirit: Whales really are ecosystem giants, fertilizing the sea and fueling the plankton blooms that support everything from the fish we catch to the oxygen we breathe. Remembering that early sense of wonder now, it’s impossible for me to look at the decline of one species, the North Atlantic right whale, with anything but urgency.

These gentle giants called our North Carolina waters home long before our coastal towns had names. Today, though, these critically endangered whales are facing a crisis they can’t outswim — and a recent move by the federal government threatens to make a dire situation even worse.

Lethal cost of speed

On March 4, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) issued an advance notice that it is considering deregulating the very rules designed to protect these endangered whales from boat strikes.

North Atlantic right whales are particularly vulnerable to ship strikes. They spend long periods near the surface, and they are hard to spot because they are dark in color and lack a dorsal fin.

The problem is simple but deadly: The faster a vessel is moving, the greater the chance that a collision will injure or kill a whale. Even a strike from a midsize boat can be fatal. And these impacts can be dangerous and devastating to boaters as well, including sinking boats and injuring passengers and crew.

That’s why in 2008, NOAA issued the Vessel Speed Rule. It established two types of management tools to slow large boats and protect North Atlantic right whales from boat strikes. First, the rule required boats 65 feet or longer to slow down to 10 knots in Seasonal Management Areas (SMAs) where North Atlantic right whales are expected to be present. Second, the rule established a voluntary speed limit of 10 knots in Dynamic Management Areas (DMAs), which are triggered by North Atlantic right whale sightings and acoustic detections. Off North Carolina, the SMA near Cape Fear is active from Nov. 1 through April 30 — the months when North Atlantic right whales migrate through our waters on their way to calving grounds farther south. The rule was designed to reduce the risk of collisions. Studies suggest boats traveling under 10 knots are less likely to kill North Atlantic right whales should they collide.

These seasonal protections cover a narrow window of time, but they align with when whales are expected or detected, and they remain one of the few safeguards the species has as it moves through some of the busiest shipping and recreational boating corridors on the East Coast. It’s a proven strategy. It works.

Mirage of technology vs. proven solution

Despite this, NOAA’s recent notice suggests that mandatory speed limits could be replaced with “advanced, technology‑based, strike‑avoidance measures.” While innovation is welcome, there is currently no technology proven to protect these whales at the scale and speed of East Coast boat traffic.

Relying on unproven technology while weakening mandatory speed limits is like removing a school zone speed limit because we hope one day cars will have better sensors. The only practical, proven, and scalable measure to protect right whales, particularly when they are migrating with their new calves, is the Vessel Speed Rule.

There are plenty of ways to strengthen the rule now, including updating the times and areas of speed zones to align with the whales predicted path today – not what it was in 2008, all speed zones mandatory, and including smaller boats in the protections. But to weaken or eliminate it all together will only hasten this species’ extinction. We cannot take away one of their best chance of survival.

More than just a whale: an ecosystem giant

The case for protecting right whales isn’t only about compassion for an endangered species. It’s also about safeguarding the health of the Atlantic. North Atlantic right whales act as ocean engineers, cycling nutrients as they migrate along the East Coast, which fuels the growth of phytoplankton, or plant-like organisms in the ocean.

When I think back to those childhood days on the beach with my aunt, I’m pretty sure she wasn’t trying to teach me anything profound about the ocean. She was probably just teasing me, the way adults do with kids who take everything a little too seriously. But the joke stuck, and so did the feeling that the ocean was full of mysteries bigger than I could understand.

Now, years later, I know that whales really do shape the ocean in ways that are just as surprising as anything she could have made up.  Losing them would mean losing far more than a species. It would mean losing a piece of the ocean that shaped us — the same ocean where I learned wonder, caution, and responsibility long before I had the words for any of it.

We have a choice now. We can let the North Atlantic right whale slip quietly into memory, or we can act with the urgency this moment demands. Defending and strengthening the Vessel Speed Rule is one of the simplest, most effective steps we can take to protect these whales and the ecosystem they support.

My aunt may have been wrong about the foam, but she wasn’t wrong about the ocean. Everything out there is connected — and right now, the North Atlantic right whales are depending on us.

Opinions expressed by the authors are not necessarily those of Coastal Review or our publisher, the North Carolina Coastal Federation.