Bag Monsters Take Over San Francisco This Thursday

This Thursday, San Francisco's Ghirardelli Square will play host to Andy Keller and his army of 100 bag monsters. The sack-clad clan hopes to raise awareness of California's plastic-bag usage, and encourage people to learn about the state legislature's vote to ban plastic bags, to happen on Aug. 14.

The "monsters" will be wearing 500 plastic bags each, representing the number each person uses per year. Keller plans to use Ghirardelli Square as a launching point for a national tour  on his three-wheeled Spyder motorcycle, continuing on to rally in 15 other cities that are considering a plastic-bag ban.

"Our goal is to further the awareness of the tremendous impact that plastic bags have on the environment," said Keller. "San Francisco appreciates the importance of banning plastic bags and we are confident that residents will come out to support us while we're at Ghirardelli Square, an iconic San Francisco landmark that has made significant strides with its green initiatives, on August 12."

According to Gina Goodhill, an advocate with Environment California, Californians use 19 billion plastic bags annually. "And all of those bags don't dissolve into the air or end up in landfills. Even worse, they land in the ocean, where many become part of the swirling mass of plastic garbage known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, which is the size of Texas, a swirling vortex of plastic and other waste that persists in the ocean and in some patches now outweighs the plankton in the water by a ratio of 6 to 1," said Goodhill.

Check out Keller's blog to follow his cross-country campaign.

--Kate Cleland