A portion of the 2019 No Straw November patch donations will go to building awareness to petrochemical plants in the USA and to help support the fight of environmental activist Diane Wilson. In 1989, Diane was a shrimp boat captain in Calhoun County, Texas, and she saw an article saying that her county - Calhoun County, Texas - had the most toxic waste disposal of all counties in America. She began a campaign 30 years ago against Formosa Plastics and is still fighting for environmental justice against Formosa Plastics in the form of a lawsuit. In late June 2019, a judge determined that Formosa Plastics, a Taiwanese-owned company, has been in "enormous" violation of its state-issued permits and federal clean water laws for discharging plastic pellets and other pollutants into Lavaca Bay and other waterways from its plant in Point Comfort. A penalty phase hearing starts on October 28th with Formosa Plastics facing up to $184 million dollars in fines. Click here to read the article on the Formosa Plastics lawsuit.
Not only do I want to help build awareness to what's been going on for decades in Calhoun County, Texas, I'm hoping to build awareness to a new Formosa Plastics plant from building in Louisiana where plastic has the potential to flow into the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico, creating more environmental disaster and endangering people and marine life. Click here to read the Center for Biological Diversity's September 10th press release about the Formosa Plant in Baton Rouge. #StopFormosa.
You might be asking how the Formosa Plant ties into No Straw November. No Straw November originated on the thought that one small change can make a difference help build awareness to single-use plastic. When tackling single-use plastic pollution, the plastic straw is easy to eliminate for most people. The idea was that people would start looking at other options to eliminate single-use plastic from their daily life. Formosa Plastics is a plastic producing factory and they have a documented history of failing to protect our environment. Enough is enough! Please spread the awareness that we don't need more petrochemical companies if they cannot follow laws written to protect all of Earth's children.
Plastic straws are one of the main ocean plastic polluters, help us change that! The goal of "No Straw November" is to bring awareness to the many plastic straws that are being used once and then thrown away in a single month. Jr Ocean Guardians challenges you to refuse plastic straws the whole month of November and to keep a tally of how many straws you eliminated from potentially ending up in the ocean. Please share this challenge with others and use the hashtag #NoStrawNovember.
We understand that plastic straws are medically vital to some. At Jr Ocean Guardians we do not condone shaming of those who rely on straws.
For more information, click here.