Now Whole Foods, which has pledged to eliminate plastic bags in all 270 stores by Earth Day, is selling a limited-edition GreeNYC cotton bag in 16 of its New York metropolitan region stores during the month of April at $11.99 a pop. It is the first of a series of cotton bags that will be introduced over each of the next several months by GreeNYC, the PlaNYC environmental campaign which features that lopsided 1970s-era bird (what kind of bird is it again?).

The article goes on to state that each year, the US requires 12 million barrels of oil to produce all these bags. Considering that the US consumes 20.9 million barrels a day (2005 CIA factbook estimate), 12 million barrels is a mere 0.15% of our annual consumption. Even if no one ever used plastic bags ever again, the amount of oil used wouldn't decrease even a quarter of a percent.

There are more effective ways to use less oil, if that's your goal, but they aren't hip and trendy like this and they require lifestyle changes.