Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Right--it's totally stupid not to pollute the bay because other people pollute it too.

It's also totally stupid to try to save gas or electricity, or limit auto pollution, or coal pollution, or any kind of pollution really, because other people are going to pollute anyway. So the hell with it.

I think you missed the point. As prior people pointed out , residential phosphate pollution accounts for 1%, so banning it was dumb. They probably couldn't find a way to ban the 99% so they just banned what they could and moved on thinking that it would look like they did something.

This is absolutely true. The ban started in the Pacific Northwest, because they didn't want to do anything about agricultural runoff, which is really the problem. The water quality in the region has not improved post-ban. Phosphates are not banned nationwide, as far as I know. That's why you can buy detergents with phosphates on line. The manufacturers just agreed to make no-phosphate detergents, so they don't have to manufacture different products for different regions. Is it better for the environment for detergents manufacturers to make detergents with a very minimal level of phosphates or have people add greater levels of phosphates themselves? Another case of good (or not so good) intentions totally backfiring.

Anonymous wrote:Right--it's totally stupid not to pollute the bay because other people pollute it too.

It's also totally stupid to try to save gas or electricity, or limit auto pollution, or coal pollution, or any kind of pollution really, because other people are going to pollute anyway. So the hell with it.

I think you missed the point. As prior people pointed out , residential phosphate pollution accounts for 1%, so banning it was dumb. They probably couldn't find a way to ban the 99% so they just banned what they could and moved on thinking that it would look like they did something.