Plastic-Free tea bags: Which brands are and which aren’t?

Most of us tea-drinkers choose tea bags rather than tea leaves – 96% in fact. But are you aware that some tea bags actually contain plastic?

Several tea bag brands use polypropylene, a sealing plastic, to keep their tea bag from falling apart. This plastic is not recyclable or biodegradable. So, even when you put all your used tea bags in the food waste or compost heap, it can lead to plastic pollution, as not all of it will be broken down.

And that’s not the only problem, recent research from McGill University in Canada also found that some types of tea bag leak millions of plastic particles into our drinks not only from the sealing plastic but from the bag itself.

Scientists found that one plastic tea bag releases around 11.6 billion microplastics and 3.1 bollion smaller nanoplastic particles into the cup. The findings were published in the Journal of Environmental Science & Technology.

What are brands doing about it?

Based on the research done by Country Living , here is a list of brands with and without plastic in their tea bag (this information may have changed since the publication of the article)

Tea bags with plastic:

• Co-op
• PG Tips
• Tetley
• Twinings ‘heat-sealed’ and ‘string and tag’ ranges
• Yorkshire Tea
• Lidl own brand

Tea bags without plastic:

• Abel & Cole
• Clipper
• Pukka Herbs
• Teapigs
• Twinings pyramid range
• Waitrose Duchy range

Those without plastic, can be safely used in the compost pile or directly in the soil.

Go to https://www.countryliving.com/uk to read more about each brand and their efforts to replace the plastic in the tea bags completely.

Source: www.countryliving.com/uk