{"id":113959,"date":"2015-03-12T19:34:20","date_gmt":"2015-03-13T01:34:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/beauty-and-the-beads\/"},"modified":"2015-03-12T19:34:20","modified_gmt":"2015-03-13T01:34:20","slug":"beauty-and-the-beads","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/beauty-and-the-beads\/","title":{"rendered":"Beauty and the beads"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"In
In this 2012 file photo provided by 5gyres.org, a sample of \u201cmicrobeads\u201d is shown.<\/span>Courtesy of 5gyres.org, Carolyn Box, via Associated Press<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

DENVER \u2013 The Colorado Senate this week gave initial approval to a measure that would ban tiny bits of plastic used in personal-care products.<\/p>\n

Known as \u201cmicrobeads,\u201d the plastic is included in soaps and cosmetic products to be used as an exfoliator. But studies found that the beads have made their way through water-filtration systems, ending up in rivers and other water sources.<\/p>\n

Concerns have grown that the tiny particles can end up being consumed by fish, or even humans.<\/p>\n

\u201cThose water utilities in Colorado have to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars each year to make sure that the drinking water is safe and that the water that\u2019s put back for farmers and other folks downstream is also safe,\u201d said Sen. Beth Martinez Humenik, R-Thornton.<\/p>\n

Sen. Larry Crowder, R-Alamosa, also supported the bill, but joked that he worried that the ban would impact a woman\u2019s beauty.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wrestled with this bill harder than any other bill I\u2019ve had to date,\u201d Crowder said. \u201cThe very idea of our facial cream, if the ladies had to give the beads up, would that affect the beauty of the ladies in which we deal with on a daily basis? I say, my fellow Americans, I was assured that it would not. So, therefore I will be a \u2018yes\u2019 vote on this. \u2026 I hope this is the right vote because I want the ladies to stay pretty.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lawmakers who were expecting a fight on the measure found that producers such as Johnson & Johnson actually support the ban and have committed to phasing out microbeads even without government regulation. Companies are replacing the tiny plastic particles with biodegradable exfoliators.<\/p>\n

Still, state lawmakers are moving forward with the ban, which would eliminate the products in Colorado by 2020. Fines as high as $10,000 have been proposed.<\/p>\n

The Senate is poised to give final approval to the bill as early as Wednesday. If it passes, then the measure would be sent to the governor for his signature.<\/p>\n

A handful of Republicans objected to the measure, suggesting that the legislation is \u201cmuch ado about nothing,\u201d adding that the companies are regulating themselves without government intervention.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe scope of this \u2026 (is) microscopic,\u201d said Sen. Kevin Lundberg, R-Berthoud. \u201cNot just that these are small beads, but if you consider the literally billions of gallons of water that the water-treatment plants deal with, we are talking about a very tiny fraction \u2026 of what\u2019s really being dealt with here.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Colorado Senate moves to ban \u2018microbeads\u2019 from soaps, exfoliators<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":113960,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5843],"tags":[94,15,13,167],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-113959","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-living","tag-colorado-state-government","tag-colorado-state-senate","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-local-news-lead"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113959","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=113959"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113959\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/113960"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=113959"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=113959"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=113959"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=113959"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}