Across the United States, plastic straw bans are going into effect with California becoming the first state to ban plastic straws from restaurant tables, starting in 2019. According to Business Insider, in 2015, plastic consumption worldwide totaled 300 million metric tonnes. And while it may seem like a drinking straw is the least of our worries, environmentalists see the straw ban as a gateway "to help people start thinking about the global plastic pollution problem.