Starbucks says to phase out plastic straws by 2020

Global coffee giant Starbucks announced Monday it is to eliminate all plastic straws from its 28,000 stores by 2020, becoming the latest corporate giant to take steps to combat pollution from disposable plastic.

After months of tests, many of them carried out in Britain, the firm announced the news on Twitter.

The plastic straws will be replaced by recyclable lids that have a small raised opening allowing consumers to sip their drink, a model that has already been road tested on some of the company’s cold beverages in the US and Canada.

Plastic straws have proven difficult to recycle, not because of the material they are made from but because they are too slim for recycling production lines to effectively sort through. The new lids, made of polypropylene, will be big enough for machines to recycle, Starbucks said.