Many of today's top celebrities are hopping on the "green" bandwagon and are using accessories to show it. Several hot young celebrities have been spotted shopping with reusable shopping bags and purchasing organic goods.

It's definitely a sign of our times. For those of us lucky enough to have been around in the 60s and 70s, this should feel a bit like deja vu as, once again, caring about the environment is the fashionable thing to do.

The term "green" is what is currently being used to loosely describe all thing that have to do with environmental consciousness and sustainabilty - the things that we can do today to have a positive impact on the environment for tomorrow. Companies, buildings, even entire cities are "going green" these days, meaning they are implementing systems or technology that embrace eco-friendliness. Among the hot topics are decreasing greenhouse gas emissions, water pollution, landfill overuse, natural habitat preservation, and recycling.

However, with such a big movement on a grand scale, it's often hard to see how each and every individual can fit in. One way that people are finding easy to make a difference, even Hollywood stars, is by using reusable bags.

In the 1970s, plastic bags became the way to transport purchases from stores to households, replacing the paper bag. Statistics that are completely reliable are impossible to attain, but the US EPS estimates that over 380 billion plastic bags, sacks, and wraps are used each year in the United States. Estimates in China state that the county uses around 3 billion plastic bags each day! The issue with plastic bags is that they are not environmentally friendly. They are not biodegradable, meaning they cannot be naturally broken down to an eco-friendly state. Instead, plastic bags photodegrade, meaning they are broken down by light into little toxic bits that work their way in to waterways and soil where they are ingested by animals. When you consider how many plastic bags we use, you quickly realize how much toxic material is being put in to our environment.

Using a reusable bag for your shopping is a simple alternative that will help reduce the amount of toxic waste that we generate. So the next time you're out shopping, do what the celebs are doing and bring your own bag!