Mardi Gras can make a lot of trash, adding up to millions of pounds each year. Now, some parades in New Orleans are cutting down on their environmental footprint by banning plastic beads.

The world’s energy demand is continuously increasing, with fossil fuels such as petroleum, natural gas, coal, oil shales, tar sands, bitumens, and heavy oils remaining the primary source. These ...

FILE - People vie for beads as the group rolls during the Krewe of Iris Mardi Gras parade in New Orleans, Saturday, Feb. 18, 2023. Mardi Gras day this year falls on Feb. 21, 2023.

Tiny plastic beads injected into the arm could banish the agony of tennis elbow. Up to two million people in Britain at any one time have tennis elbow, which is triggered by any repetitive arm ...

In 2018, an industrial vacuum machine sucked 46 tons of plastic beads from the catch basins along a five-block stretch of the St. Charles Avenue parade route, where Freret travels.

Cheap plastic beads often end up in landfills and can clog up the city’s 100-year-old drainage system. That’s led to more calls to ditch them altogether.

A catch basin contractor for the City of New Orleans pulls out a jumble of beads from a catch basin on St. Charles Ave. in New Orleans, La., Monday, Jan. 8, 2018.

Beads have been central to the annual Carnival parade in Provincetown. But no more. At the 46th Annual Provincetown Carnival people participating in the Aug. 22 parade can no longer throw plastic ...

Starting Carnival 2025, the Krewe of Freret announced that they will no longer throw plastic beads in an effort to have more sustainable throws. Skip to content. NOWCAST WDSU News at 6pm.