If you haven’t already seen, the Coen brothers skewer clean coal in this ad for The Reality Coalition:
Just for the weekend, I think I will harness the awesome power of the word “skinny.”
This weekend, too, I have to reassess my relationship with my toilet paper. Turns out the kind I love — and yes, it IS possible to love toilet paper — is killing forests.
Still, trees and tree quality remain a contentious issue. Although brands differ, 25 percent to 50 percent of the pulp used to make toilet paper in this country comes from tree farms in South America and the United States. The rest, environmental groups say, comes mostly from old, second-growth forests that serve as important absorbers of carbon dioxide, the main heat-trapping gas linked to global warming. In addition, some of the pulp comes from the last virgin North American forests, which are an irreplaceable habitat for a variety of endangered species, environmental groups say.
Here’s the poop on a variety of national brands, from Greenpeace, which provides ratings based, in part, on recycled content. In addition to toilet paper, Greenpeace rates facial tissue and paper towels. As luck would have it, all of the tissue, toilet paper, and paper towel brands I regularly purchase are bad news for the environment.
I must admit I have been swimming in the river of denial on this issue, but I can no longer sit on it or flush it from my mind: It’s time to change.
And it’s time to quit with the bad puns. This weekend do a tree — if not your booty — a favor: Buy recycled toilet paper.
Unfortunately, none of the more “eco-friendly” brands seem to be widely distributed.
Posted by Teleprompter | March 1, 2009, 5:42 pmyes. it sucks.
i will have to drive 40 mi to the nearest trader joes or buy toilet paper via mail order (nightmare: delivery delay!). urban or large suburban areas are definitely (or “as usual”) in much better shape on this front.
i suppose we are supposed to take the fight to the next level and write letters, make phone calls, lead million-butt marches … ugh.
Posted by didionsmommy | March 2, 2009, 7:44 amThere in lies a dilema. You may be saving trees by using recycled TP but the carbon footprint you are leaving by having to go so much further out of your way may not be worth it.
Posted by Jello | March 2, 2009, 9:57 amYeah, if you’re going to have to travel far or get it individually delivered then it’s probably not worth it. Instead, think of something else you can do, like other sources of paper use you can reduce/eliminate – no paper napkins, no paper plates, etc.? And if you think about it, we’d save far more paper in this country if only we could eliminate all the direct-mail advertising.
Posted by Kris | March 2, 2009, 11:25 amwe drive a prius. (yes, we are those people … cloth diapers, old-fashioned motor-less lawn mower.)
but the point is, no one should have to drive beyond their regular grocery store to get t.p. that makes sense for the environment.
it’s crap (ha!) what the paper companies say in the article … that recycled t.p. can’t be soft … freakin’ get the development department to come up with a soft variety instead of making nonrecycled varieties softer and softer and whiter and whiter.
i suspect we will be seeing recycled t.p. from kimberly-clark within a year … surely they can’t withstand the withering exposure …
they can bring a recycled product to market and claim it was their idea all along.
in the meantime, a local (to me) market chain (stop&shop) stocks seventh generation. you can search availability by product at seventh gen’s site:
http://www.seventhgeneration.com/where-to-buy
Posted by didionsmommy | March 2, 2009, 12:21 pmhere’s some paper waste I’d like to eliminate … the thousands of pages of phone books that go straight into recycle every year. how can we eliminate that automatic delivery?
Posted by didionsdaddy | March 2, 2009, 2:28 pmYes, and no matter how many “official” no marketing lists I get on, I still have a ton of solicititous advertising in my mail. Add to that all the excess plastic and cardboard packaging . . . good news is we’re about 2/3rd recycling and 1/3 rd real trach in a given week. I also compost, but can’t garden – so my trees and shrubs are happy!
Posted by Philip H. | March 2, 2009, 3:22 pm