The Yeti\’s Cyber Smithy

Now long ago, I ran into a product which I thought could be improved by a slight change to he wording on the label. It read “Recycled Toilet Paper”. I think maybe it would have done better if the label had read “Toilet Paper” with smaller print stating “Made from recycled paper” or something of the sorts. If there is anything I don’t want recycled, it is toilet paper. After using the stuff and flushing it, I simply have no desire to see it again in any shape or form.

Have you heard about recycling? If you are not recycling, you are an old fashion Earth Raper. In you are recycling, then maybe you are one of the new in vogue Earth Rapers. In some cases, recycling may be worse for the ecosystem than consuming raw materials. No, not in all or even most circumstances. But certainly in enough circumstances that the blanket idea that recycling is doing Mother Earth a favor should be avoided. The same is true about believing this new Green Generation is always better than the old Grey Generation.

When I was a child, soda pop came into our house in glass bottles. Those bottles went back to the store, were washed, sterilized and reused. Thus saving precious resources. Not the resources that the bottles were made out of. We have plenty of sand. Instead, the energy required to melt and form that sand. Energy usually translates into electricity which typically translates into he burning of coal or other fossil fuel, so what ever we do to decrease its use is a good thing. Well, it is a good thing on the surface.

The truth is I can’t say if using recyclable glass bottles is a good thing. On the surface it seems great, but how much gasoline and diesel fuel is consumed moving these bottles back and forth? Oh, I think it was the more green thing to do, but the truth is I simply do not know.

The same is true of electric and hybrid cars. They sound like a great idea because they burn less gasoline, but where exactly is that electricity coming from? It seems mighty clean when it comes out of the wall, but what went into creating the stuff? Sure, the end user consumption of gasoline in a vehicle creates more pollution than the end user consumption of electricity to do the same thing, but how much damage did the earth suffer to create that electricity vs. that gasoline? Making things even more confusing, what price does the environment pay for the mining of the materials necessary to create the batteries found in electric and hybrid cars. What about the acids and other chemicals used to produce those batteries? What are the waste products of these industries? I simply do not know.

What I do know is that the people who produce modern marvels such as these are interested in the bottom line. If they can convince the consumer to purchase what they offer for sale, then they make more money. So I suspect much of what we think is and is not green is based more on advertising efforts than research. Consider the paper industry.

Lets call this the wood pulp industry because paper can be made out of several products other than trees. Lets also call it the wood pulp industry because I want to include such things as cardboard and not limit he conversation to sheets of paper. As I understand this industry, it grows trees, cuts those trees down and then uses energy to make paper and cardboard products. Now the recycled paper industry is much the same, only it gets the pulp for its products from used paper. The thing that strikes me about this process is the step that was removed, growing trees. I think growing trees is a good thing. As they grow, they produce oxygen and I am rather fond of oxygen.

Some folk might argue that we are running out of space in the landfills. To that argument, I again point out what we do with toilet paper. If you have a properly operating septic system, the toilet paper flushes into that system where it breaks down. If you bury it in the woods, mother nature does its own recycling. Without a measure of preservation, paper turns into dirt. Of course it does, it comes from trees. Like the leaves that drop to the ground every fall, paper is biodegradable. Like wood, it also makes for a fairly clean source of energy when burned. I recall reading an article in Mother Earth News which discussed using newspapers and junk mail to heat your home. Reportedly, if you play your cards right you can heat your home all winter on the junk mail received during the other three seasons. So why would we recycle paper if not for the feel good experience of saying we recycle?

Not long ago, the company that hosts this blog went green. I had only heard of such declarations briefly on the evening news so I looked into it.

“All of the resources that we use - paper in the office, electricity for our servers, even the gas in our cars that bring us to the office - leaves behind some kind of soul-sucking residue in the world.

When we learned that running DreamHost generated as much carbon dioxide as 545 average-size homes we realized we had to do something to neutralize our emissions.”

http://www.dreamhost.com/aboutus-green.html

Bravo for Dreamhost and the other companies which seek to live in harmony with the ecosystem. But how exactly do they achieve this? There are many steps which bring a company towards being green. These include decreasing power consumption and generating less waste. But the bottom line is that few of us have the resources required to produce our own electricity and other fuels. After all, although we can do our best to turn lights and other electrical devices off when not needed, they are sometimes needed and we do have to get to work somehow.

This is where “Emission Reduction Credits” or “Offsets” come into play. Third party companies now exist which will sell you these things to offset your carbon footprint. Basically, you figure out how much carbon emissions you generate and then buy an offset from a company which repairs the damage you have created. Great idea, but how do those companies do that?

Dreamhost does there part and then buys offsets from a company called The Green Office. In return, The Green Office issues a certificate, which you can view online. Dream Host’s certificate is always up to date.

http://www.thegreenoffice.com/cnr/47kgqr3/

“For example, when you buy 10 tons of carbon offsets, the seller guarantees that 10 fewer tons of global warming pollution go into the atmosphere. While the pollution you produce yourself is the same, you get the credit for that 10-ton reduction.”

http://fightglobalwarming.com/page.cfm?tagID=270&source=ggad&gclid=CNKymsrr2pECFQp_HgodmmBqXQ

Back at the Green Office I recalled noticing that the place sells many items which have been reportedly been manufactured with Green technology. Among there many offerings are, yep you guessed it, recycled toilet paper.

http://www.thegreenoffice.com/component/option,com_virtuemart/page,shop.browse/category_id,21104/Itemid,10/

“If every household in the U.S. replaced just one 4-pack of 260 sheet virgin fiber bathroom tissue with 100% recycled ones, we could save: 988,200 trees”

That sounds like a good thing until you realize that in saving those 988,200 trees we are also not growing 988,200 trees. While I don’t like the idea of raping national forests and not replenishing the stock, growing trees the way we grow corn sounds like a good oxygen producing plan.

I commend Dream Host for their concern and efforts. Its one of the reason I do business with them. I commend all of the other companies mentioned here in. I am thrilled that being green is becoming a selling point. I do think recycling is a good thing. I do think being green is a good thing.

But I wonder if recycling and being green might not be as good as it sounds and I am sure it isn’t good enough to convince me to recycle my toilet paper.