Which is more environmentally friendly – buying milk in a plastic jug or a paper carton?
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The Top 10 green living myths
By Judy Lowe | 05.13.09
Later today, the website Climate Culture is releasing a list of the 2009 Top Green Myths, things that you do – or don’t do – because you’ve read or been told they’re good or bad for the environment – but which, surprisingly, may not be producing the green results you’re expecting.
Lots of these have been argued before — Is local food always greener? Are paper bags better than plastic? — and there’s not always one “right” answer to them. But let’s look at the list and then get your opinion :
1. Green myth: Recycled paper is better for the environment than virgin paper. Fact: Recycled paper can sometimes be more carbon intensive than virgin paper. It depends on where you live. If your home is in the Pacific Northwest or Maine, where much of the electricity comes from hydro power, you may be better off with virgin paper since plants that manufacture recycled paper are often near large metro areas where power is from less efficient sources. The “difference in emissions from electricity use in paper production can be larger than the emissions associated with cutting down the tree to produce paper in the first place,” notes Zeke Hausfather, executive vice president of energy science at Climate Culture.
2. Green myth: Local food is always greener. Fact: “The method of production and type of food is far more important than the distance traveled in determining life-cycle greenhouse-gas emissions. For example, chicken from the supermarket is likely greener than local beef from the farmer’s market.” That said, there are plenty of other reasons to buy locally produced food, Mr. Hausfather admits.
3. Green myth: Washing dishes by hand uses less water than a dishwasher. Fact: It depends. Often, people underestimate how much hot water they use when washing dishes by hand. The most environmentally friendly way: washing your dishes in cold water.
4. Green myth: It’s better to drive to your vacation destination than to fly. Fact: Not if your car is an SUV, station wagon, minivan, or truck. That may be mitigated, though, if you have the entire family in the car, or drive a car that’s fuel-efficient.
5. Green myth: Compact fluorescent lights (CFLs) result in mercury emissions; incandescents don’t. Fact: “CFLs generally result in less mercury emissions than conventional incandescents, since coal-based electricity generation is the single largest source of anthropogenic mercury emissions and CFLs save a considerable amount of electricity,” says Hausfather. While much has been made of the mercury dangers of broken CFLs, he notes that most of the bulb’s mercury is bound to the glass.
6. Green myth: Given a choice between paper bags and plastic bags, go with paper. Fact: From a standpoint of carbon emissions, they’re equally bad. Plastic is worst from a solid waste perspective. (But plastic is a littering problem in many places.) Most environmentally friendly of all, as you already know, is bringing your own reusable bags (which is, admittedly, easier if you aren’t buying groceries for a family of four).
7. Green myth: An electric car is best for the environment. Fact: If you live in a state where most of your electricity is generated by coal, that’s not so. In those areas, electric cars can emit more carbon than high-efficient hybrids. Unless the electricity for the car is generated solely by renewable energy, electric vehicles are “far from zero emissions.”
8. Green myth: If you want to help alleviate global warming, plant trees. Fact: Once again, it depends on where you live. In areas with cold winters, “the additional sunlight absorbed by the dark-colored trees just about offsets any cooling from carbon reduced.” In high-latitude regions, “planting trees can actually heat up the earth,” Hausfather says. However, in urban areas and the tropics, planting trees is good from a global-warming perspective. (Remember, this is talking only about benefits to the climate, not to trees or other ecosystem effects.)
9. Green myth: Buy milk in paper or glass cartons if you have the choice. Fact: Because half-gallon plastic milk jugs use much less material, they have lower life-cycle greenhouse-gas emissions than glass or paper containers of the same size.
10. Green myth: Using your garbage disposal isn’t good for the environment. Fact: It depends on a couple of local factors and also on what you would do with the garbage if you didn’t put it in the disposal. If you’re going to toss it in the trash, it’s probably better to grind it up in the disposal, although the benefits may depend on how your community captures methane emissions from wastewater treatment and landfills. If you want to do it right, compost your leftover food.
I asked Hausfather to provide some scientific evidence for these claims and here they are:
1. Recycled versus virgin paper. This one is a bit thorny, he admits. He’s willing to discuss it with me, so if you’d like to know more of what’s behind the issue, say so in a comment and it can be a future blog post.
2. Local food is always green. This is based on a life-cycle analysis of food sources by Weber and Matthews (2008) in which they find:
“…the GHG emissions associated with food are dominated by the production phase, contributing 83% of the average U.S. household’s 8.1 t CO2e/yr footprint for food consumption. Transportation as a whole represents only 11% of life-cycle GHG emissions, and final delivery from producer to retail contributes only 4%. Different food groups exhibit a large range in GHG-intensity; on average, red meat is around 150% more GHG- intensive than chicken or fish. Thus, we suggest that dietary shift can be a more effective means of lowering an average household’s food-related climate footprint than “buying local.” Shifting less than one day per week’s worth of calories from red meat and dairy products to chicken, fish, eggs, or a vegetable-based diet achieves more GHG reduction than buying all locally sourced food.”
Their paper is available here. Note that this is a rather carbon-myopic approach, and there are plenty of benefits to local food beyond their associated GHG reductions.
3. Dishwashers versus hand-washing dishes: This is based on calculations using dishwasher efficiencies from the US Federal Trade Commission and a study by the British nongovernmental organization Waterwise. Average dishwasher age is estimated to be seven years, based on the Waterwise study. The relationship between energy use per cycle and water use per cycle is based on calculations by the US Department of Energy. Average water use and temperature for handwashing (80 minutes and 80 liters per 12 place settings, 90F) is derived from the study by Bonn University, in Germany. Dishwasher capacity is assumed to be12 place settings. Whether dishwashing or hand-washing is optimal will differ based on the fuel mix of electricity generation, the water temperature used in hand-washing, the user’s water heater fuel and efficiency, the efficiency of the dishwasher, the temperature setting of the dishwasher, the load factor of the user’s dishwasher, and the flow rate of the user’s kitchen sink (which we assume to be 2.5 gallons per minute based on average sink flow data from the Laurence Berkeley National Labs). There is no clear winner, other than washing by hand with cold water.
4. Flying versus driving the car on vacation: The calculations are based on the carbon emissions per mile from flying via the World Resources Institute. Vehicle emissions per mile are based on the highway m.p.g. of the vehicle in question using the EPA’s fuel economy database and the number of passengers in the vehicle, taking into account the effect on fuel economy of extra passenger weight.
5. Mercury emissions of CFLs versus incadescent lights: This is based on CFL mercury data from the EPA’s Energy Star Program. Mercury emissions per kWh are based on NERC subregion data from the EPA’s eGRID and state-level transmission loss data from the US Department of Energy. Health impacts of broken CFLs in homes based on remarks from Dr. Helen MacIntosh, a professor of environmental health at Harvard University, reported here.
6. Paper versus plastic: Paper and plastic bags both require comparable amounts of energy per bag for production, given that paper bags are considerably more massive than plastic ones, though paper bags are slightly preferred. Data on life-cycle carbon emissions for paper and plastic are taken from FRIDGE: Socio-economic impact assessment of the proposed plastic bag regulations. Other reports argue that paper bags have higher life-cycle GHG emissions, though methodologies and analysis boundaries differ across reports.
7. Electric cars: This is based on wheel-to-wheel efficiency data for Tesla Roadster and Toyota RAV4 electric vehicles and electricity generation emissions data from the EPA’s eGRID for each NERC subregion.
8. Planting trees to help alleviate global warming: There is a wide and contentious literature on this question, though most people agree that carbon benefits of afforestation in temperate areas is at least partially offset by albedo effects. One of the seminal papers on the subject is Bala et al (2007), where they argue that:
“…[in high latitude areas] the warming carbon-cycle effects of deforestation are overwhelmed by the net cooling associated with changes in albedo and evapotranspiration. Latitude-specific deforestation experiments indicate that afforestation projects in the tropics would be clearly beneficial in mitigating global-scale warming, but would be counterproductive if implemented at high latitudes and would offer only marginal benefits in temperate regions. Although these results question the efficacy of mid- and high-latitude afforestation projects for climate mitigation, forests remain environmentally valuable resources for many reasons unrelated to climate.”
Click here for the paper.
9. Plastic milk jugs versus paper or glass: This is based on a the revised version of the comprehensive life-cycle analysis of plastic, paper, and glass half-gallon milk containers from Franklin Associates. You can find a summary of the report here.
10. Using the garbage disposal: Composting is ideal, but using the garbage disposal can be better from a carbon perspective than landfilling organic waste if your local wastewater treatment plant captures its methane emissions. This will differ by geographic area, and there are no good publicly available databases on which wastewater treatment plants capture methane and which do not. Note that there are cases in which waste disposed through the sink does not go to the sewer but is discharged to streams and rivers, and food waste can contribute to eutrophication and other nasty (though not carbon related) ecosystem impacts. See here and here for two contrasting views on this issue.
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2. treeguy | 05.13.09
The seminal paper you refer to by Bala, et al is based on an impractical, impossible scenario — that is, if there were no trees at all. And, virtually all papers regarding the albeto effect are based on this single study. In other words, a single study does not constitute a viable debate, regardless of how many papers were written about it. And, if the study was research of an impossible scenario, isn’t it moot?
It’s far more important to mention all of the environmental benefits that trees provide…including absorbing carbon dioxide…regardless of the latitude where they are planted. There have been an exponential number of studies and papers on the environmental benefits of trees.
3. BBHY | 05.13.09
“Unless the electricity for the car is generated solely by renewable energy, electric vehicles are “far from zero emissions.”
So the coal power plant doesn’t make any pollution when powering your home, but when you plug in an electric car it starts pumping out all sorts of nasty stuff? How does the power plant know?
Maybe those power plants generate pollution all the time, but then the problem would be the power plant, not the electric car. If you care about pollution, then you need to fix the power plant anyway. If you don’t, then you don’t care what the electric car does. You simply can’t ignore coal power plants and then complain that electric cars are bad because they are powered by coal.
I’ve seen the detailed analysis that these figures are based on, and they claim that oil production has only a 15% energy loss from the well to the filling station. I don’t believe it. Nobody has ever provided figures to back up that claim, it’s just taken as a given from the oil industry. I think oil production is not nearly that efficient, and I’m sure they are not including secondary losses such as natural gas flaring. Certainly processing oil shale and sands is much less efficient and much more polluting by a factor of 2 or 3. A great many wells are now using pressurized water injection to keep the flow up. Those wells suffer a water cut of up to 30%, and that water has to be separated from the oil. It takes energy to supply the pressurized water and more energy to separate the water from the oil. The 15% number is most likely a best case figure and the average is probably more like a 30% energy loss from oil well to filling station.
That would make even an electric car powered completely from coal based electricity more efficient than a gasoline powered hybrid. Add a portion of renewable power to the mix and you are way ahead with an electric car. There aren’t any panels you can mount on your roof that turn sunshine into gasoline.
4. Zeke Hausfather | 05.13.09
To nuance the discussion of recycled paper a bit, it really depends on an enormous amount of factors including how the paper is produced, where it is produced, where the recycled paper is produced, how the paper is disposed of, how much methane is captured and burned vs. released in the landfills its sent to, etc.
Its true that a good portion of virgin paper production is located in areas of the Pacific Northwest of Maine with considerable hydropower generation, though some is also located in Georgia and the Southeast. Most paper mills also get a good portion of their energy from burning tree byproducts that are not used for paper production. This is nominally carbon neutral if the trees in question are coming from a timber plantation; less so if they are produced from clearcutting old-growth (though the albedo issue makes this tricky as well). However, the energy used in production is counterbalanced by reduced emissions from reduced paper decomposition, though the magnitude of this depends on the amount of anaerobic vs. aerobic decomposition and the amount of carbon content that is sequestered in landfills. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0959-6526(99)00149-3 gives a good overview of the issues involved in approaching the problem.
Given that modeling all of this is impractical, you can take comfort in the fact that, on balance, recycled paper is probably better than virgin paper. Sometimes a simple heuristic is the best you are going to get.
In response to treeguy, Bala et al is hardly the only paper on the subject. Other papers with similar results include Montenegro et al (http://climate.uvic.ca/people/alvaro/aff.pdf), Marland et al (http://www.rrraul.org/ClimatePolicy-2003.pdf), Betts (http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v408/n6809/abs/408187a0.html), and Randerson et al (http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/314/5802/1130)
Others like Bird et al (http://biogeosciences-discuss.net/5/1511/2008/bgd-5-1511-2008.pdf) find that albedo effects are significant, but not negating the carbon sequestration benefits to the extent Bala et al suggest. Bonan et al have a good summary article on the state of the controversy in Science last year (http://www.fseee.org/fsnews/bonan_forests-and-climate-change_science.pdf).
Regardless, tropical aforestation is unambiguously good, and temperate region aforestation is likely CO2-eq reducing. Its also useful to note that forests have many environmental benefits beyond this carbon-myopic view.
5. Ben | 05.13.09
There is a fine line btwn skepticism and cynicism. But better to stir up the readership and reinforce conflict, than informing them of the better methods at their disposal. There is more money to be made in conflict than education, right? Fail.
6. Rachel Konrad | 05.13.09
Green myth No. 7 is inaccurate. Even in the worst case scenario, in which a coal-fired power plant produces 100 percent of electricity, an EV is more efficient than a hybrid or conventional gas guzzler according to numerous well-to-wheel efficiency studies and real-world data.
Consider the case of Canada, where an EV charged in a hydro-dominant province such as British Columbia or Manitoba represents a 98 percent reduction in overall greenhouse gas emissions compared to its gasoline equivalent. Even in coal-dominant Alberta, the EV represents a 45 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.
This article also contains another inaccuracy. It says electric vehicles are “far from zero emissions.” In fact, EVs have no tailpipe and therefore produce no tailpipe emissions whatsoever. Do they require some form of energy? Yes, of course. In the case of the Tesla Roadster — the only highway-capable EV for sale today in North America or Europe — it’s impossible to go 0-60mph in 3.9 seconds without expending some energy, in this case energy from the electricity grid (which as you note contains an increasing percentage of renewable sources). However, it’s important to note that there are no tailpipe emissions on this car — and it’s vastly easier to “clean up” the grid with renewable energy than to somehow reconfigure an existing internal combustion engine and make it cleaner; the ICE becomes dirtier and dirtier than older it gets, yet an EV will actually become more efficient as the grid becomes more efficient.
Thanks.
Rachel Konrad
Tesla Motors Inc.
7. editorial | 05.13.09
Hi Ben, I put up this post because I was interested in the topic. This sort of thing always appeals to me. However, I know that the usual visitors to the blog and the Monitor’s Environment section often differ on these topics. So I figured that I — and maybe many of us — would learn something from the comments. And I have. No ulterior motives at all. Judy Lowe
8. Vince | 05.13.09
Hey Judy, this top ten list is fantastic. Thank you for helping to demistfying some of the falsehoods out there. It’s sometimes hard to seperate as our society is getting more and more greenwashed. i think there are many valid steps we can take to help with the global issue, but we have limited time and resources and need to identify where our biggest value will come from. You can post this to our site http://www.toptentopten.com/ and link back to your site. We are trying to create a directory for top ten lists where people can find your site. The coolest feature is you can let other people vote on the rankings of your list.
9. Zeke Hausfather | 05.13.09
Rachel,
Thanks for dropping in! Its useful to note that our analysis showed that the Tesla roadster was better than to Toyota Prius in almost every part of the U.S. given the current grid mix (which its important to note will become more green in the future). However, this is a bit of an apples to oranges comparison, since the Tesla is a 2-seater sports car and the Prius is a 4-door 5-seater sedan. A more fair comparison would be the now-discontinued 2-seater hybrid Honda Insight, in which case the Insight is lower carbon in many parts of the Midwest and South. You can see a map comparing the annual carbon emissions here:http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j237/hausfath/TeslaInsight.png. That said, the Insight certainly doesn’t have the same performance as a Tesla!
The calculations involved are:
Electrical-outlet-to-wheel efficiency for Tesla Roadsters is given [http://www.stanford.edu/group/greendorm/participate/cee124/TeslaReading.pdf] as 2.18 megajoules (MJ) per kilometer (km). We convert this to kilowatt hours (kWh) per mile using the following equation:
EVEff = 1 MJ / 2.18 km * 1.609 km / mile * 1 kWh / 3.6 MJ = 0.205 kWh per mile
Annual emissions from electric vehicles are calculated based on the following equation:
EVCO2-eqAnnual = milesAnnual * EVEff * CO2-eqElectric
Where:
• EVCO2-eqAnnual is annual greenhouse gas emissions from electric vehicle driving in pounds of carbon dioxide-equivilent
• milesAnnual is the number of miles driven per year
• VEff is the efficiency of the electric vehicle in question (in kWh per mile)
• CO2-eqElectric is the emission factor [http://www.epa.gov/cleanenergy/energy-resources/egrid/index.html] for the user’s zip code based on their NERC subregion, their state’s transmission losses, and indirect emissions associated with fuel extraction, refinement, and transportation as well as power plant construction and decommissioning
Emissions from hybrid-electric vehicles are calculated using the following equation:
HEVCO2-eqAnnual = milesAnnual / HEVmpg * DirectCO2Gasoline / (1 - IndirectCO2-eqGasoline)
Where:
• HEVCO2-eqAnnual is annual greenhouse gas emissions from electric vehicle driving in pounds of carbon dioxide equivalent
• HEVmpg is the efficiency of the hybrid (in miles per gallon)
• DirectCO2-eqGasoline is the emission factor for gasoline combustion based on numbers from the EPA [http://www.epa.gov/OMS/climate/420f05004.htm]
• IndirectCO2-eqGasoline is the percent of total gasoline emissions that are a result of indirect emissions caused by the extraction, refinement, and transportation of gasoline
Specifically, we assume that:
• milesAnnual is 12,000 miles per year, based on EPA estimates of average annual vehicle mileage
• DirectCO2-eqGasoline is 19.675 lbs carbon dioxide equivalent per gallon of gasoline
• IndirectCO2-eqGasoline is 4.860 percent of total gasoline carbon emissions based on work by Meier (2003) [http://merllc.com/ab4.htm].
Combined city/highway miles per gallon are 46 for the 2009 Toyota Prius [http://www.toyota.com/prius-hybrid/] and 65 for the 2006 Honda Insight.
The net carbon difference of using an all-electric vehicle instead of a hybrid-electric vehicle for each zip code can be calculated by:
NetCO2-eq = EVCO2-eqAnnual - HEVCO2-eqAnnual
10. Grant | 05.13.09
In regards to electric vehicles… What is the environmental impact of battery disposal and replacement? Does the EV still come out ahead when those factors are figured in? What is the life expectancy of a set of batteries on an EV?
11. Zeke Hausfather | 05.13.09
Oops, slight typo in the previous post: I should have written that the Tesla Roadster gets 2.18 kilometers per megajoule rather than vise versa. This is correctly included in the equation as 1 MJ / 2.18 km.
The perils of poor proof reading…
12. snopake | 05.13.09
This is gonna be great!
In 1973, at the age of 13, I saw a TV show that said that eggs were bad for me. News to me — I had been taught in school that things like eggs and milk and meat were nourishing. It was the dawn of health-conscious eating in the U.S., and since that time we’ve all been subjected to an unending torrent of “information” about what we ought to eat. Unfortunately, the advice is rarely the same twice in row: carbs are good, carbs are bad; fats are bad, some fats are good; eat more protein, eat less protein. Oh, and exercise: you need to exercise mildly/moderately/vigorously for at least one/three/twenty hours a week to live a long, healthy life.
Now comes green living and, no doubt, decades of controversy over what’s good for the planet and what’s bad. Only now we’re not just responsible for our own bodies, but for the future of Earth, so the pressure is turned up a notch.
I can’t wait.
I can’t wait.
13. Scott L | 05.13.09
Sherry: re chicken waste–
Composted chicken fecal matter is a GREAT fertilizer for your home garden! So I’d save it, compost it, and in a few months you have a free, environmentally friendly (at least compared to artificially produced nitrogen fertilizers) topsoil additive. It’s such a good fertilizer, in fact, that you can (and my roommates and I do) buy it at greenhouses.
14. Bruce > Samso | 05.13.09
# 6 Paper or Plastic
The main point in this debate has to revolve around plastic in our seas. It is a huge problem that is quickly getting worse. Plastic will haunt us for a long long time. Paper can turn back into earth easily enough; leave one on the forest floor and watch what happens to it. Leave a plastic bag at the same spot and come back in 200 years - it will still be there!
15. Jim Kamp | 05.13.09
Judy - did you read the Franklin Associates article you linked re: “Myth” #9?
“CONCLUSION… When reused rather than merely recycled, glass bottles perform significantly better across all three dimensions of energy consumption, solid waste generation, and greenhouse gas emissions…”
How could you create the link without even reading the target article? It was only three pages long! I have to agree with the comment by Ben (5.) - much of your article is cynical and sensational. Please do some research on the “reduce” and “reuse” parts of the Three Rs and write a better one that contributes to the solution rather than just increasing ignorance.
16. John Pelley | 05.13.09
My wife uses a tub, which she puts in the sink to wash dishes. When she rinses, the rinse water goes into the tub. She ends up using less than one gallon of water for an entire day’s dishes for two people.
Don’t choose between paper or plastic. Bring your own bags. Stores are selling reusable bags for $1.00 each. Some are giving them away sometimes. Some stores even will give you a nickle credit for each bag you use.
17. editorial | 05.13.09
Jim, To me, the crucial words in that conclusion are “when reused rather than merely recycled…” How much glass is reused rather than recycled? If you buy glass bottles frequently, there are only so many you can keep and reuse. Judy Lowe
18. Pete | 05.13.09
Every article I’ve read about green myths has completely missed the point this one included.
“Myth”:Electric cars are bad if your power comes from coal.
Right now it might be worse but is serves the purpose of unifying the power generation. Rather than having my own internal combustion engine in addition to the coal power plant there is just one power source. Now when that coal fired power plant gets converted to something greener, my car immediately gets greener as well.
“Myth”: Recycling is just as bad.
It may use more resources right now but it build behaviours in the people to sort and separate. People are still struggling with this, I see public recycle bins with food containers/scraps in it so we’re not there yet. Secondly much of what we consume is not renewable so sooner or later we’ll have to reuse/recycle.
Overall we should be looking toward the future for real solutions, not just trying to trim a few kg of emissions here and there and keep on going as we have been, business as usual.
-Pete
19. Matthew Wright | 05.14.09
1. WRONG Recycled paper vs virgin — Recycled is much better period, closing the loop, means we can have better LAND USE EQUITY. The plants can be 100% Renewable Energy as can the entire electricity supply ie http://www.repoweramerica.org/
You see there is competition for land and allocating forested lands for virgin paper when we can get 80-95% of the fibre from post consumer uses is inequitable. Add to that, other fibre sources than trees give higher yields per unit of land for less water etc.
2. I agree with this, local food is not always greener - but food should from a distribution perspective come on Railway lines which down the track can be electrified so as to be able to decarbonise the supply chain.
3. I agree
4. You need to calculate the emission factors - that are not yet accepted by IPCC for flying ie multiply by at least 2.7 for flying. The obvious answer here is to use the train — because the rail network can be electrified and run on 100% renewable energy ie http://www.repoweramerica.org
5. I agree with 5 — but add that CFL’s are quite transitional and we are all awaiting solid state lighting — versions of Light Emitting Diode’s (LEDs)
6. Paper wins, and if it uses less land, water and energy than bioplastics (we’re going to have to leave all petroleum in the ground to decarbonise the economy) then simple paper is the go - unbleached of course, this is second preference to reusable bags.
7. An electric car is always better because it can be run on 100% renewable energy — initially customers can pay a premium for GreenPower, but later on (and we must lobby for this) we will have 100% renewable energy electricity grid — and if you don’t know about it Wind Power is the cheapest dispatch backed up by concentrating solar thermal with storage.
8. Planting trees - they need to be biodiverse preferably around existing national parks (highest conservation areas) adding to buffering these. They also need to take into account (and have a background Ecological Vegetation Class) a potential step change or 2 in climate.
9. Glass wins - and we should move from recycling to 10 or 15 standardised bottles that are sold with a container deposit (50c) which is reimbursed upon return these can then be high temperature low water steam sanitised and reused. — this is the best option — again close the loop 90% less raw materials.
10. Garbage disposal — direct compost using a tumbling bin is the way to go, only for biodegradables of course, cut the transportation and associated costs out. Municipal waste management uses a shocking amount of resources.
20. editorial | 05.14.09
I see this list very much like questions on standardized tests, where everything in a statement is true — except one small statement. It’s interesting as an intellectual exercise and I enjoyed thinking these through. It didn’t change my mind on the *overall* value of trees, paper bags, local food, and recycled paper. And I can’t imagine washing greasy dishes with cold water, but it’s something to think about. One thing that the list shows us is that so often, these issues have many nuanaces. Judy Lowe
21. Florentine | 05.14.09
Judy Lowe you’re not “myth busting” - your article does more to paralyze people rather than empowering them to make sustainable lifestyle choices.
Let’s move the conversation past squabbles over the greenness of garbage disposals and talk about the big impact stuff we need to change, like our consumer culture and dependence on cars.
22. HeatherL | 05.14.09
HI Sherry! To answer your question about chicken poo…find a local organic gardener and see if they’re interested. I’m currently looking for a bit myself LOL!! Best of luck to you and your chickens.
23. Mike McFadden | 05.14.09
When you take a look at this list one factor comes up time and again: the pervasive use of coal-powered electricity. Why we continue to use such destructive and out-of-date technology perplexes me. There is no such thing as clean-burning coal. What we must do is to embrace new technology, such as wind or solar or wave means of electricity production and get into the 21st century. Coal should have gone out of style when Dickens was still writing. Stop dragging our feet and let the scientists develop the technology for clean electricity. This way all the debates over electic cars, CFLs, dishwashers, leaving computers on all day, etc. will vanish. All the conveniences in our modern lives can be boiled down to use of electricity, use of fossil fuels. As technology is developed to make those conveniences less destructive the arguments for fossil fuels lose their power of persuasion.
24. Thorne | 05.14.09
Well. This is just a general garden variety comment to let you know how much I appreciate finding all of this information in one spot. Thanks!
25. biokleen | 05.14.09
I think for number 1 (along with many others obviously) you need to take a few other things into account… Maybe this is the “thorny” part. What do you do with the paper, virgin or recycled, after it’s used up? Throw it away, so it doesn’t burn more emissions while being recycled, or recycle it, so it can be used again instead of filling up a landfill. Carbon emissions aside, I believe it’s still most important to Reduce-Reuse-Recycle.
26. ryan | 05.14.09
I think the Myths and debunking of them all reflect very entry-level ideas about green living. It’s easy to debunk or sidestep all of the Facts that debunk the Myths.
1 and 2 are, as noted about 2, carbon-centric. Cutting down trees has many negative impacts beyond just carbon emissions.
3 is based on the fact that inefficiently hand-washing dishes is inefficient, a poor argument, and it forgets about the costs of manufacturing a dishwasher. Phase out dishwashers and the world will be greener.
Myth 4 is based on the importance of where in the atmosphere your emissions occur. That is the myth that would need to be debunked, a qualitative comparison of the effects of the emissions, not a quantitative comparison between total emissions.
5 I don’t know about.
6 is an old myth, the current green standard is to bring your own bags, something un-debunkable.
7, electric cars need to be seen within an overall shift within the energy industry. Evaluating it outside of a societal move towards alternative energy is silly.
8 is like 3, of course, planting trees in stupid places is stupid, but planting trees where they belong is smart. There’s room for a critique of some of the ridiculous tree-planting programs that exist, but there’s also room for a critique of people who use tons of hot water when they hand-wash their dishes. Doesn’t change the basic reality.
9, the choice of paper and glass is in large part a desire to move away from storing liquids in plastic.
10 seems to come from 10 years ago. Most of the cities in my area collect food scraps with green waste for those people who don’t compost it themselves. And as is sort of noted in the follow up notes, water quality and stormwater management is the big issue with garbage disposals. Disposals add unnecessary waste to already overloaded systems.
So my opinion is that the list is superficial.
27. Scott Cassel | 05.14.09
Green Myth #5 creates another Myth:
While it is true that CFLs produce lower mercury emissions from power plants than incandescents, cities all across America agree that CFLs should still be recycled because of their mercury content. It is a complicated issue for consumers. Please don’t confuse them further. It is better to say they should buy CFLs for energy savings, and should recycle them for the environment. No one can argue with that.
28. afahey | 05.14.09
This calls to mind a blog post from a few years ago that put the plastic vs. paper debate to rest for good. It’s *what you put in your shopping bag* that counts. The impact of our meat purchases absurdly outweighs all the veggies we can eat. Check out the chart here and see what I mean:
http://daily.sightline.org/daily_score/archive/2007/09/19/it-s-in-the-bag
29. Carolyn Hopper | 05.14.09
Plastic bags end up in rivers, trees. They are a hazard to birds and fish. Time to ban them and require everyone to bring their own cloth bags to the store
30. Ann | 05.15.09
“Jim, To me, the crucial words in that conclusion are “when reused rather than merely recycled…” How much glass is reused rather than recycled? If you buy glass bottles frequently, there are only so many you can keep and reuse. Judy Lowe”
You can buy milk in glass bottles that are returned. There are some arguments about energy use in washing and sterilizing–haven’t looked at the figures for about 20 years. We alternate buying reusable bottles and local milk in plastic.
31. Dani | 05.18.09
While interesting, this article heavily weighs carbon emissions and associated global warming impacts over all other life cycle impacts, i.e. toxic waste disposal in the case of electric car batteris, as usual, goes unaddressed…
32. Michael Christie | 06.01.09
Bring on the life cycle debate. Thanks for an interesting debate from all.
33. Ashish Agrawal | 06.09.09
Yes, I also think that planting tree allevate the global warming.For more tips see http://www.commonfloor.com/green-living/?f=aa12
34. JB | 06.24.09
This is no myth. It is quite real and happening now. I just read a new book called Two Cents Per Mile: Will Obama Make it Happen with the Stroke of a Pen? Simply put, this book shows the open conspiracy going on between the Department of Energy and corporations to prevent the development of 100% electric cars. Big corporations, with the help of the Department of Energy want to move us toward what they call the “hydrogen economy.” This is a dangerous idea and a very expensive one. The book calls upon the reader to send letters to local, state and federal officials to get us back on track for all electric cars. There are links in the book to customize form letters. If you value America’s future, the environment and are concerned about what kind of world our kids will inherit, you have to check this book out. http://www.amazon.com/Two-Cents-per-Mile-President/dp/0615293913/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1245854577&sr=8-1
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1. Sherry | 05.13.09
So has anyone calculated whether having a small chicken coop at your home results in net positive environmental benefits? We feed our food scraps to the chickens, and get our eggs and some of our meat from them (which reduces packaging using on store bought products). They still get about half their food from the feed store (bad for environment) and produce waste which I am not sure how best to dispose of or use. Any thoughts?