WaterCheck.Biz Reveals The Dangers of Plastic Water Bottles

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Q&A with Leslie Gabriel
Founder www.WaterCheck.biz
WaterManBlog.com

CELESTE: Why are plastic water bottles so dangerous and in what way do they negatively impact our environment?

LESLIE: A few things you should know about Plastic Water Bottles - Besides Being Yucky :)

• The most commonly used plastic for making water bottles is polyethylene terephthalate (PET), which is derived from crude oil.
  

• Making bottles to meet Americans' demand for bottled water requires more than 1.5 million barrels of oil annually, enough to fuel some 100,000 U.S. cars for a year.
  

• Worldwide, some 2.7 million tons of plastic are used to bottle water each year.

• Recent studies link plastic toxins such as Bisphenol A (BPA) to breast cancers and reproductive mutations.
  

• Plastics leach carcinogens including BPA during regular use, exposure to heat and especially after cleaning.
  

• From manufacturing to use and disposal, plastics pollute our health and environment.

CELESTE: Do you donate a portion of your proceeds to water sustainability projects?

LESLIE: Every quarter (3 months) we choose a non-profit, water related organization to support. Beyond money, we also provide these organizations with free publicity - with over 15,000 unique visitors every month - we place a hot link logo of the h2o organization on every page of our vast website. We also provide additional publicity to the chosen organization on over 10,000 letters to our customers, when an order ships.

What Makes A Perfume Eco-Friendly?

Hamish Taylor

Managing Director & Consultant
http://www.shinergise.com

There are several ways in which this can be answered and in essence (every pun intended) it boils down to the materials that are used to create the fragrance:

1) Essential oils grown on poor quality soils e.g. lavender, lavandin, spike spanish, etc.
These can be grown organically and/or based on Fair Trade as well as grown sustainably on land that is often unsuitable for other growing purposes e.g. lavender and lavandin grows on very poor soil which would find it hard to grow other meaningful crops without extensive fertilization and artificial irrigation.

2) Other Essential Oils such as Vanilla Absolute grown in rainforest canopies.
Vanilla is an orchid which can only grow within small farms by training the vines on trees in the rainforest, most typically Madagascar but also India, PNG, Uganda, Tahiti. Whilst the rainforest trees themselves do not offer eco-friendly or sustainable crops, the vanilla orchids that grow on them do offer sustainable harvests and do therefore "protect" the rainforest trees that they grow on which most otherwise be cleared to plant other cash crops.

3) Eco-friendly aroma chemicals e.g. synthetic sources from by-products.
For example, linalol and linalool and a host of associated similar products are produced from the by-product stream of vitamin production. Others including several turpentine derived materials are manufactured from the by-products of paper pulp manufacture.

4) Biodegradable materials.
The industry is self-regulating and over the past two decades have deliberately and systematically withdrawn materials from use based on their eco-toxicity profiles. This has included the voluntary discontinuation of several non-biodegradable musks and the development of similar olfactive contribution materials which are biodegradable. Extensive eco-testing, leading to appropriate labeling and restrictive use levels are then used to ensure skin safety and meet stringent environmental conditions. There are literally thousands of materials, each of which is governed by the IFRA/RIFM body whose member companies are monitored for compliance.

You could get into a debate about whether sustainable essential oils are the way to go to create an eco-friendly perfume, however you could also look at the carbon footprint and say that using chemicals sourced from by-product streams would also be highly eco-friendly as otherwise these would be waste products.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
http://www.linkedin.com/in/hamishtaylor
Hamish Taylor graduated from Edinburgh University in 1987 with a degree in Chemistry and a passion for business. He joined Unilever as part of their graduate programme and spent the next 19 years working for their Quest International fragrances subsidiary. In 1989 he was posted to Japan for the first time, an experience that led to a further three years spent in Japan (1991-94) where he fulfilled Sales and Marketing leadership roles.

After three years of European and global account management experience, Quest was bought from Unilever by ICI in 1997 after which Hamish once again returned to Japan. He led the Asia Pacific Creative Development function in addition to significant account management leadership in Japan and Asia.

Having worked for and with Unilever as a client for some 15 years, in 2002 he moved to the USA to take on global responsibility for Quest's business with Procter & Gamble. Fuelled by a strong identification with P&G's "Connect & Develop" approach to product innovation, his global team won internal and external recognition for creative success. Having fulfilled various business leadership roles in Europe, Asia and the USA, Hamish joined the Fragrance Division executive leadership team in 2006.

After the acquisition of Quest by Givaudan, Hamish left the business in June 2007 to establish Shinergise Partners Ltd.

Q&A: Coral Rose, Founder of Eco-Innovations

Coral Rose

Founder of Eco-Innovations
Corporate Sustainability Strategy
Sustainable Textile and Solutions
Website: www.eco-textiles.com
Blog: www.coralrose.typepad.com

CELESTE: In addition to buying vintage and used clothing, what should consumers look for when buying eco-friendly clothing?

CORAL: Look for apparel:

• THAT IS THIRD-PARTY CERTIFIED ORGANIC:This is certification for the growing of the fiber. There are additional 'voluntary' certifications such as the Global Organic Textile Standards (GOTS) that cover processing of the item including dyes as well as social standards.

• AN ITEM THAT IS VERSATILE & WILL SERVE IN MORE WAYS THAN ONE: An example might be a Patagonia jacket that converts to a vest--2 jackets in one--or pants that zip-off for different lengths-shorts-capris-long-so you get 3 garments in one.

• THAT WILL ALLOW YOU TO CONSERVE ON LAUNDERING: For cotton (conventional or organic) over 76% of the life cycle impacts happen at the consumer level. Not only do we consume a lot, we do a lot of laundry. This (76%) happens in the washing-drying-water, etc, so work on wearing outer-garments that are not soiled more than once!

CELESTE: When people throw out used clothing and shoes rather than donating them, how is this impacting our environment?

CORAL: Great question. The 2006 EPA Facts (resource EPA-United States Environmental Protection Agency:http://www.epa.gov.osw) regarding MSW (Municipal Solid Waste) is as follows: In 1960, we were generating 2.7 pounds of waste per person PER DAY. In 2006, that number is 4.6 pounds of waste per person PER DAY. Note: Rubber-Leather-Textiles are lumped into the same bucket at 7.3% of the total MSW. So the impact of not 'trashing' our clothes and shoes amounts to over 7% of the municipal waste that is generated.

CELESTE: Name a few apparel companies we should keep our eyes on.

CORAL:

• PATAGONIA: They are the original pioneers in organic cotton,usually setting the trends in sustainable fibers.

• TARGET: They are just getting into this arena of sustainable textiles. It will be interesting to see where they go with products and with consumer messaging.
  

CELESTE: Many consumers are choosing to bring their own fabric totes with them while they shop now rather than using the stores' plastic or paper bags. When purchasing totes for this purpose, what would be your 'top pick' as far as material used to make the tote?

CORAL: Choosing one fiber as a 'top pick' is not as easy as it sounds- there are many 'tradeoffs' to consider, that occur during the life cycle of the product with most sustainable fibers.
On a personal note, I prefer Hemp, one of natures finest whole fibers. Here is a bit from my blog of why:

Hemp fiber dates back to 2800 B.C. Prior to 1880 the US economy was based on hemp. Industrial hemp was a primary source of food, fuel and fiber. It is now illegal to grow hemp in the US. Hemp grows well without the use of chemical herbicides and pesticides. Manufactures of hemp fiber claim that the fiber is biodegradable. All hemp fiber in the US is imported. China and Eastern Europe are the primary producers of hemp. Although seed for food consumption is readily available certified organic, certified organic hemp fiber is not widely available. To date,IMO certifies only one organic hemp farm in Inner Mongolia. (www.imo.ch/).

Bye-Bye Plastic: Grocery Bags Get Greener

Author: Karen Talavera
Copyright (c) 2008 Karen Talavera

It's a small thing for each of us, but a huge thing when you add us all up. I refer to the impending departure of plastic bags from your local grocery, drug, and/or convenience store. At last, the day has come, and for me that day is today.

I just made my weekly pilgrimage to the local Publix, the dominant grocery chain in my neck of the woods (which happens to be Florida) to be greeted by - at long last - reusable fabric grocery bags for sale at a mere 99 cents each. I selected four bags and put them in my empty cart. They were not only incredibly roomy, but well constructed and even fairly attractive. It was such a small act, but it felt like deliverance.

You see, my husband's been complaining about plastic grocery bags for years now. He's become more vocal about it since the EU and later San Francisco banned them last year. He works for a French company and travels to Europe several times a year. After every trip to the home office I have to hear about our wasteful American ways, and the inevitable commentary on all those plastic grocery bags we use comes up. Despite the fact that most grocery stores offer plastic bag recycling bins, and that we use them, he remains on his soap box. But not for long.

I agree with him, and have long contemplated pulling out the seemingly self-propagating pile of canvas promotional bags and beach tote bags we've accumulated over the years and bringing those with me on my weekly grocery shopping trips. Yet I inevitably forget. Or the bags aren't wide enough. Or some other lame excuse. Unlike fashionable celebrities, we're not in the income bracket to afford $300 Coach or $1,000 Hermes bags (nor are we supportive of raising and killing more cows to produce them). So I've been patiently waiting for someone to corner the market on reusable shopping bags.

Apparently they have. The tiny tags on the bags I purchased from Publix say they're from www.greenbags.info. The Green Bag company is literally in good company, with other firms like Sage Green (www.environmentbags.com) creating mass market solutions for the cost-conscious and lazy of us. I applaud them. Make it effortless and practically free to ditch the petroleum based, sea turtle-suffocating plastic bags we mindlessly use and who wouldn't switch?

Lest you've read this far and are still not convinced to switch, let me share my astonishment at how my four new reusable fabric bags somehow held the same amount of groceries normally contained in nine or ten plastic bags. Even heavy juice bottles, glass wine bottles, cans and cleaning products fit nicely and safely into the new bags. Perhaps the most pleasant surprise came when I quickly realized how much easier it was to carry four - heavy through they were - rather than ten bags from the car into the house. Finally, somehow with fewer bags the groceries seemed to put themselves away faster as well. Who would have guessed?

Last week I was on my way out of a Midwestern city waiting for my flight in a quiet airport terminal when my snack bar neighbor, with whom I enjoyed a meager airport dinner, pointed to the bar TV. The channel was airing a news story about the harm plastic bags do to our oceans and sea creatures. I mentioned most of Europe and now China - yes, even those environmental despoilers - had just banned them. I cited the facts my husband had oft-quoted, that in the United States (which has less than one-quarter of China's 1.3 billion people,) the Sierra Club estimates almost 100 billion plastic bags are thrown out each year. That if just every one of New York City's 8 million people used one less grocery bag per year, it would reduce waste by about 5 million pounds.

"What the hell is our problem then?" she asked. I had no answer, but she had a great idea. To all of you sales and marketing types out there like me, stop ordering your usual imprinted trade show tote bags and order re-usable grocery bags as promotional give-aways instead. Then we'll really be making some progress.

Like I said, I bought four re-usable fabric shopping bags today for a grand total of $3.96 plus tax. It was a pittance to pay for an earth-conscious decision that will reap dividends for years to come and furthermore had me thinking about bringing my own shopping bags with me anywhere I go. It was a small thing, in so many ways, but it felt amazingly grand. It was something anyone could do, anywhere in this country, right now. It was something that very soon, we can ALL do. And that we all should.

Tomorrow when I take my morning walk on the beach maybe I'll see one less plastic bag sailing in the wind. At least I'll know now that day is a realistic possibility. Won't you join me?

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/home-and-family-articles/byebye-plastic-grocery-bags-get-greener-319601.html

About the Author:
Karen Talavera is a keen observer, critical thinker and aspiring book author with a passion for writing, learning and teaching. She lives in South Florida and sounds off frequently on her blog of the same name, Sound Off. Read more of Karen's writing at http://worldwidesoundoff.blogspot.com .