For the Daily Dispatch Stephanie Nelson performed a cost-benefit analysis of the benefits of bottled water vs. using a Brita/PUR pitcher system vs. drinking plain old tap water. Highlights below:
“ The typical cost of the store-brand gallon of filtered water is about a dollar. The typical sale price of a six-pack of half-liter bottles is about $1, which is about one-third more expensive at $1.34 per gallon. By comparison, if you were to buy a pitcher water-filter system (such as PUR or Brita) your average cost per gallon of filtered water would be about 25 cents. The Brita company bases this cost estimate on the purchase of a $25 pitcher (one filter included), plus 5 replacement filters at $9 each, for a total yearly cost of $70. Each filter produces 40 gallons of water and the average Brita owner uses six filters in a year, to produce 240 gallons, which is the equivalent of using about two-thirds of a gallon per day. (Of course, your costs would be lower if you took advantage of Brita and PUR coupons that you can find on their Web sites and in the newspaper coupon circulars.) You could also buy the systems at household stores and use the 20 percent off coupon for the household store to buy the system. If your family uses two-thirds of a gallon of filtered water per day, your annual savings would be about $175, compared to using gallon jugs. That is also a conservative estimate; people that buy individual water bottles at the grocery store ($1 per six pack on sale) or individual water bottles at concession stands ($1 or more each) would save far more money by using a pitcher water-filter system. Shoppers who use filtered-water systems also help reduce the environmental impact of producing and disposing of plastic bottles. The Web site http://www.filterforgood.com/ (sponsored by Brita) encourages consumers to make a pledge to help reduce plastic water bottle waste. You will also be able to print a coupon for Brita products after you make your pledge, including $5 off the pitcher system or $1 off refills.
The Web site mentions a disturbing fact: Consumers send 38 billion plastic water bottles to landfills every year. Not only does that add trash to our environment, but it also takes 1.5 million barrels of oil to create that many bottles. Even though the bottles are recyclable, we do not manage to get them all to recycle bins. According to the site, last year the average consumer used 167 plastic bottles but only recycled 38 (28 percent). Shoppers can get $5 coupons for the PUR filter system or $2 coupons for the PUR refills at http://www.purwater.com/. Click on the Promotions link to sign up for coupons that you will receive by mail.”
To add to Ms. Nelson’s through research, I’d like to point out that in the U.S. bottled water isn’t even necessarily better, or "more pure," than tap water. Bottledwater.org says that the “Bottled water standard of quality . . . is as stringent as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) standards for public water supplies.” Bottled water legally only has to be equally as healthy or pure as your tap water, so if you're suspicious of your tap water, you should be equally as suspicious of domestic bottled waters. While I am sure that some bottled water companies exceed the standards for public drinking water, it is common knowledge that many bottled water companied simply bottle the tap water received by their plant.
What then, is the point of buying bottled water? Reduce your waste and improve your health by drinking tap water, or getting a pitcher or faucet filtration system.
Showing posts with label water quality. Show all posts
Showing posts with label water quality. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Dirty "Cleaning"
Everyone likes to keep themselves and their houses clean, right? Laundry detergent, dishwashing detergent, deodorizers, disinfectants, toilet bowl cleaners, glass cleaners, furniture polish, all-purpose cleaners... the list goes on. Unfortunately, all mainstream versions of these products do more to make our world (and our health) dirty, than clean. They are toxic to people and to the environment.
Most commercially available cleaning products contain materials that are considered hazardous waste by the U.S. government. Hazardous waste use normally requires a license and some means of proper disposal, but use in households across our nation goes on unchecked, polluting our water supply, our air, and our bodies. Laundry detergent, for example, contains a chemical so toxic that it can be used as a pesticide. What's worse, the worst, most toxic chemicals may not be on the label-- the government protects the companies from revealing their "trade secrets." But that's only an issue if you bother to read the label- and can understand what each ingredient means and does! My guess is that most people (myself included) have been filling their houses with toxic chemicals with no idea what's in them.
One major concern is cancer. Before the industrial revolution, 1 in 8,000 people had cancer. Today that number is 1 in 3. We still don't know for sure which materials can cause cancer, but we have some idea. According to the EPA, toxic fumes released into our air due to cleaning products are three times more likely to cause cancer than other air pollutants. Air inside American houses is an average of two to five times (and can be up to 100 times) more polluted than the air outside, mostly the result of mainstream cleaning products- that means by simply breathing inside our homes, we're increasing our risk of cancer. Largely because of this, housewives have a 55% higher rate of cancer than women who work outside the home- and all thanks to chemicals we've used to keep ourselves "clean" and "healthy"!
Aside from containing probable carcinogens, known side effects of mainstream cleaning products are central nervous system damage, headaches, confusion, symptoms of mental illness, joint pain, chronic fatigue, birth defects, kidney and liver poisoning (sometimes damaging enough to cause death), allergic reactions, respiratory tract irritation and distress, and death for asthmatics. In Washington State, for example, 6% of janitors suffered injuries from cleaning products that were so bad they had to miss work. 10% of poison control calls deal with injuries due to cleaning products- mainly from children under six. Many chemicals in cleaning products can be stored in fatty tissues and passed on through mother's milk. Here is a full list of health and environmental effects of mainstream cleaning products.
And they do get into our environment, with staggering consequences. As of 2002, two thirds of our streams contained damaging pollutants from cleaning products. Chlorinated materials can form other compounds, like DDT, which are stored in fatty tissues of organisms, take a long time to be broken down, and are passed up the food chain in increasingly higher concentrations. Petroleum-based products (toilet cleaner, detergent, glass cleaner, etc) use non-renewable resources which cause impurities in our water supply. EDTA, a chemical found in all-purpose cleaners, binds to heavy metals in lakes, activating the metals.
Phosphates are one of the worst culprits in mainstream cleaning product pollution. They are ingredients in mainstream laundry detergent as well as a variety of cleaning products. They cause "algae blooms" which suffocate surrounding wildlife, killing off fish and shellfish populations, turning bodies of water the color of pea soup, and causing giant "dead zones" in which only the most primitive bacteria and algae can survive. From an anthropocentric perspective, they hurt local economies by eliminating incomes related to tourism, fishing, and shellfish sales. Phosphates are so dangerous that eleven states have banned them. This is great news for the environment, but most of the country still allows the use of this highly damaging ingredient! Here is more information on phosphates and other effects of mainstream cleaning products.
The moral of the story, folks, is that pretty much all mainstream cleaning products contain at least one ingredient which is considered hazardous waste. If you're not willing to contain this ingredient after use for disposal at a hazardous waste facility, you should probably be using something else to clean your toilet, windows, countertops, clothes, and dishes.
So what can we do?
As my Dad always taught me about capitalism, we can vote with our feet. Here is a list of biodegradable, environmentally safe cleaning products. Of course, this works best if you contact the companies whose brands you used to buy, and let them know why you're leaving. The good news is, many people are already doing this! The natural household cleaning market is growing by 18-25% each year. This is still only one percent of the total cleaning market, but it's progress!
We can contact our elected officials and ask them to support a ban on phosphate use, as eleven states have already done. We can also request that the government itself switch to use natural cleaning products. The city of Santa Monica did this in 1994, in 15 of 17 cleaning product categories, eliminating the purchase of 1.5 tons of hazardous waste per year, and saving itself 5% of its previous cleaning budget to boot!
We can urge our places of employment to switch to environmentally friendly cleaning products, especially by pointing out the savings Santa Monica's city government experienced when it did so.
We can tell our friends. There are some very simple cleaning solutions which involve environmentally safe products you and your friends probably have lying around your houses anyway. The Worldwatch site on cleaning products, which has been helpful throughout this post, contains some excellent and easy ideas for "greening" your cleaning routine. (It's at the bottom, titled "Simple Things You Can Do.")
Good luck!
Most commercially available cleaning products contain materials that are considered hazardous waste by the U.S. government. Hazardous waste use normally requires a license and some means of proper disposal, but use in households across our nation goes on unchecked, polluting our water supply, our air, and our bodies. Laundry detergent, for example, contains a chemical so toxic that it can be used as a pesticide. What's worse, the worst, most toxic chemicals may not be on the label-- the government protects the companies from revealing their "trade secrets." But that's only an issue if you bother to read the label- and can understand what each ingredient means and does! My guess is that most people (myself included) have been filling their houses with toxic chemicals with no idea what's in them.
One major concern is cancer. Before the industrial revolution, 1 in 8,000 people had cancer. Today that number is 1 in 3. We still don't know for sure which materials can cause cancer, but we have some idea. According to the EPA, toxic fumes released into our air due to cleaning products are three times more likely to cause cancer than other air pollutants. Air inside American houses is an average of two to five times (and can be up to 100 times) more polluted than the air outside, mostly the result of mainstream cleaning products- that means by simply breathing inside our homes, we're increasing our risk of cancer. Largely because of this, housewives have a 55% higher rate of cancer than women who work outside the home- and all thanks to chemicals we've used to keep ourselves "clean" and "healthy"!
Aside from containing probable carcinogens, known side effects of mainstream cleaning products are central nervous system damage, headaches, confusion, symptoms of mental illness, joint pain, chronic fatigue, birth defects, kidney and liver poisoning (sometimes damaging enough to cause death), allergic reactions, respiratory tract irritation and distress, and death for asthmatics. In Washington State, for example, 6% of janitors suffered injuries from cleaning products that were so bad they had to miss work. 10% of poison control calls deal with injuries due to cleaning products- mainly from children under six. Many chemicals in cleaning products can be stored in fatty tissues and passed on through mother's milk. Here is a full list of health and environmental effects of mainstream cleaning products.
And they do get into our environment, with staggering consequences. As of 2002, two thirds of our streams contained damaging pollutants from cleaning products. Chlorinated materials can form other compounds, like DDT, which are stored in fatty tissues of organisms, take a long time to be broken down, and are passed up the food chain in increasingly higher concentrations. Petroleum-based products (toilet cleaner, detergent, glass cleaner, etc) use non-renewable resources which cause impurities in our water supply. EDTA, a chemical found in all-purpose cleaners, binds to heavy metals in lakes, activating the metals.
Phosphates are one of the worst culprits in mainstream cleaning product pollution. They are ingredients in mainstream laundry detergent as well as a variety of cleaning products. They cause "algae blooms" which suffocate surrounding wildlife, killing off fish and shellfish populations, turning bodies of water the color of pea soup, and causing giant "dead zones" in which only the most primitive bacteria and algae can survive. From an anthropocentric perspective, they hurt local economies by eliminating incomes related to tourism, fishing, and shellfish sales. Phosphates are so dangerous that eleven states have banned them. This is great news for the environment, but most of the country still allows the use of this highly damaging ingredient! Here is more information on phosphates and other effects of mainstream cleaning products.
The moral of the story, folks, is that pretty much all mainstream cleaning products contain at least one ingredient which is considered hazardous waste. If you're not willing to contain this ingredient after use for disposal at a hazardous waste facility, you should probably be using something else to clean your toilet, windows, countertops, clothes, and dishes.
So what can we do?
As my Dad always taught me about capitalism, we can vote with our feet. Here is a list of biodegradable, environmentally safe cleaning products. Of course, this works best if you contact the companies whose brands you used to buy, and let them know why you're leaving. The good news is, many people are already doing this! The natural household cleaning market is growing by 18-25% each year. This is still only one percent of the total cleaning market, but it's progress!
We can contact our elected officials and ask them to support a ban on phosphate use, as eleven states have already done. We can also request that the government itself switch to use natural cleaning products. The city of Santa Monica did this in 1994, in 15 of 17 cleaning product categories, eliminating the purchase of 1.5 tons of hazardous waste per year, and saving itself 5% of its previous cleaning budget to boot!
We can urge our places of employment to switch to environmentally friendly cleaning products, especially by pointing out the savings Santa Monica's city government experienced when it did so.
We can tell our friends. There are some very simple cleaning solutions which involve environmentally safe products you and your friends probably have lying around your houses anyway. The Worldwatch site on cleaning products, which has been helpful throughout this post, contains some excellent and easy ideas for "greening" your cleaning routine. (It's at the bottom, titled "Simple Things You Can Do.")
Good luck!
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Pharmaceuticals in our Drinking Water
On Monday, one of the cover stories in the Express (a publication of the Washington Post) announced the alarming discovery of “six commonly used drugs” in the District of Columbia’s water supply. The discovery was the result of a study by the Associated Press, which found that pharmaceuticals were present in the water supplies of at least 41 million Americans. The drugs discovered in DC water included caffeine, naproxen, and ibuprofen. In many other cities across the nation other drugs, including sex hormones (from drugs like birth control and Viagra), were also found.
Reading this article made me very angry. Unlike the average express reader, I was not angered by the news that the water I drink could be harmful to my health; I had accepted that long ago. I was furious that what should already be common knowledge was presented as new, and that a public that should be better informed instead reacted with such surprise. I have known for years that our over-medicated species has been poisoning our waters, ourselves, and wildlife. I was disappointed that the AP article was narrowly focused on the effects these drugs could potentially have on human health, with only passing mentions of the well-documented ill effects drugs in small concentrations have on wildlife around the nation.
If you perused any of the articles covering this story, you will have read that when we take medications, ANY medications, the body does not metabolize the entire dose. What is left exits the body and enters the water cycle. Pharmaceuticals (as well as many other dangerous or toxic compounds such as flame retardants) enter the water system despite wastewater treatment, because current wastewater treatment practices do not remove them. A 2004 study by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that between 11 and 17 organic wastewater-related contaminants (OWCs) remained in wastewater after treatment.
It has been proven that these chemicals have drastic consequences for aquatic life. The September 2007 issue of Environmental Health News summarized a paper by Filby et. al. which studied the effects of one estrogen found in wastewater (17α- ethinylestradiol) on minnows. They found that exposure to wastewater containing estrogen caused “male fish to start producing egg yolk,” effected the blood concentration of hormones, and changed the expression of genes necessary for synthesizing hormones. The minnows also experiences a “decrease [in] the size of testes and alter[ation of] secondary sex characters, including coloration and behavior.”
A 2004 study by Nash et. al. studied the effects of estrogen on zebra fish by exposing them to environmentally relevant concentrations of estrogen. Fish which were exposed for only 40 days did not suffer significant effects, but lifelong exposure caused complete population failure with no fertilization, as the exposure caused the males to lack functional testes and instead have either undifferentiated or inter-sex gonads.
In the media coverage of the AP study, it was frequently mentioned that the effects of drugs at such low concentrations had not been studied in depth in humans, which as far as I can tell is a fair assessment. Still, if one drug can render a fish sterile in 2-5 years (the lifespan of a zebra fish), I cannot imagine what 30 or more years of exposure to a cocktail of drugs could do to people or other wildlife, despite the low concentrations. And, by the way, you can’t escape by drinking bottled water. Most bottling companies filter their water using the same technology as the wastewater plants, and that “pure” spring they draw from is likely already contaminated.
Now I try to keep my blog postings as hopeful as possible, but unfortunately as of yet there is no cost-effective or practical solution. The only successful methods of removing these compounds during wastewater treatment, such as reverse-osmosis, are prohibitively expensive to be performed on all the wastewater generated in the nation. Furthermore, our still rapidly growing world population depends greatly on pharmaceutical birth control, which is more effective than other methods. In order to develop a solution, more research is necessary into improved wastewater treatment technology, and into better drugs that are more efficiently metabolized by the body or have fewer consequences outside it. And of course, little difference though it will make, I know I am going to be thinking a lot more carefully about whether or not I actually need that 4 pm Tylenol.
Another interesting study on the effects of chemicals on frogs can be found here.
And a side note: The antibiotics that end up in our wastewater (whether the penicillin you took for your last infection or the Clorox you used to whiten your towels) contribute to the evolution of drug-resistant strains of bacteria and viruses. While somewhat unlikely, it is possible that our over-zealous need to be “clean” could create a resistant and deadly strain of germ.
Reading this article made me very angry. Unlike the average express reader, I was not angered by the news that the water I drink could be harmful to my health; I had accepted that long ago. I was furious that what should already be common knowledge was presented as new, and that a public that should be better informed instead reacted with such surprise. I have known for years that our over-medicated species has been poisoning our waters, ourselves, and wildlife. I was disappointed that the AP article was narrowly focused on the effects these drugs could potentially have on human health, with only passing mentions of the well-documented ill effects drugs in small concentrations have on wildlife around the nation.
If you perused any of the articles covering this story, you will have read that when we take medications, ANY medications, the body does not metabolize the entire dose. What is left exits the body and enters the water cycle. Pharmaceuticals (as well as many other dangerous or toxic compounds such as flame retardants) enter the water system despite wastewater treatment, because current wastewater treatment practices do not remove them. A 2004 study by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that between 11 and 17 organic wastewater-related contaminants (OWCs) remained in wastewater after treatment.
It has been proven that these chemicals have drastic consequences for aquatic life. The September 2007 issue of Environmental Health News summarized a paper by Filby et. al. which studied the effects of one estrogen found in wastewater (17α- ethinylestradiol) on minnows. They found that exposure to wastewater containing estrogen caused “male fish to start producing egg yolk,” effected the blood concentration of hormones, and changed the expression of genes necessary for synthesizing hormones. The minnows also experiences a “decrease [in] the size of testes and alter[ation of] secondary sex characters, including coloration and behavior.”
A 2004 study by Nash et. al. studied the effects of estrogen on zebra fish by exposing them to environmentally relevant concentrations of estrogen. Fish which were exposed for only 40 days did not suffer significant effects, but lifelong exposure caused complete population failure with no fertilization, as the exposure caused the males to lack functional testes and instead have either undifferentiated or inter-sex gonads.
In the media coverage of the AP study, it was frequently mentioned that the effects of drugs at such low concentrations had not been studied in depth in humans, which as far as I can tell is a fair assessment. Still, if one drug can render a fish sterile in 2-5 years (the lifespan of a zebra fish), I cannot imagine what 30 or more years of exposure to a cocktail of drugs could do to people or other wildlife, despite the low concentrations. And, by the way, you can’t escape by drinking bottled water. Most bottling companies filter their water using the same technology as the wastewater plants, and that “pure” spring they draw from is likely already contaminated.
Now I try to keep my blog postings as hopeful as possible, but unfortunately as of yet there is no cost-effective or practical solution. The only successful methods of removing these compounds during wastewater treatment, such as reverse-osmosis, are prohibitively expensive to be performed on all the wastewater generated in the nation. Furthermore, our still rapidly growing world population depends greatly on pharmaceutical birth control, which is more effective than other methods. In order to develop a solution, more research is necessary into improved wastewater treatment technology, and into better drugs that are more efficiently metabolized by the body or have fewer consequences outside it. And of course, little difference though it will make, I know I am going to be thinking a lot more carefully about whether or not I actually need that 4 pm Tylenol.
Another interesting study on the effects of chemicals on frogs can be found here.
And a side note: The antibiotics that end up in our wastewater (whether the penicillin you took for your last infection or the Clorox you used to whiten your towels) contribute to the evolution of drug-resistant strains of bacteria and viruses. While somewhat unlikely, it is possible that our over-zealous need to be “clean” could create a resistant and deadly strain of germ.
Monday, March 10, 2008
TAMPONS
This past Saturday, March 8, was International Women's Day. I asked my boyfriend, "What are you doing for me today?" He studied abroad in Cuba, which, like all communist countries, actually celebrates the holiday. Apparently, it didn't make a big impression on him, though. "Treating you well, just like I do every day" he replied. "Aw, that's sweet," I said, "but in Poland they give the women flowers."*
Clearly, I had to find another way to celebrate. So I put on my comfiest pj's, curled up in bed and read a large portion of Our Bodies Ourselves. One section discussed menstrual products ("sanitary napkins"), and touched very briefly upon their environmental impact, which is huge.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, this is a post about menstruation. PERIODS! TAMPONS! PADS! BLOOD! VAGINA! Ok, I think I've gotten it all out of the way. Hopefully, some of you are still with me, especially the ladies, since this is an International Women's Day special just for us (fellas can read if they want.... if they all haven't abandoned ship by now). I know this is a topic that's considered taboo or at least impolite, embarrassing, or awkward--but it's precisely because people find it hard to talk about that menstrual product activism hasn't taken off. It's because it's not a "sexy" cause that the fairly easily relieved environmental impact is still so great. So let's talk about it.
If you use 20 pads or tampons per period, and have your period once a month from age 12 to 47, that's 8,400 pads and tampons in your lifetime. There are three billion of us (women) on earth, and about 150 million of us in the United States... that's a lot of pads and tampons. Unfortunately, many tampons are flushed down the toilet, which means that tampons (and applicators) often litter the water of our beaches. Many tampon applicators are plastic, which means they don't biodegrade (mainstream tampons biodegrade in six months). Mainstream pads also come wrapped in plastic, and are lined along the bottom in plastic, which means they have a permanent place of honor in our landfills. In addition, those pads and tampons had to come from somewhere- cotton farms that could be left as forests or used to grow corn for biofuel or any number of other products, lessening the burden on the land.
Furthermore, we have the issue of dioxins. The wood pulp used to make mainstream tampons and pads is bleached early in the process. There is no reason for this use of chlorine, which then pollutes the earth, except to make the tampons and pads seem "clean" and "fresh"- the irony is delicious, no? The bleaching process leaves behind dioxins as a byproduct- dioxins are considered by the FDA to be likely cancer-causing agents. The bleach-dioxins add to the dioxins already in the cotton from pesticide use during growth. Our vaginae (Blogger is telling me the Latin plural is correct for vagina) are more sensitive and absorbent than most other parts of our bodies. Why expose them to poisons when we don't have to- why take risks we can easily avoid?
Oh, and did I mention pads increase the risk of yeast infections?
Now, before I talk about solutions, I feel I should 'fess up to something: I am a part of the problem. Yes, I am a mainstreamer, a Tampax and Always woman. I'm helping fill the landfills and possibly poisoning my body in the process. But, after researching these solutions, I am resolved to try at least one of them. Who knows, perhaps in a couple months I'll be able to write an entry about how each possible "solution" to the menstrual product environmental problem feels and functions. I'm all for saving the environment, but I also like wearing bathing suits and playing soccer.
Before I get into each possible solution, here's the link to the Our Bodies Ourselves page about these products. One other note: props to my housemate Emily for having tried many of these products and telling me all about them.
1. The solution that requires the least change but also creates the least change (but a lot better than no change!) is using organic 100% cotton tampons and pads. This gets rid of the chlorine/dioxin problem, and the plastic applicators, wrap, and lining. It doesn't reduce our use of cotton, but it minimizes the environmental effects post-use, because they're 100% biodegradable. Emily says they work well and she's never had a problem with leakage (which I thought might be a concern because there's no plastic lining on the bottom). The pads are a little thicker than mainstream pads, and the cotton can start to separate a little if you've been wearing it for a while or moving around a lot. The tampons are a little drier than mainstream ones. But hey, they're less likely to give you cancer! I saw an Amazon.com listing for a 12 pack of 20-tampon boxes (that's 240 tampons) for about $50. That's a good deal, and let's be honest- we've got pretty good biological evidence that we'll use them all eventually. I'll probably choose to buy some organic cotton tampons and pads, just as a back up in case the other "solutions" I try don't work out in all situations. The devil you know, right?
2. Reusable pads. An example of this is GladRags. They're made out of cloth (you can even make them yourself from old clothing!) and consist of an outer layer that's shaped vaguely like a mainstream, winged pad. the "wings" snap together under your underwear, holding the pad in place, and there's a slot into which you can insert little cloth fillers (about the size and shape of panty-liners). You can put a different number of fillers in (or none) depending on how heavy your flow is that day. There is a bigger reusable pad for overnight. When you want to change it, you just wash out the main pad and the fillers. Apparently they're really comfortable, although they are thick, because they wrap all the way around to snap underneath. Bonus for gardeners and people who don't share bathrooms with others who might get freaked out: if you soak the pad in water in a jar or something before washing it, you can use the menstruation-water to fertilize your garden. It looks like the day pads are around $10-15 each, and the overnight pads are $15-20. You can also make some for yourself for FREE (my favorite word!), if you're up for an environmental craft project. They last for five years, at least. Reusable pads sound really cool to me, especially since you can make them out of recycled materials, but... I do my laundry as rarely as possibly, so I don't know if this is a good choice for me.
3. Cups. Check out keeper.com for more details (and nifty visuals)- Keeper is the most common brand of menstrual cup. It a gum-rubber or silicone (for those allergic to latex) cup with a little stem coming out the bottom. You fold the cup twice, insert it in your vagina, then pull gently down on the stem. It suctions in place and you can even use it while you're swimming. The cup holds about an ounce of fluid- and most women only menstruate four or five ounces. The website says you might end up changing it twice a day (just pull it out--upright--then tip it over into the toilet), but I'd probably empty it each time I was in the bathroom. You can wash it with soap and water, and between periods you can store it in a little cloth bag they give to you. I have no idea how this feels, but the website mentioned that some women choose to cut off up to half of the "stem" for comfort. The Keeper costs $35, lasts for ten years, and is available on their site or in Whole Foods and other stores. I think this is the one I'm going to try first.
4. The Sea Pearl. This is a reusable tampon made out of a sea sponge. Unfortunately, our seas are even more polluted than our land, and that pollution can become concentrated in organisms like sea sponges. Our Bodies Ourselves said that because of this, many women who us the Sea Pearl choose to boil it in water for ten minutes before first use. Elle Bee (EO's resident environmental scientist), please tell me- does that actually work? Does boiling things remove pollutants? Apparently the boiling makes it slightly smaller and less flexible each time you do it. You can clean them by boiling them, soaking them in vinegar, or some other options. They last about six months, and cost about $5 each from GladRags. I don't know anyone who's personally tried sea sponge tampons. I probably won't try it, because of the pollution thing.
That's all I've got. Remember to check out the Our Bodies Ourselves page for more info on these products, as well as others I didn't mention because I'm getting tired. I hope you had a happy International Women's Day!
*Please note: my boyfriend is awesome and this story about him is merely for comedic effect.
Clearly, I had to find another way to celebrate. So I put on my comfiest pj's, curled up in bed and read a large portion of Our Bodies Ourselves. One section discussed menstrual products ("sanitary napkins"), and touched very briefly upon their environmental impact, which is huge.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, this is a post about menstruation. PERIODS! TAMPONS! PADS! BLOOD! VAGINA! Ok, I think I've gotten it all out of the way. Hopefully, some of you are still with me, especially the ladies, since this is an International Women's Day special just for us (fellas can read if they want.... if they all haven't abandoned ship by now). I know this is a topic that's considered taboo or at least impolite, embarrassing, or awkward--but it's precisely because people find it hard to talk about that menstrual product activism hasn't taken off. It's because it's not a "sexy" cause that the fairly easily relieved environmental impact is still so great. So let's talk about it.
If you use 20 pads or tampons per period, and have your period once a month from age 12 to 47, that's 8,400 pads and tampons in your lifetime. There are three billion of us (women) on earth, and about 150 million of us in the United States... that's a lot of pads and tampons. Unfortunately, many tampons are flushed down the toilet, which means that tampons (and applicators) often litter the water of our beaches. Many tampon applicators are plastic, which means they don't biodegrade (mainstream tampons biodegrade in six months). Mainstream pads also come wrapped in plastic, and are lined along the bottom in plastic, which means they have a permanent place of honor in our landfills. In addition, those pads and tampons had to come from somewhere- cotton farms that could be left as forests or used to grow corn for biofuel or any number of other products, lessening the burden on the land.
Furthermore, we have the issue of dioxins. The wood pulp used to make mainstream tampons and pads is bleached early in the process. There is no reason for this use of chlorine, which then pollutes the earth, except to make the tampons and pads seem "clean" and "fresh"- the irony is delicious, no? The bleaching process leaves behind dioxins as a byproduct- dioxins are considered by the FDA to be likely cancer-causing agents. The bleach-dioxins add to the dioxins already in the cotton from pesticide use during growth. Our vaginae (Blogger is telling me the Latin plural is correct for vagina) are more sensitive and absorbent than most other parts of our bodies. Why expose them to poisons when we don't have to- why take risks we can easily avoid?
Oh, and did I mention pads increase the risk of yeast infections?
Now, before I talk about solutions, I feel I should 'fess up to something: I am a part of the problem. Yes, I am a mainstreamer, a Tampax and Always woman. I'm helping fill the landfills and possibly poisoning my body in the process. But, after researching these solutions, I am resolved to try at least one of them. Who knows, perhaps in a couple months I'll be able to write an entry about how each possible "solution" to the menstrual product environmental problem feels and functions. I'm all for saving the environment, but I also like wearing bathing suits and playing soccer.
Before I get into each possible solution, here's the link to the Our Bodies Ourselves page about these products. One other note: props to my housemate Emily for having tried many of these products and telling me all about them.
1. The solution that requires the least change but also creates the least change (but a lot better than no change!) is using organic 100% cotton tampons and pads. This gets rid of the chlorine/dioxin problem, and the plastic applicators, wrap, and lining. It doesn't reduce our use of cotton, but it minimizes the environmental effects post-use, because they're 100% biodegradable. Emily says they work well and she's never had a problem with leakage (which I thought might be a concern because there's no plastic lining on the bottom). The pads are a little thicker than mainstream pads, and the cotton can start to separate a little if you've been wearing it for a while or moving around a lot. The tampons are a little drier than mainstream ones. But hey, they're less likely to give you cancer! I saw an Amazon.com listing for a 12 pack of 20-tampon boxes (that's 240 tampons) for about $50. That's a good deal, and let's be honest- we've got pretty good biological evidence that we'll use them all eventually. I'll probably choose to buy some organic cotton tampons and pads, just as a back up in case the other "solutions" I try don't work out in all situations. The devil you know, right?
2. Reusable pads. An example of this is GladRags. They're made out of cloth (you can even make them yourself from old clothing!) and consist of an outer layer that's shaped vaguely like a mainstream, winged pad. the "wings" snap together under your underwear, holding the pad in place, and there's a slot into which you can insert little cloth fillers (about the size and shape of panty-liners). You can put a different number of fillers in (or none) depending on how heavy your flow is that day. There is a bigger reusable pad for overnight. When you want to change it, you just wash out the main pad and the fillers. Apparently they're really comfortable, although they are thick, because they wrap all the way around to snap underneath. Bonus for gardeners and people who don't share bathrooms with others who might get freaked out: if you soak the pad in water in a jar or something before washing it, you can use the menstruation-water to fertilize your garden. It looks like the day pads are around $10-15 each, and the overnight pads are $15-20. You can also make some for yourself for FREE (my favorite word!), if you're up for an environmental craft project. They last for five years, at least. Reusable pads sound really cool to me, especially since you can make them out of recycled materials, but... I do my laundry as rarely as possibly, so I don't know if this is a good choice for me.
3. Cups. Check out keeper.com for more details (and nifty visuals)- Keeper is the most common brand of menstrual cup. It a gum-rubber or silicone (for those allergic to latex) cup with a little stem coming out the bottom. You fold the cup twice, insert it in your vagina, then pull gently down on the stem. It suctions in place and you can even use it while you're swimming. The cup holds about an ounce of fluid- and most women only menstruate four or five ounces. The website says you might end up changing it twice a day (just pull it out--upright--then tip it over into the toilet), but I'd probably empty it each time I was in the bathroom. You can wash it with soap and water, and between periods you can store it in a little cloth bag they give to you. I have no idea how this feels, but the website mentioned that some women choose to cut off up to half of the "stem" for comfort. The Keeper costs $35, lasts for ten years, and is available on their site or in Whole Foods and other stores. I think this is the one I'm going to try first.
4. The Sea Pearl. This is a reusable tampon made out of a sea sponge. Unfortunately, our seas are even more polluted than our land, and that pollution can become concentrated in organisms like sea sponges. Our Bodies Ourselves said that because of this, many women who us the Sea Pearl choose to boil it in water for ten minutes before first use. Elle Bee (EO's resident environmental scientist), please tell me- does that actually work? Does boiling things remove pollutants? Apparently the boiling makes it slightly smaller and less flexible each time you do it. You can clean them by boiling them, soaking them in vinegar, or some other options. They last about six months, and cost about $5 each from GladRags. I don't know anyone who's personally tried sea sponge tampons. I probably won't try it, because of the pollution thing.
That's all I've got. Remember to check out the Our Bodies Ourselves page for more info on these products, as well as others I didn't mention because I'm getting tired. I hope you had a happy International Women's Day!
*Please note: my boyfriend is awesome and this story about him is merely for comedic effect.
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