|
Green Shopping
 How to
Become a Green Consumer
Shopping Stories
Shopping is one of the most interesting ways to learn about the
environment. Everything we buy from food, to clothing to household
goods to cars has a fascinating story of human creativity, of
ingredients from many places, of processes to put those ingredients
together, of fuel to allow those processes to run, and of ways
of getting them from the manufacturer to you, the consumer.
 By looking closely at any ordinary item used every day, it
is possible to write an unsuspected environmental story. In these
days of "globalization" the environmental stories of
the things we use are very different from what they were even 50
years ago. Many are made in other countries, sometimes on the other
side of the earth. For some products, the ingredients and the parts
needed to make them have traveled around the world several times
before the finished product is ready to be shipped to a store where
you can buy it. And nearly all of the things we buy use fossil
fuels coal and gas to produce energy, oil for making plastics
and lubricants, and gasoline, diesel and kerosene for transportation,
to name a few.
The
environmental story of a product tells us the story of its whole
life, from "cradle to grave" as some people who study
products put it. And the story of product's life includes all the
ways it touches the natural environment. How if affects the air,
the water, plants, animals, ecosystems, the oceans and rivers,
the soil, and human health: you.
Shopping, Energy and Climate Change
We live in a time when we often hear "Shopping is
good!." And it is. Everyone enjoys shopping and the
pleasure of having new things. But as residents of the planet
Earth we now face a new problem called climate change. As responsible
citizens we need to take a look at how shopping, energy use and
climate change are connected, and learn how to make choices that
make sense for our future. One way to do that is to look at the
environmental stories of shopping.
A big part in almost any product's environmental story is fossil
fuel. Fossil fuels are the everyday energy sources we've come to
rely on coal, oil and gas. They give us the energy from the carbon
of plants fossilized under the grounds many millions of years ago.
We now know that burning fossil fuels, although it supplies a remarkable
amount of easily-obtained energy, is changing the mix of gases
in the Earth's atmosphere. We also know that fossils fuels are
non-renewable we can't replace them in our lifetimes. So the
more we use, the sooner they will be used up.
Most scientists now agree that the addition to our atmosphere
of carbon dioxide produced in burning fossil fuels is causing global
temperatures to rise. Rising temperatures are causing changes in
the Earth's climate, from which the term climate change has been
adopted to describe this worrying trend. This is a global problem
that can only be solved through the cooperation of all countries
and people on Earth.
Keeping the Planet Healthy We Can All Help
With over six billion people on the Earth, it is a challenge
to plan how we would like to keep the planet healthy in this new
century. While that sounds like a big project, it is important
to know that every individual has a part in making decisions that
determine the way things will go.
Writing the environmental stories of things is a way to become
aware of how every purchase is a decision that determines
the future health of the planet. It makes shopping a much more
important and interesting activity.
The Environmental
Stories of …Things
 What are the elements of the environmental stories of Things?
Much like the stories of any lives, they begin with where they
began, and follow them through their growth, travel, experiences,
and ultimate end.
How many ways did they touch the natural environment? And why
does that matter to us all?
Asking good questions is a way to decide what's in a story. Here
are some good questions to ask when writing the environmental stories
of things:
Note: Educated guessing is a very important part
of environmental story-writing. You won't know the answers
exactly but you will be right about more things than you
might expect. And the more you discuss the things you're not
sure of with other people, the more you will come closer to
the answers.
- What is this Thing made of? (List all the ingredients as best
you can.)
- Where did this Thing begin its life: where do its materials
come from? A forest, an ocean, a mine, a farm field, a factory
farm? In what country (for example)?
- What did mining/growing/fishing for/logging for this Thing's
ingredients do to the place and the ecosystems (animals, plants)
the materials came from?
- What kind of processing was used to make this Thing: chemicals
used? energy used? wastes put into local water, air and soil
(what are the environmental regulations in the place where the
processing was done?) How much water was used? How much solid
waste needed disposal, and where could it go? How safe is it
for the workers who make it?
- What kind of packaging does this Thing come in? What kind of
packaging materials does it use, where did those materials come
from? How many chemicals did it take the make the packaging materials?
How far did the packaging travel to get to the factory where
the product was made and put into it?
- How far did this Thing travel in its life: all the different
steps - the raw materials to the processing plants, the processed
ingredients to their assembly point, the packaged product to
a warehouse, then to a retail outlet, then to your house, then
to the recycling facility or landfill where it ended up?
- How many steps of this Thing's life took fossil fuel products coal,
oil, gas, plastic, fertilizer-pesticides-herbicides (which takes
lots of fossil fuels to produce), diesel fuel, gasoline, kerosene,
asphalt roads to produce or move it? You won't be able put
a number on this, but how many steps in the process will
give you an idea of how many times a product has given off carbon
dioxide emissions that contribute to climate change.
- How much carbon dioxide did this Thing produce in it's life
(this is especially important for cars)?
- And lastly,
where does it go and what does it do when I no longer need
it? How does the disposal of a product all of its ingredients touch
the natural environment and ecosystems? What greenhouse gases
are produced as a result of disposing of Things (trucks to landfill,
methane from decomposing organic materials, emissions from incineration,
etc.) Can it be recycled so the parts or ingredients can be remanufactured
into something else? And are Things cheaper or more expensive
when they have recycled content (e.g., recycled paper is much
more expensive than paper made from newly-cut trees how does
that affect people's shopping choices?)
- And then, some questions on the Thing's characteristics: was
it made to last a long time? Or be updated and replaced in a
year or two? Is it reparable? It is possible to get an extended
warranty for replacement or repair? How long does its life compare
to one that my parents would have bought when they were younger?
Is it designed with "built-in obsolescence" as a feature so
it will be out of fashion or no longer working in quite a short
time to encourage purchase of another one?
 The answers to these questions have a lot to do with climate change.
If everyone gets 5 of a product over their adult life instead of
one, and all of those Things are imported instead of made in one's
own country, the carbon dioxide emissions are much greater.
Think
in multiples. It matters what you do… because
what if everybody did the same?
- How many plastic bags do you think you throw away
every year (remember, they're made of oil, a non-renewable
resource)?
- Now
multiply by 300 million Americans and 33 million Canadians?
- Where do all those plastic bags go?
- How many plastic bags do North Americans throw away every
year?
- Just multiply, and try to make an educated guess.
- (Then you can do the same exercise with running shoes,
newspapers, computers.)
Green Shopping
 There are things you can do to reduce the climate change contributions
of shopping. It's very helpful to know the basics of what to think
about and what to ask when you shop.
Here are some good rules of thumb for improved ratings
on how the Things you buy affect the environment and climate change.
- Buy local products. This saves greenhouse
gases from transportation local products traveled a shorter
distance (compare the carbon dioxide produced in transportation
for an Ontario apple and a New Zealand apple)
- Buy products that contain recycled content. Recycled
content means natural resources have been saved from waste,
and new ones don't need to be extracted saving on carbon dioxide
emissions
- Buy organic food
products. No poisonous chemicals have been used to grow
them. Farm chemicals fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides use
a lot of fossil fuel to produce. So organic foods save carbon
dioxide by reducing fossil fuel use. They're healthier too for
both you and soil.
- Buy things that are durable. That means well-made
and long-lasting. It costs more at the time, but it saves money
in the long term. Buying durable goods saves natural resources,
fuel for processing the ingredients of replacements, and the
energy it takes to dispose of the old one.
- Eat a little less meat. Producing meat uses
a lot of water and a lot of grain grown with chemical fertilizers.
Eating more local vegetables saves carbon dioxide in several
different ways. It's very healthy, too!
- Bring your own reusable bag. Factories around
the world churned out a whopping 45 trillion plastic
shopping bags in 2002, ranging from large trash bags to thick
shopping totes to flimsy grocery sacks. That's a lot of oil
used to make the plastic which you may use for one trip and
then throw away.
What's Green about "green" products?
Some features of environmentally-friendly products are that they
have:
- Energy-conserving features
- Minimal packaging
- Recyclable materials
- Alternative fuel use
- Compact size (save energy & resources)
- Non-polluting uses
- Renewable resource ingredients
- Non-toxic ingredients
- No genetically engineered (GE) ingredients
- No poisonous chemicals used in their cultivation (organic foods)
- No CFCs or ozone-depleting aerosols
 Green products are:
- Durable, reusable many times or long-lasting
- Repairable
- Biodegradable
- Grown
without damaging local habitat (e.g., organic foods, shade-grown
coffee)
- Humane to animals, or animal-free
- Solar or wind powered
- Made from sustainably logged lumber
- Manufactured in "green" factories (e.g., using ecologically
sound, sustainable closed-loop systems)
- Water-conserving
Look for green products features to help reduce your Shopping
Footprint!
 The
distance things travel is a big factor in carbon dioxide creation.
Check where things you buy were made or grown, and guess how many
kilometers of distance it was transported -- burning fossil fuels.
Remember that buying local saves carbon
dioxide!
Developing Environmentally-Friendly
Consumer Behaviour
Writing the environmental stories of products often makes
people wish to find greener substitutes. As consumers become more
aware of the environmental impacts of products and processes, they
ask more questions about how to find environmentally-friendly ones.
A good example is organic food food produced without chemical
fertilizers and pesticides. Only a few years ago organic food was
only available in alternative health food stores. But now it is
becoming
much more popular in mainstream grocery stores and specialty stores.
More shoppers are now aware that organic food is good for heatlh.
Green Shoppping Ideas
One way to become more familiar with the qualities that make shopping
green is to browse some green shopping web sites. The following
are some websites that offer a wide range of products and services
that have been selected for their environmentally-friendly qualities:
- Eco-Mall http://www.ecomall.com
- Eco-Mall is a US site which provides links to hundreds
of other sites that offer green products. This site also
offer inks
to magazines, companies, eco-tourism, investments, natural
health and many other activities that have taken an environmentally-conscious
direction in their work.
An additional feature is an In-House
Resource section, which
features a list of articles, quotes, information, environmental
projects,
and additional useful links. Eco-Mall donates 3% of its revenues
to environmental causes.
- The Good and Plenty Green Shopping Directory http://www.mothernaturefanclub.com/Good_Plenty.htm
- This directory offers a good description of what it means
to be a "green consumer." It then lists environmentally-friendly
products by categories which include such Home, Energy, Kids, Garden,
Media, Non-Toxic and Services.
- Coffee The Real Price of Your Daily Fix http://www.worldwatch.org/pubs/goodstuff/coffee
- The World Watch Institute, famous for their annual "State
of the World" environmental reports, offer some interesting
background on the environmental (and social) costs of drinking
coffee every morning. And the importance
of the "fair trade" movement.
- The World's Top 40 Greenest Products http://www.biothinking.com/top40.htm
- This is a neat collection of products from a website called "biothinking." They
offer excellent examples of good use of design for environmental
problem-solving.
- Cleanology http://www.mothernaturefanclub.com/Cleanology.htm
- Another directory from the above web site focuses on the
future of green energy processes a central part of climate
change mitigation.
- Terra Choice Canadian Environmental Choice Program http://www.environmentalchoice.com/index_main.cfm
- The Environmental Choice Program provides a list of certified
green Canadian products, identified with the EcoLogo.
- International Fair Trade Association www.ifat.org
- Provides information about fair-trade co-operatives and associations
worldwide and offers a catalog of sources of fair-trade products,
including coffee.
- Consumer's Choice Council www.consumerscouncil.org
- An association of environmental, consumer, and human rights organizations
dedicated to protecting the environment and promoting human rights
through ecolabeling.
- Environmental Yellow Pages for Ontario http://www.enviroyellowpages.com/listings/Canada/ON/
- This is an important advance for environmental products
and services. This on-line Ontario Yellow Pages features
categories
for households,
shoppers, builders, chemical clean-ups, site testing, hazardous
materials, monitoring, water quality a whole range of
contacts that can benefit the environment.
Useful Printed Resources
- Shopping With a Conscience - The Informed Shopper's
Guide to Retailers, Suppliers, and Service Providers in Canada
A book of tips on how to become a socially responsible consumer, by
Rajani Achar, David Nitkin, Kay Otto, Paul Pellizzari and EthicScan Canada.
EthicScan Canada Limited, 1996.
- The Secret Lives of Everyday Things an excellent book and
curriculum unit, North West Watch, Seattle, WA http://www.northwestwatch.org/publications/
- Three Green Guides from Terra Choice:
- The Environmental Choice Program's Certified Products and
Services Guide
- The Environmental Choice Schools Program Guide
- The EcoBuyer Catalolgue
TerraChoice Environmental Services
Inc.
(Environmental Choice Program)
2197 Riverside Drive, Suite 300
Ottawa, Ontario K1H 7X3
ecoinfo@terrachoice.ca
Tel: (613) 247-1900
Fax: (613) 247-2228
- Good Stuff? A Worldwatch Institute Behind-the-Scenes
- Guide
to the Things We Buy http://www.worldwatch.org/pubs/goodstuff
- Contains
many of the tips, facts, and links you'll need to start making
more informed purchases that benefit your health and the
environment.
- Our Air, Ourselves, Our Water: Power of the Green
Consumer
- An informative pamphlet
Available from: The Waterfront Regeneration Trust
207 Queen's Quay West, Suite 580
Toronto, Ontario M5J 1A7
Email: info@wrtrust.com
Tel: (416) 314-9490
Fax: (416) 314-9497sw
ACTIVITY 1
- Explain how fossil fuels influence climate change.
- Choose a product or item that you recently bought. Answer
the questions to tell its Environmental Story. Rate your choice
environmentally 1 - 5(5 is best )
- Look for the 'Rules of Thumb fro
Green Shopping'
- Choose 2 choose 2 things you would like to do.
Write a persuasive paragraph that you could use to convince your family to
follow those rules.
|
