Forests Pay the Price for America's Love Affair with Really Soft Toilet Paper

[G_j]

http://www.alternet.org/environment/129351/forests_pay_the_price_for_america%27s_love_affair_with_really_soft_toilet_paper/

Forests Pay the Price for America's Love Affair with Really Soft Toilet Paper
By Tara Lohan, AlterNet. Posted February 27, 2009.

Why the best use of 300-year-old trees might not be in the bathroom


Americans have been long chastised for our environmental footprints (and for good reason). But the latest report from environmental groups including Greenpeace should give us major reason to pause. The Guardian could not have said it any better:

The tenderness of the delicate American buttock is causing more environmental devastation than the country's love of gas-guzzling cars, fast food or McMansions, according to green campaigners. At fault, they say, is the US public's insistence on extra-soft, quilted and multi-ply products when they use the bathroom.

The numbers are shocking: More than 98 percent of the toilet paper we use in the US is from virgin forests, the Guardian reports. Across the world, people are struggling to save our forests from deforestation, and instead of helping out, we're wiping are butts with our best defense against climate change. And until the time comes when Obama gets Congress to pass a TP Act, Greenpeace has some help for consumers, with a handy guide for getting some good toilet paper that won't harm the environment.

The New York Times explained why it is we insist on only the finest trees:

...Fluffiness comes at a price: millions of trees harvested in North America and in Latin American countries, including some percentage of trees from rare old-growth forests in Canada. Although toilet tissue can be made at similar cost from recycled material, it is the fiber taken from standing trees that help give it that plush feel, and most large manufacturers rely on them.

,,more..

[Taverner]

1. Honestly, can't we use water like they do in Asia?

Seriously - over there you use water to wash your hinterlands, and then wash your hands afterwards. This is why money is never held in the left hand.

[rcrush]

2. Sorry I'm not wiping my ass barehanded.

YOU CANT MAKE ME! I'll pay someone else to wipe my ass barehanded before I do that.

[Taverner]

3. What about a squirt gun?

The higher end toilets all had them, and nothing a blast of water up the ol yinyang to wake you up :)

[rcrush]

6. Yeah but aiming that thing would be tricky

Some people would need a super soaker.

[FudaFuda]

4. LOL. Don't want a re-usable shitrag, either. n/t

.

[JCMach1]

20. No need, just get the sprayer in the right spots!

[MineralMan]

5. Oh, for pity's sake...there are many brands of

toilet paper made with recycled materials. Buy that if this seems like a problem.

No doubt there are issues more worth our time.

[G_j]

10. 200 year old trees, not worth our time...

don't educate yourself,



"Greenpeace, the international conservation organization, contends that Kimberly Clark, the maker of two popular brands, Cottonelle and Scott, has gotten as much as 22 percent of its pulp from producers who cut trees in Canadian boreal forests where some trees are 200 years old."

[MineralMan]

11. I'm not the one in need of education here.

Google Recycled Toilet Paper and educate yourself, please. The option to purchase TP made with recycled materials is there, and has been for a long time.

The solution exists. I've been using it for years. How about you?

[G_j]

12. yes I have, for years

but I posted the OP to educate others, is that a problem?

[MineralMan]

15. No, I don't see it as a problem,

but I note that no reference was made to the easy availability of TP made of recycled materials. Without that, it seemed like just a rant to me. Since such paper is available, even at the supermarket where I live, there is a ready solution for those who want to use it.

It is an issue, of course, but posts that don't inform of a simple solution miss the mark, in my opinion.

I've been using TP made of recycled materials since the 1970s. It wasn't so easy to find then, but it was available. It's not "fluffy" but it does the job just fine.

Education is the task at hand, and not just education about the damage being done by the use of virgin materials for such a mundane product. Along with that, information on ways one can immediately help mitigate the problem is necessary.

Raising an alarm is OK, but only if some time is spent offering a solution, it seems to me.

[JanMichael]

19. Speak for yourself

We wouldn't have seen this if it hadn't been posted on DU.

Yes, deforestation is a big issue-- I can't imagine what your problem is with this article.

[thejokerwasme]

7. This is horrid news...I use 7th Generation when I can, or the rough, cheap stuff!

We have got to get it together ASAP!

[donheld]

8. Cry me a river

I'm keeping my Charmin!

[Roadless]

9. No ones "but comfort" is worth chopping down a tree

Use the recycled or cheap stuff. When you look at the big picture, 200 years from now our great great great grandkids are going to wonder why we did things like Nascar and wiped our behinds with "luxury toilet paper" when we could have been setting aside natural areas for them.

I have to be pessimistic but history is going to define us as bloated and selfish if we don't start pulling together as a team.

[Vattel]

13. The article is full of shit.

The claim that "more than 98 percent of the toilet paper we use in the US is from virgin forests" is obviously false. Virgin forests are pretty damn rare, toilet paper is not.

[wickerwoman]

14. Right. It's not a consumer problem; it's a problem of production.

There's no reason they can't use tree farms to create trees for toilet paper.

Greenpeace should be putting pressure on manufactures not to use old growth trees... I can't imagine the timber is cheaper than what comes out of tree farms. And it makes no sense that old growth trees produce super-soft TP. What a load!

[Vattel]

16. I;m sure that the vast majority of TP does come from tree farms

[MineralMan]

17. You are correct, of course.

It's very unlikely that most toilet paper is made from wood from virgin forests, since, as you say, there aren't enough of those to do the job.

Alarmism solved no problems, which was the reason for my "For pity's sake" post upthread. There are numerous brands of TP that are made from recycled materials, yet the alarmist article did not bother to mention that. It made only a casual reference to Greenpeace as a source for information.

A Google search actually turns up the names of those brands and even offers places you can order the stuff by the case if you wish.

I buy mine in the supermarket near me, right in the toilet paper aisle. Amazing. I find three available brands, all with 100% recycled content. It's even cheaper than the fluffy stuff.

We need to educate, rather than just alarm. Rants make us look foolish. Giving links to sources of the solution make us look wise.

[Roadless]

18. Good article

We are going to have to pull together as a team and lose some of this selfishness we have, or history is going to paint us with a very self involved and greedy color.