Paper shouldn't be going to landfill, it should be turned to compost first then topsoil. Paper might use more energy but none of the energy or materials used need* to have ground input.
So Paper can be made closed environmental cycle where as plastic requires well below topsoil inputs to be made.
*They probably do use buckets and buckets of ground carbon and that should be Apple's next mission once they hit all paper packaging.
Yes but most paper is bleached to get that white look which makes it more toxic than plastic as plastic can be reused over and over again whereas paper has only a limited life.
That being said: Any idiot knows that a car driven by an electric motor is clean and has no emissions. You can claim that they use fossil fuels to charge the battery except in most European countries, New Zealand, and most of Australia where their energy is 100% renewable and clean (New Zealand uses natural gas, thermal, hydro, and wind). It's dirty old America that is lagging behind in clean tech. Hell China is catching up and will surpass you soon.
Incidentally a petrol engine at best is ~35% fuel efficient, diesel is at best ~75%, whereas electric cars are ~95% and use nothing when parked up in a traffic jam. So whatever issues electric cars have they are offset by the benefits in general.
Nice fairytale.
In 2015, 73% of Australia's electricity was generated from coal and 13% from natural gas. Natural gas is not a renewable and New Zealand will only reach the 90% renewable energy mark in 2018 - which is none the less laudable.
So, since nearly 86% of Australia's electricity is generated from fossil fuels, the only way an electric vehicles would be more energy efficient than ICE vehicles would be if the electricity generation from fossil fuels was more efficient than that from petrol and diesel. It isn't. Coal is in the range of 32 % to 42 % while natural gas is 32% to 38%.
So an electric vehicle might be as low as half as efficient as a diesel.
If Apple wanted to be environmentally friendly with their packaging, they wouldn't only make it from virgin fiber, they would use recycled paper as well, and they would make it from hemp, not wood. Also, a plastic bag takes only about 20% the energy to make as a paper bag does.
Paper shouldn't be going to landfill, it should be turned to compost first then topsoil. Paper might use more energy but none of the energy or materials used need* to have ground input.
So Paper can be made closed environmental cycle where as plastic requires well below topsoil inputs to be made.
*They probably do use buckets and buckets of ground carbon and that should be Apple's next mission once they hit all paper packaging.
Yes but most paper is bleached to get that white look which makes it more toxic than plastic as plastic can be reused over and over again whereas paper has only a limited life.
That being said: Any idiot knows that a car driven by an electric motor is clean and has no emissions. You can claim that they use fossil fuels to charge the battery except in most European countries, New Zealand, and most of Australia where their energy is 100% renewable and clean (New Zealand uses natural gas, thermal, hydro, and wind). It's dirty old America that is lagging behind in clean tech. Hell China is catching up and will surpass you soon.
Incidentally a petrol engine at best is ~35% fuel efficient, diesel is at best ~75%, whereas electric cars are ~95% and use nothing when parked up in a traffic jam. So whatever issues electric cars have they are offset by the benefits in general.
Electric cars have zero emissions really? Guess all that electricity coming from coal and natural gas plants are magical then. It takes more energy to charge an electric car than is used by a combustion engine nowadays.
redraider11, I guess you didn't get the memo that the plastic bags are made from oil products and can remain in the environment for centuries. Paper products are made from renewable (and in this case recycled) resources that also offset the production process to some extent. If they do end up in landfil they also break down unlike plastic bags.
Actually most landfills aren't maintained properly enough to aid in the breakdown process. When you stack a bunch of stuff on top of each other air can't get down into the middle of it to break anything down. They're essentially mummifying the garbage and it doesn't go anywhere. Also you still didn't provide an argument for why we should go to paper when it kills trees and produces more gases and takes more energy to make them. So you're not really doing anything for the environment if you're just using more energy than you should. In fact you're just harming it more. Plus plastic can be recycled l, so you're "it's more biodegradeable" argument is moot. Especially with all the glues, dyes, and bleaches that into making a paper bag.
I still have all of my Apple bags and use them. Maybe Apple could have gone at it a different way. Offer a small discount if you don't require a bag or a small amount of money back for returning useable Apple plastic bags.
Huh??? The original purpose of switching from paper to plastic was to save trees. I guess the question is:
Kill a tree or fill a landfill?
Environmentalists are never satisfied.
Yeah they are not the smarts people on earth this why we still have the same problems over and over again.
When I live in CA back in the 80's and 90's I remember all the fighting going on with the save the tree bunch and everyone else, at the same time, there was big movement to go away from Styrofoam which was used to stop paper usage in packaging of food.
I remember some guy who was the franchise owner of a Mac Donald's in Oakland CA. He said back in the 70's he was forced to stop using paper to wrap hamburgers, and was told by the environmental groups to use Styrofoam, now these same groups are telling him to stop using Styrofoam and go back to paper. He then said all he wanted to do was the right thing, but how is using paper the right thing when it was bad just 10 yrs earlier.
BYW, recycle paper is not the answer since paper over time breaks down, and can only be recycle so many time before it becomes useless. Today they have to add in virgin pulp in order to make even recycled paper. The forestry industries solved the problem by creating fast growth tree farms which they can grow trees over and over again on the same land.
Plastic on the other hand can be recycled many times over and does not required virgin petroleum products.
The environmental groups are good at complaining but very few actual come up with sustainable solutions.
Huh??? The original purpose of switching from paper to plastic was to save trees. I guess the question is:
Kill a tree or fill a landfill?
Environmentalists are never satisfied.
Almost all paper is made from recycled sources - no one is chopping down trees to make paper. And the original purpose was not to save trees - it was because plastic bags are far cheaper to manufacture than paper bags and supermarkets liked plastic also because roaches lived quite well in paper bags.
What Apple should really do is put a handle onto product boxes. Then, unless a customer is buying more than one item, a bag isn't really needed at all. Or, they should have re-usuable cloth bags and give a little discount or some freebie for their use. Trader Joe's lets you enroll in a sweepstakes if you use your own bags.
What Apple needs to do is just tell people to bring their own bags. The wife and I been using our own bags for shopping for 5 yrs now. The down side is we never have any paper or plastic bags laying around our house if we need them for like cleaning up after the dog, so we now buy plastic bags just for the dog.
Our recycle can goes out ever week since we recycle everything we can. Our garbage can goes to the curb once every three weeks. We try not to bring things into our house which has to go back out in the garbage.
For electronic I tend to keep the boxes so when I sell them to someone else I put them back in the same box I bought them in. As much as I love Apples boxes, and how well they are made and how nice they are to open, the amount of material going into those boxes is more than any other product of the same size. As others pointed out the amount of energy needed to convert pulp into paper is high and the amount of clean water needed to do this is one of the worse. Also Apple buys all their boxes in China and you can image the environmental impact.
Any time you talk about whether one solution is better than another you have to look at the end to end process required to take from raw material to and end product and back again and how much energy is required to make that happen. Most people look at these things in isolation of one another. Today there is no carbon neutral solution, only ones which may be less carbon positive than the other.
I hardly ever need to use a bag at the Apple Store. I just order through the Apple Store App, take my purchase off the shelf and walk out the door. No need to bother a sales rep for a bag unless I'm buying multiple items. Besides, if you live in a densely populated urban environment in the US like I do, walking around with an trendy Apple bag is just asking to be mugged. Perhaps bringing your own reusable bag is the most environmentally responsible plan. I do that religiously when grocery shopping.
I usually put purchases straight into my purse (It's a tote type purse so It can hold quite a big, I can put 2 2 liter bottles in there), even produce when I do groceries; I either use no bag or a real small one if there are many small purchases I don't want to spread out everywhere. Big bags are annoying no matter how they are made.
Plastic can be recycled, but most plastic bags are not. At most they get reused as small garbage bags (that's how most people I know reuse them). So, if people instead of using those plastic bags for garbage, buy them instead, you're still left with plastic in your garbage. Maybe making this plastic easily biogradable would be the ultimate answer since it is getting into the garbage regardless.
I hardly ever need to use a bag at the Apple Store. I just order through the Apple Store App, take my purchase off the shelf and walk out the door. No need to bother a sales rep for a bag unless I'm buying multiple items. Besides, if you live in a densely populated urban environment in the US like I do, walking around with an trendy Apple bag is just asking to be mugged. Perhaps bringing your own reusable bag is the most environmentally responsible plan. I do that religiously when grocery shopping.
I'm in the same boat.
The greenest solution is to not even use a bag. I rarely need a bag when I'm at the Apple store. And for groceries or going to Target, I use reusable bags. They are stronger anyways compared to plastic or paper.
The last time that I shopped at Trader Joe's, the person who was ringing up my purchases asks me if I prefer a paper bag or plastic.
Sorry, it's gotta be plastic, I reply with a grin on my face. Easier to carry and much more convenient, planet Earth be damned.
I've probably written this before, but one of my goals in life is to drastically increase my carbon footprint and get it more in line with the overall consumption level of various heroes of the green movement, such as Apple board member Al Gore. I still have a long way to go before I can ever catch up with him, but I am working on it. It's not easy, but patience is required.
Yeah. I always knew people like you just stand for spite, and not for any real solutions.
I mean spending more on gas is probably less important than sticking it to them Liberals.
As much as I love Apples boxes, and how well they are made and how nice they are to open, the amount of material going into those boxes is more than any other product of the same size.
I disagree. Apple has minimal packaging compared to the competition. Although I don't have any very recent examples, here are some from a few years ago:
I hardly ever need to use a bag at the Apple Store. I just order through the Apple Store App, take my purchase off the shelf and walk out the door. No need to bother a sales rep for a bag unless I'm buying multiple items. Besides, if you live in a densely populated urban environment in the US like I do, walking around with an trendy Apple bag is just asking to be mugged. Perhaps bringing your own reusable bag is the most environmentally responsible plan. I do that religiously when grocery shopping.
I'm in the same boat.
The greenest solution is to not even use a bag. I rarely need a bag when I'm at the Apple store. And for groceries or going to Target, I use reusable bags. They are stronger anyways compared to plastic or paper.
Yes to all points. It drives me nuts when I'm shopping and buy an item that I had no problem carrying in my hand only to have the cashier put it into a bag and hand it to me. Am I no longer capable of gripping that item after I paid for it?
Comments
In 2015, 73% of Australia's electricity was generated from coal and 13% from natural gas. Natural gas is not a renewable and New Zealand will only reach the 90% renewable energy mark in 2018 - which is none the less laudable.
So, since nearly 86% of Australia's electricity is generated from fossil fuels, the only way an electric vehicles would be more energy efficient than ICE vehicles would be if the electricity generation from fossil fuels was more efficient than that from petrol and diesel. It isn't. Coal is in the range of 32 % to 42 % while natural gas is 32% to 38%.
So an electric vehicle might be as low as half as efficient as a diesel.
energy than you should. In fact you're just harming it more. Plus plastic can be recycled l, so you're "it's more biodegradeable" argument is moot. Especially with all the glues, dyes, and bleaches that into making a paper bag.
Maybe Apple could have gone at it a different way.
Offer a small discount if you don't require a bag or a small amount of money back for returning useable Apple plastic bags.
Yeah they are not the smarts people on earth this why we still have the same problems over and over again.
When I live in CA back in the 80's and 90's I remember all the fighting going on with the save the tree bunch and everyone else, at the same time, there was big movement to go away from Styrofoam which was used to stop paper usage in packaging of food.
I remember some guy who was the franchise owner of a Mac Donald's in Oakland CA. He said back in the 70's he was forced to stop using paper to wrap hamburgers, and was told by the environmental groups to use Styrofoam, now these same groups are telling him to stop using Styrofoam and go back to paper. He then said all he wanted to do was the right thing, but how is using paper the right thing when it was bad just 10 yrs earlier.
BYW, recycle paper is not the answer since paper over time breaks down, and can only be recycle so many time before it becomes useless. Today they have to add in virgin pulp in order to make even recycled paper. The forestry industries solved the problem by creating fast growth tree farms which they can grow trees over and over again on the same land.
Plastic on the other hand can be recycled many times over and does not required virgin petroleum products.
The environmental groups are good at complaining but very few actual come up with sustainable solutions.
What Apple should really do is put a handle onto product boxes. Then, unless a customer is buying more than one item, a bag isn't really needed at all. Or, they should have re-usuable cloth bags and give a little discount or some freebie for their use. Trader Joe's lets you enroll in a sweepstakes if you use your own bags.
What Apple needs to do is just tell people to bring their own bags. The wife and I been using our own bags for shopping for 5 yrs now. The down side is we never have any paper or plastic bags laying around our house if we need them for like cleaning up after the dog, so we now buy plastic bags just for the dog.
Our recycle can goes out ever week since we recycle everything we can. Our garbage can goes to the curb once every three weeks. We try not to bring things into our house which has to go back out in the garbage.
For electronic I tend to keep the boxes so when I sell them to someone else I put them back in the same box I bought them in. As much as I love Apples boxes, and how well they are made and how nice they are to open, the amount of material going into those boxes is more than any other product of the same size. As others pointed out the amount of energy needed to convert pulp into paper is high and the amount of clean water needed to do this is one of the worse. Also Apple buys all their boxes in China and you can image the environmental impact.
Any time you talk about whether one solution is better than another you have to look at the end to end process required to take from raw material to and end product and back again and how much energy is required to make that happen. Most people look at these things in isolation of one another. Today there is no carbon neutral solution, only ones which may be less carbon positive than the other.
Plastic can be recycled, but most plastic bags are not. At most they get reused as small garbage bags (that's how most people I know reuse them).
So, if people instead of using those plastic bags for garbage, buy them instead, you're still left with plastic in your garbage.
Maybe making this plastic easily biogradable would be the ultimate answer since it is getting into the garbage regardless.
The greenest solution is to not even use a bag. I rarely need a bag when I'm at the Apple store. And for groceries or going to Target, I use reusable bags. They are stronger anyways compared to plastic or paper.
I mean spending more on gas is probably less important than sticking it to them Liberals.
Apple iPhone 4S vs. Samsung Galaxy Nexus vs. Samsung Galaxy Note
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1v5Ly4rdWm0
And who can forget what happened when Microsoft came up with iPod packaging:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9HfdSp2E2A
Yes to all points. It drives me nuts when I'm shopping and buy an item that I had no problem carrying in my hand only to have the cashier put it into a bag and hand it to me. Am I no longer capable of gripping that item after I paid for it?