Totally Greenwashed: Green Planet Bottle

“Green Planet Bottle” has become a substitute for consumers of the plastic bottle water since 2009. This product is labeled as organic, 100% plant-based, petroleum-and BPA-free, and carbon neutral. It is not only healthy for consumers, but also has positive impact on our environment. It sounds like the days of plastic water bottle made from petroleum are gone. However, I wonder how “green” or sustainable these green planet bottles can truly be?

According to the fact sheet of Pacific Institute, the process of bottling water produces more than 2.5 million tons of carbon dioxide and it takes 3 liters of water to produce 1 liter of bottled water. Transporting bottled water also requires millions in barrels of oil. Not only the waste is produced, but the time it takes to break down is also significant. It just doesn’t worth it.

Throughout Green Planet website, I could not see anything about the company itself but just the product. It has a very simple and basic bare bone format with hardly any information about their practices such as actual production process and transportation system of the bottle. They claim that their product is sustainable comparing to “old school bottled water”. Their bottle is not like those made from crude oil that could cause over filling of landfills and harmful greenhouse gases. Without leaching harmful chemical, it is safe to reuse. But in fact,a compostable bottled water is still bottled water. It is the same thing with only different packaging and marketing campaign. When it comes down to it, bottle water will never be as good for the environment.

In Annie Leonard’s YouTube video, she states clearly that bottled water is actually trashing our environment all around the world. Even the plastic bottle water labeled as recycling, it is still not fully recycled. Some of them will slate to be down cycled or end up in the landfill. Therefore, this company obviously involves greenwashing component. They are definitely trying to take advantage of the good intentions of consumers who wish to protect the planet. They are misleading them about the real face of their product.

Good: Making your own cleaning products

When we shop in the supermarket, we could always see household cleaners that are labled as "save", "natural", and "green". However, many of them which look credible are actually fake that it actually has harmful impact to the environment. Many companies claim that their cleaning products are green and a safer alternative for both human and environment. Are they telling us the truth?

"Company select ingredients for cleaning products to enhance their performance, but a lot of chemicals, we simply don’t know anything about!" stated by Tom Natan, a chemical engineer with the non-profit National Environmental Trust. He points out that almost all of these "green" or conventional cleaning products contain harmful chemicals. It will both affect our health and planet if we keep using them.

Without the ingredients listed on the label of household cleaner, we, as consumers, are difficult to know exactly what is in the products. We couldn’t even know whether these products have benefits or not to our body. In "Six hidden dangers in your home”, one of the hiddens tells us about how mixing some cleaning products affect our health,

"Toxic gases can form when you use multiple cleaning products at the same time. Chloramines gas, which can be highly irritating to your lungs, forms when you mix ammonia with chlorine bleach. Mixing chlorine bleach with an acid-based product (like toilet bowl and over cleans, drain openers, or vinegar) can release chlorine gas, another lung-irrating fume."

Due to the fact that chemicals household cleaners make cleaning easier but not greener, why don't we start making our own natural, healthy cleaning prodcuts? All you need is just some baking soda and vinegar. To maintain our clean enviornment in safe and healthy ways, you may want to watch this video. It is about how to make your own cleaning products by using natural ingredients that does not pollute .