Great article as always Virginia. The only thing that I don’t get is how an idea with logical intentions can be blown out of proportion. Well that’s just me. I’d rather look for alternatives rather than gripe about the obvious.

Maybe in 10 years the price will be equal. The sugarcane is usually burnt or dumped, so all the cost is in transport and processing. Cornhusk cellulose – not sure where it ends up now. The amazingly smooth and luscious corn husk paper I saw 10 years ago, was made in Italy. It was “normal” looking cardstock.

There is no reason that hemp paper isn’t eventually the same price as tree pulp paper. Grows quicker than trees. (When you grow hemp for fiber, it gets really tall, like bamboo. About 18 feet or more. It is also grown close together. Takes about 6 months to grow that tall.) Of course, hemp was the first fiber used for papermaking, 2,200 years ago.

For most businesses, just use as close to 100% post consumer waste recycled paper that you can find. That is easy to do. Really important to make these markets sustainable. It is just pathetic that only 2 or 3 mills in the US make 100% PCW paper.

I know that many people are turned off by radicalism and once turned off, are unlikely to consider the value of green living, especially if it requires a change in lifestyle. People don’t like being reprimanded or told that everything they’re doing is wrong. They’re likely to shut you off completely and just stop listening.

I also feel that too many people are at risk of writing off environmental responsibility all together because they fear the costs associated with it. My intent in this post was to demonstrate that green doesn’t have to mean less green in the bank, because that’s really the true motivator in our society.

I merely hoped to open people’s minds to the consideration that there is value in green living and working by demonstrating ways to get started and to appeal to the power of the pocketbook. It’s my hope that once the environment wiggles its way into people’s thought processes, it will build support from there.

HEALTH CONSCIOUS people want to “feel good” about themselves and say to their neighbor, “Hey, look at me, I am drinking WATER. I am healthy.”

If you buy into “Smart Water”, chances are you are pretty dumb and aren’t concerned about the environment. Pun intended.

Good article.

One of the mills we use went into bankruptcy a few years ago. Not enough market for recycled paper. Better now, but not by much. (We do fancy stuff, so we use lots of alternative fiber papers.)

56% of paper is getting to the recycling bin — and from there it is shipped to Asia. We need to create systems here in this country, for recycled content.

Use tree free paper if you can. Paper has been made out of trees for only 125 years. Papermaking is a 2000 year old technology.

Sometimes, you need hard copies for record keeping.

We don’t have to cut down trees to make paper — but we can make paper out of post harvest waste. Like sugarcane. Really. I swear. I’ve seen gorgeous paper made from corn husks.

Within the realm of technology, I think it’s nearly impossible to impose limitations such as banning hairdryers, because who would do it? The Government is the only organization in place to do such a thing, but who would vote to limit our freedom? And how much money would go into enforcing this kind of law? The Government could impose a power regulation, but again, that’s going against our freedom in a big way – It’s a no win situation, in my view.

With the popularity of green culture, there are some positive aspects of technology, though. Hybrid cars, for example – when they become cheaper to buy as well as operate, even the “right-wing” (not to take sides) people would have no reason not to go green, even if unintentionally. Why would they do this? Because they save money. As far as hairdryers, what if someone invented a brush that used reverse ion fusion to create a negative humidity or used dark matter to absorb water molecules, but was perfectly safe to use (and more convenient)? Sure, that’s far fetched – but you get my idea.

It doesn’t even have to be high-tech technology. I ride a motorcycle as my only (motorized) transportation. I get a few miles to the gallon short of a Prius, it’s cheap to repair, brand new is half the price of a car, and when it’s ready for the junk yard, there’s very little that can’t be recycled. If safety, stability, passenger capacity, and weather were solved in a mainstream way, this fifty year old technology could cut our nation’s oil consumption in half within five years. Plus it would boost our economy (the rest of the world would want them too), and put us in better moral standing with the rest of the world.

One final thought – what if it was an officially undisputed fact – in ten years, coal and oil (what’s left) in all forms will vaporize. Think the powerful and the rich would stand by and watch?