Greenwashing: The Green Movement for Big Profits

2008-08-22 3

Go Green and check out livinggreenchannel.com Hey everyone, I'm Elizabeth Chambers and you're watching LivingGreenChannel.Com, your online Video source for living an eco-friendly lifestyle. For big business, going green has become the trendy and profitable thing to do. On the shelves of any store you can find products that boast green claims such as eco-friendly, energy efficient, Organic, and partially recycled. How many of these claims do you think are untrue or completely false? If you guessed 99.9% are false you would be correct. According to a study from Terrachoice Environmental Marketing out of 1,018 common consumer products reviewed only one product didn’t commit one of the “6 sins of greenwashing.” When looking for an eco product that backs up it’s claims and is good for the environment where can you turn? Unfortunately, as this study proves, these products don’t exist. And here is why. According to Terrachoice’s research over 50% of products tested with eco friendly labels fail to mention the enormous environmental drawbacks such as containing hazardous waste and travel costs. These need to be factored in when considering to buy and eco-friendly product. For example even eco-popular CFL (Compact Flourescent Lightbulbs) contain mercury (meaning they can not be thrown in your trash) and over 90% of them have been manufactured and shipped from China. This is called the “sin of hidden trade-off,” by Terrachoice. Think of it this way, no matter which way you slice it a can of soda will never be good for your health or the environment. Diet Soda has replaced the sugar with an artificial sweetner that has proven to be a slight carcinogen that may or may not cause cancer. In many cases the diet sodas still contain excessive amounts of caffeine, artificial colorings, and flavors, not to mention not nutritional value, which are harmful to your health. When you factor in a manufactured can that needs to be recycled and travel costs what is the health and environmental impact of ...