Writing about a solar biochar kiln left me thinking a lot about how to define “eco friendly”. I’ve also been thinking about it in relation to some news a friend pointed me at: “canvas bags are worse than plastic bags”. Poor Tim Minchin.
(I should note: I didn’t read all of those articles in full, most of them I skimmed. I know, I know, I know – I’m part of the problem. They also mostly cite the same couple of studies. I might try to write more about that later…)
A couple of those articles touch on this, but I think it’s worth exploring on its own: there are different kinds of “eco friendly”. There are different ways that we’re at risk of seriously changing the ecology of our planet. Also, we’ve realized different ways we might significantly change our environment at different times, so an intervention targeted at one thing (like plastic pollution) may turn out to worsen another (like ozone depletion).
It’s a very complex system, and I suspect almost every intervention will have some trade-offs, but most of the time I read about these things people seem to feel the need to end with a strong declaration of “this is good” or “this is bad”. It’s hard to hold in our heads these complex systems of effects/trade-offs.
Different interventions can also interact with each other. There was a Scientific American article a few years back that I can’t seem to find that looked at the interactions between different climate and water related projects, showing how some would reinforce each other and others might be mutually exclusive.
Anyway, a non-exhaustive list of things to consider when thinking about “eco-friendly”:
- Plastic pollution
- Large and small pieces can physically hurt animals.
- Many kinds of plastic have been shown to leach chemicals that act like hormones in our bodies, and the bodies of other animals.
- Plastic generally takes a long time to biodegrade. This can be good or bad, depending on your perspective.
- Biodegradability in general
- There’s concern that styrofoam and other plastics will sit for thousands of years before breaking down.
- I’ve heard it argued that non-biodegradable plastic can be a form of carbon sequestration, since things tend to release greenhouse gasses when they biodegrade. But be careful that plastic doesn’t end up in the ocean, where it can interfere with other carbon sink processes.
- Some things are useful primarily because they don’t degrade, or don’t degrade quickly. Think plastic siding and decking.
- Greenhouse gas emissions
- There are several of these, CO2 and methane being the ones that get talked about the most.
- Water vapor is a significant greenhouse gas.
- Particulate emissions
- These contribute to “bad air quality” stuff like smog.
- Conversely,
particulates can provide additional nucleation sites for cloud formation, causing a certain amount of global coolingactually it’s way more complicated than I thought: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Particulates#Climate_effects
- Land use/human displacement
- I think this one can be subtle, but for an exaggerated example: “the best way to stop global warming is with an enormous mirror near the equator that can replace a bunch of dark, sun-absorbing trees! Let’s level the Amazonian rainforest!”
- On a smaller scale, think dams that prevent fish migration.
- Also, humans are animals and some populations of humans have been on their land participating in the local ecosystem for a long time. Who you move is absolutely a question of ecology (and, often, justice).
- Toxic compounds/heavy metals
- A lot of things are toxic to the majority of living creatures. Sometimes we produce these when extracting resources (think quarries turned to lakes where almost nothing can live), sometimes these leak out when we’re done with a product (think broken solar panels).
- Low atomic weight
- The elements that make up our planet were mostly formed in one of two ways: in a star that was active, or in a star going nova. My understanding is that an active star will only fuse elements up to about iron (after that the fusion stops producing energy), and that a nova is required for most of the heavier elements.
- As a result, the lower-atomic-weight elements are more common. Easier to come by. This can mean extracting them is less destructive, can be done in more places, etc.
- Durability
- I got this bottle brush. It’s eco friendly because you can detach the brush part and replace it, so you’re throwing away less when it wears out. Cool right? Except rather than making the handle out of plastic, it’s made partially from bamboo and partially from plastic, glued together. Within a month the parts started coming apart.
- Repairability
- My wife and I have inherited her parents’ old washer and dryer. These machines are twenty years old or so, and have been repaired many times. They are less water and energy efficient than the most modern washers and dryers, but the internal construction is very simple, with almost no electronics. When they stop working it’s obvious what the problem is, and that its fixable. With more complex devices people are more inclined to say “too hard to fix, just buy a new one”.
- Reusability
- TODO
- Recyclability (Recyclable-ness? Suitability for recycling?)
- TODO
I’ve got more to write here, and some editing to do, but it felt worth putting up what I’ve got so far.