If you’re feeling down about carbon emissions, take that feeling and stuff it into a tote bag
In the back of my car, there’s a load of bags. More precisely, there’s one bag with a load of bags stuffed inside. They are the heavy plastic or cotton ones, emblazoned with the names of various retailers and they were usually an emergency purchase when I’d gone in to get a few things but forgotten to take a bag with me out of the back of the car.
It’s also been a huge branding success. In the past two decades, the reusable shopping bag is seen as a symbol and practical example of environmental virtue in action: to such an extent that some iterations are regarded as fashionable.
Totes are usually made from cotton; which needs a lot of water and all too often pesticides and fertilisers, which in turn create nitrous oxide, a greenhouse gas. A 2018 study by the Danish Environmental Protection Agency estimated that to offset the carbon footprint of your tote bag, you’d have to use it 7,100 times, so every day for 20 years. If the cotton is organic, you’d have to use it 20,000 times. I now have to avoid dying for the next 50 years so the tote bags don’t do any harm.
Sean-Moncrieff Sustainability Climate-Change For-You
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