Breaking My Paper Towel Addiction

Whoever said “ignorance is bliss” was probably thinking of environmentalists.  I minored in Environmental Studies in college, and now a thick coat of green guilt pollutes many of the everyday activities of my Western lifestyle.  When I accelerate too quickly after I get the green light, I think of the excess gasoline I'm burning; when I go the grocery store, I feel bad whenever I forget my reusable bags; and I often turn down the thermostat to 55 in winter, covering up in sweatshirts and blankets before upping the heat.

The upside of all this guilt is empowerment and purpose.  I’ve donated to help hunger relief efforts in Somalia, and I’ve signed petitions to defend human and animal rights, but I act to protect the environment in the choices I make every single day.  

Yet there’s one place where I haven’t been so environmentally diligent: paper towels.  I’ve been known to reuse a tissue after wiping off a smudge of mascara, and I even started buying less-soft toilet paper after reading this New York Times article, which says that the really plush, cozy T.P. is much worse for forests than recycled paper alternatives.  But I love me some paper towels.  I use them as napkins, dish scrubbers, microwave covers, and general de-messers.  I’ve even used a whole paper towel for a scant drip of juice or oil on the counter - even to clean up water spills.  

They may be convenient, but paper towels are not very “green.”  Here’s a few not-so-fun facts about the paper industry from Carbonrally.com:

• The United States consumes 30 percent of the world’s paper each year.
• Of the 741 pounds of paper used by the average American each year, close to 55 pounds is tissue paper (which includes paper towels, napkins, facial tissue, and toilet tissue).
• Even with recycling programs, a little more than one-third of the trash going into landfills is paper products. Paper towels are not recycled.

And a couple more for good measure from The Daily Green:

• Paper accounts for 25% of landfill waste (and one third of municipal landfill waste).
• Municipal landfills account for one third of human-related methane emissions (and methane is 23-times more potent a greenhouse gas than is carbon dioxide).

So on Friday night, after years of keeping a stray dish towel dangling off of the oven door handle, I made the full paper-to-cloth switch.  I bought $10 worth (meaning, a lot) of old dish towels and cloth napkins from Goodwill to supplement my current stash.  I reorganized my cabinet space and two of my storage bins - one for clean towels and one for dirty - and dusted off my crab-shaped napkin holder (which we fondly named “Crabkin”).  Finally, I put away my paper towels and their little upside-down-T-shaped holder away in a hard-to-reach cupboard, intending to use them for emergency “biomaterial” spills only.  

"Crabkin" with our collection of cloth napkins and nice, hand-drying only, dish towels

  

 
The environmental benefit of choosing cloth over paper towels will be diffuse - I won’t get to see the trees I save.  But the financial benefits will be concentrated squarely in our diminished grocery bills: According to Green Matters, the average family uses around 104 rolls of paper towels each year, at at annual cost of $180!  And that’s the best thing about caring for the environment: while Mother Earth will give you a karmic nod of gratitude for choosing cloth towels over paper, driving slower, and turning down the thermostat in winter; your bank account will thank you, too.  

(Check out the NRDC’s ratings of the most environmentally-friendly household paper products here.)