Is eco toilet paper really a better choice? Your questions answered
For a product we use every single day, toilet paper doesn’t rank highly on our list of things to think about. But are we missing a chance to give the environment a little treat? Can our loo roll really make a difference? And will it feel like sandpaper if it’s made out of more sustainable materials than trees made liquidy soft with loads of water, heat and energy? To find out, we asked Dr Elissa Foster, the head of sustainability at the toilet paper producer Who Gives A Crap.
Elissa, it’s toilet paper. Does it really have an impact on the environment?
Yes, definitely. Most of us don’t think too much about what our toilet paper is typically made of, but the majority of what’s on the market is made using trees. They are cut down, pulped and turned into tissue, then it gets directly flushed down the toilet. As Who Gives A Crap and many other brands have shown, there are other materials that can be used to make toilet paper, such as bamboo or recycled fibre. It’s a much better use of resources to rely on these other types of fibres rather than using trees and cutting them down just to flush them down the toilet.
Okay, but it can’t be that many trees getting cut down to make loo roll, can it?
We conducted research to find out just how many trees are cut down each year to supply the world’s toilet paper users, and we found that it’s over 1 million trees per day. These trees come from both tree plantations (planted mono crops – often fast-growing, introduced pine species) and native forests. Some locations might have been traditional old growth ancient forests before they were converted into tree plantations.
And that’s … bad? You’re saying trees are … good?
Trees and forests are the lungs of the planet, and they’re really helping us to bring the carbon back in from the atmosphere. As a society, we want to try to keep the remaining forest intact. We’re cutting down more and more of these forests that provide amazing services to us, including capturing carbon from the atmosphere that we are emitting through our industrial activities and transportation activities. They also are home to tons of animal and plant species, and they help filter water and keep our water sources clean and pure.
There are very important uses of trees and those can come from plantations. But it’s better to use them for things that absolutely need to be made from trees, rather than toilet paper, which can be made from other alternative sources, like bamboo and recycled fibre. Because it is a one-use product, and it just gets flushed down the toilet.
You must get to say that nearly every day.
Literally.
Bamboo is one of the materials you use to make toilet paper at Who Gives A Crap. Talk to us about that – It’s grown in China. Isn’t transporting it worse?
No, transporting paper from one region to another is not a bigger problem than cutting down trees. Most consumer goods result in a decent amount of carbon emissions during the life cycle of the product and the production of the product, and that’s the same for toilet paper. The majority of carbon emissions that come from our business are from making the product – transportation emissions are just a much smaller fraction of the total carbon footprint. It makes sense for us to find the ideal material and best manufacturing partners that can make it as efficiently and with as few carbon emissions as possible during production.
But the pandas? And their tiny baby pandas?
We have sourced all of our bamboo from FSC-certified forests, which means we can trace where the bamboo is coming from back to the forest. Having that certification is a strong point of assurance that the bamboo is really coming from a location that hasn’t caused any deforestation or harm to the wildlife in the area.
Also, bamboo is a very fast-growing grass. Because it grows so quickly not as much land is required to grow the amount of bamboo that’s needed. It’s processed very similarly to tree fibre, but because it grows so quickly, it can be harvested more quickly and uses less land.
So the trade-off is that recycled or bamboo toilet paper sucks to wipe with, right? It’s probably rough and thin like the stuff we had in primary school.
The toilet paper is not brown nor scratchy, and your fingers will not go through it. Our toilet paper is white, soft and strong. Both our recycled and bamboo papers really live up to expectations, work perfectly well and look very lovely.
Why does any of this matter if I just flush it anyway? Doesn’t all toilet paper biodegrade?
It is biodegradable. It’s going to go down the toilet. That’s why there’s a huge opportunity to focus on what you’re using to make the toilet paper – that’s the key part of sustainability for toilet paper. As it’s a biodegradable, single-use product, there’s not really an end-of-life sustainability story. Your focus can be on what it’s made of, so we can alleviate the pressure and the need to keep cutting down these trees.
Our need for toilet paper is only going to grow and grow (as the population continues to increase). Making a concerted effort now to move away from trees will really help save them.
Who Gives A Crap donates 50% of its profits to clean water and sanitation nonprofit organisations. Shop its 100% recycled or bamboo toilet paper.