One of the biggest problems the growing green movement faces can be found hidden in every baby's diaper. Eco friendly diapers are in short supply unlike that which they were intended to collect. There currently are not enough landfills to deal with all the diapers out there.
Babies go through about 5,000 diapers during potty training and the EPA says that diapers account for 3.4 million tons of waste (roughly 2% for the US total) in landfills (1998 figures). To qualify as eco friendly diapers it will be necessary to bypass the landfills as well as the harmful chemicals.
Huggies Diaper
It may at first seem an easy, green choice to go with cloth diapers rather than disposable, but the diaper solution is not so cut and dried. To make cloth your diaper of choice you will need a few basic items.
First and foremost you will need a washer and dryer at your beck and call and the time to constantly wash the tainted offerings that your baby produces at a near prolific rate. You will need to choose an eco friendly laundry soap and the style of cloth diaper that best suits your child.
This is by far the most preferable way to deal with the diaper issue, but not the solution for everyone. City dwellers may look to a diaper service, but eco friendly diapers do not come from most pay services. Due to excessive hot water use and necessity of chlorine bleach (to kill Staff and other infections common to babies), these services produce less than earth friendly results.
This takes us back to disposable diapers. Conventional disposables (Pampers, Huggies) are also not eco friendly diapers. Their manufacture involves chlorine (a volatile organic compound VOC) and all use chemical gel cores that "lock in" a baby's pee. These chemical gels contain sodium polyacrylate known for respiratory and skin irritation problems (mind you in much higher doses than found in diapers).
These manufacturers would argue that the chemicals used are all within safe limits, but do you really want to swaddle your child in such potential problems? Disposable, eco friendly diapers do exist, sort of, and are making strides towards even higher standards of green on a daily basis.
A well know manufacturer of many green products, Seventh Generation, makes a disposable, biodegradable diaper or so they say. The truth is a truly biodegradable diaper doesn't really exist due to the quantity of diapers versus the available landfills.
But Seventh Generation is a very transparent company as far as their ingredients go and produces some of the most earth friendly products available. They also claim that their diapers use a "chemically inert" gel and claim independent scientific research has shown it is "nontoxic, not carcinogenic, and nonirritating to the skin."
Another company, Gdiapers, makes a similar product with the added advantage of making their diapers flushable. The flushable feature does eliminate the landfill problem (some statistics put a diapers landfill life around 500 years), but both of these so called eco friendly diapers use similar gel cores on which there is still not enough definitive research.
The winner, at least for the moment, in the disposable eco friendly diaper contest is made by Tushies. Assembled in the US, these are made of a cotton blend, chlorine free wood pulp and best of all, NO chemical gels. Not as widely available as the Seventh Generation product, this brand can be found in some health food stores and also online.
The final word on diapers is that "eco friendly diapers" is an still an oxymoron at this point. Diaper services show facts that gel absorbents in disposables are harmful and disposables claim the chlorine used in diaper services is harmful. There is no definitive proof of either side being right. The eco friendly diapers of the future will combine all the best features, flushable, no gel absorbents above all comfort and safety for your baby.
Eco Friendly Diapers - Do They Really Exist?
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