LITTLE ROCK — My wife and I are about to begin planning some major remodeling, including an add-on to our kitchen area. We want to use products that are healthy and environmentally responsible, but worry that not every manufacturer (and others) is on the up-and-up on this. What can you tell us?
We turned to a recent article by Tristan Roberts, editorial director at BuildingGreen Inc., in Brattleboro, Vt., which publishes information on “green” building products and solutions (visit BuildingGreen.com).
“I would bet that sometime in the last 24 hours you have received a marketing message centered around how ‘green,’ how ‘environmentally friendly,’ or (if it’s really serious), how ‘sustainable’ something is,” Roberts wrote.
The 2011 Cone Green Gap Trend Tracker found that 97 percent of Americans believe they know what common environmental marketing claims such as “green” or “environmentally friendly” mean, he said. But our interpretations are often inaccurate, according to the researchers. More than two in five of us (41 percent) erroneously believe that these terms mean a product has a beneficial impact on the environment. Only about one in three (29 percent) understand that these terms more accurately describe products with reduced environmental impact compared with competing products.
That study seems to indicate a lot of willingness to believe what marketers and advertisers tell us. Sorting out the green from the greenwash has become a necessity for builders, designers and consumers. To help, Roberts and his colleague, Jennifer Atlee, developed a guide to common problems, Nine Types of Greenwashing, included in a report on green building product certifications.
Here they are:
Green by association.
A company slathers itself and its marketing thoroughly in environmental terms and images so that even if its products have no environmental benefits, consumers associate them with positive environmental attributes. Examples: Housing developments named for natural features that they have destroyed, e.g., “Conifer Lane.”
Lack of definition.
Marketing for a product makes an environmental claim that sounds good to the consumer but is too vague or general. Example: A radiant barrier paint product is advertised as having anincredibly high R-value (the measure of resistance to heat flow; the higher the R-value, the lower the heat loss). But the ad neglects to mention that it only insulates that well when installed on NASA spacecraft that see thousands of degrees of temperature differences.
Unproven claims.
Environmental claims are made by a company, but the company cannot or will not provide evidence to back them up. Example: A manufacturer claims to have eliminated hazardous ingredients from a product but claims that due to trade secrets, it can’t reveal any specifics.
The non sequitur.
A company uses a valid claim about a product as the basis for a further claim that is not warranted, but may on its surface appear to be reasonable. Example: A manufacturer accurately claims that its product is resistant to mold growth, but also implies or states that thus using the product improves the health of occupants - a claim that really needs to be evaluated separately.
Forgetting the life cycle, aka the red herring.
A company chooses one easily understood aspect of a product’s environmental profile to improve and highlight, while ignoring other significant impacts - out of ignorance or intentionally to divert attention.
Example: A company touts the high recycled content in its countertops, but uses a lot of embodied energy and carbon to make them, and uses binders that affect human health.
Bait and switch.
A company heavily promotes the environmental attributes of a single product, while manufacturing a bulk of otherwise similar products that lack the same environmental attributes. Example: A company sells cedar shingles certified as sustainably harvested, earning acclaim, but produces a small volume at such an increased price that most of its sales are for noncertified products.
Rallying behind a lower standard.
A product earns an apparently valid, thirdparty certification, but the product’s manufacturer or trade association had influenced the development of the relevant standard in a way that makes the certification less meaningful than it appears. Example: The forest products industry caught hell in the early 1990s for environmental damage caused by logging, but rather than join the rigorous green standard that has already been developed, the industry bands together to create its own program with similar, but much more vague standards.
Reluctant enthusiast.
A company lobbies against new environmental measures, claiming that they will be too costly. But if it’s losing the battle, it hedges its bets, publicly embracing similar measures, while continuing to resist them behind the scenes. Example: “Beyond Petroleum.”
Outright lying.
Either intentionally or inadvertently, a company bends the truth, or simply ignores it. Example: A company claims that a product is beneficial to the environment, when it’s actually just less bad. Or a manufacturer claims its product contains recycled content based on reuse of scrap within a manufacturing line, but that actually doesn’t meet the definition of recycled.
We hope this helps you sort out products.
HomeStyle, Pages 35 on 07/30/2011