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30 Oct 02 - bags; phone books; perc; cell phones; billing; laundry scoops; mercury ** WASTE PREVENTION FORUM ** -- A project of the National Waste Prevention Coalition -------- Forum archive: http://www.reuses.com/nwpcarchive -------------------- From Sue Williams, Town & Country Markets, Bainbridge Island, WA, following up on recent postings about grocery bags (including the proposal that the National Waste Prevention Coalition should do a reusable shopping bag campaign): In our six stores, which are in the Seattle area, a plastic bag costs 6.6 cents (with handles and shorter than common - no one fills to the top of those tall bags), and a plastic bag costs 1.9 cents. In the one store for which I have worked the numbers, we use 12,000 paper bags and 15,000 plastic bags per week (higher paper use in this store than the other 5) - making the average bag cost 4.5 cents. The attitude in our company is that offering the 5 cent sack return credit is "the right thing to do," and no one has ever really questioned if it made sense economically. Some customers appreciate the 5 cents for its monetary value, and most appreciate just the recognition for doing a good thing. (A few, who have shopped in Europe where you pay for each bag the store provides, have thought it absurd that we pay them, and they think we should charge for bags.) I wonder, though, how many people don't even know that they will get 5 cents for bringing their own bags. If a campaign to encourage reuse of bags is commenced, count me in as an enthusiastic participator! E-mail: osuzyanna [ AT ] hotmail [ DOT ] com -------------------- From Steve Apotheker, Metro, Regional Environmental Management, Waste Reduction Division, Portland, OR, responding to recent postings about phone book reduction (including the proposal that the National Waste Prevention Coalition should do a phone book reduction campaign): I would second the observation by David Allaway that telephone book reduction should focus on businesses. There is a lot of potential in this program. An analysis of our businesses indicates that about 15 percent of the region's businesses have 20 or more employees and account for more than 70 percent of total employment. More than half of these jobs are easily in office environments. At Metro Regional Center (our main offices), we have done a telephone book reduction campaign for the last two years. We have reduced our annual order from our original allotment of 1-plus sets per employee by more than 50 percent each year. We have: 1. Put a link to an Internet telephone book on our internal Intranet. 2. Provided instruction on how to do effective searches with the Internet book. 3. Assisted people in putting shortcuts to the Internet phone book right on their computer desktop. 4. Put current-edition paper phone books as loaner sets at all staff support locations. 5. Supported this approach by not automatically distributing hard copies of Metro's in-house phone book, but instead providing links, etc., to the electronic version. 6. Encouraged folks to keep their old paper version and swap out every two or three years. 7. Encouraged people to, when they get their new set at home, bring last year's set to work (thus you are only one year behind). Diversion of half of our phone books is equivalent to one week of disposal at Metro Regional Center. Regarding Meg Lynch's 10/21/02 comments on phone book reduction, I have a two-fold response. Part of her frustration is due to lack of phone company service. Qwest has been skewered for siphoning off resources to attend to customer service, which I think includes updating their electronic directory. Interestingly, Qwest has decided in the last few months to make a major promotion effort to let us know now they are going to focus on customer service. I think it would be good to have an automated mechanism for Metro employees to give immediate feedback when the phone number is not there, both to Qwest and our Oregon Public Utility Commission. I do think that many people have a lack of experience in searching efficiently in an online directory, especially when you may not have the exact name of the business. We do things automatically in a paper directory that we have to relearn how to do with an online directory because they have to be done explicitly. Finally, in response to someone else's comment, phone directories make money off their Internet "yellow pages" ads, so I am not sure that they will necessarily be against promotion of those online directories. E-mail: apothekers ( AT ) metro ( DOT ) dst ( DOT ) or ( DOT ) us -------------------- Link to a 10/22/02 Reuters news service article about a proposed future ban in Southern California of the dry cleaning chemical perchloroethylene (forwarded by Jeff Gaisford): http://reuters.com/news_article.jhtml?type=sciencenews&StoryID=1615583# The South Coast Air Quality Management District (AQMD), which regulates air pollution in four southern California counties, is proposing to phase out the use of perchloroethylene, or "perc," by the year 2019. A dry cleaning industry group is protesting the ban, while an environmental group is urging the AQMD to not wait so long to put the ban into effect. The AQMD will consider the ban during a public hearing this Friday, Nov. 1. -------------------- Link to a 10/18/02 article by Tom Mainelli on the PCWorld.com website, about how the first disposable cell phone has now arrived in stores (the disposable cell phone concept has been the subject of a number of previous Forum postings, going back to November, 1999): http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,106116,00.asp The $40 disposable cell phones, made by a company called Hop-on.com, come with 60 minutes of talk time, and can be reloaded with additional minutes. Hop-on.com plans to collect old phones for recycling through a mail-in program, as well as through recycling programs with phone sellers. Customers who return a used phone to Hop-on.com will get a $5 rebate toward the purchase of a new one. Hop-on.com chief executive officer Peter Michaels says his company is doing its part to encourage people to reuse or recycle the phones. "I do not know any other electronics maker who will buy back like us," Michaels says. -------------------- Excerpted from an article by Jennifer Bayot in the 10/29/02 New York Times: WANT BILLS BY SNAIL MAIL? IT MIGHT COST YOU MONEY You may dread monthly bills in the mailbox, but consider them a perk. Some companies are charging for them. For years, businesses have cajoled customers to view their bills online, mostly by offering cash, gift certificates, sweepstakes prizes and other incentives in return. A tough economy, though, has led to an even more aggressive stance. In a move to cut administrative costs and save on paper and postage, some companies have started billing customers a few extra dollars a month for paper statements. Leading the charge are telecommunications companies like Primus and MetroPCS. Some lenders and insurance providers, like State Farm Insurance and USAA, are charging a few customers for monthly paper statements. Credit card issuers like American Express are adding paper fees to merchant accounts, and online services that initially mailed statements, like NetBank and Ameritrade, the online brokerage firm, have begun charging for them, setting a standard for some new businesses that want to do the same. These companies say consumers should be ready and even eager to go paperless because Internet transactions have become more secure, not to mention more familiar and accessible. Some consumers argue that charging for paper bills punishes people who are not comfortable handling their finances online. After all, not everyone owns a computer or has a fast Internet connection. About 60 percent of American households have a computer at home and Internet access. Though many more people can use a computer with a fast link at the office, several said they were uncomfortable transmitting sensitive financial information while on the job. Companies that want to eliminate paper are asking for too much too soon, these people suggest. Paper bills for fixed installments (the same amount every time) are the most likely to disappear. State Farm warned customers this month that they would have to pay $1 for paper statements. Long-distance and wireless businesses, suffering from the poor economy and the telecommunications industry's troubles, also appear eager to cut off paper. MetroPCS, which offers wireless service in a handful of cities, and Primus, the telecommunications provider, each started charging customers $2 a month this year for mailed bills. Primus said 22,000, or 14 percent, of its customers now view and pay their bills online. Companies say that they need to cut costs and that consumers need to adapt. Many corporations invested heavily in the online billing programs, which allow their customers to save on postage and paperwork. It seems only fair, some businesses say, to bill online to help themselves as well. A number of studies and surveys show that the average company saves about $1 a bill by moving from a paper-based system to an electronic system. The charges for bills are rarely made across the board, with companies tending to aim at certain groups, like people who are technology savvy or their least profitable customers. Credit card companies, for example, are forcing small businesses to pay for paper bills, although they may someday extend the surcharges to individuals. Many consumers have been happy to go paperless. But for others, paying and viewing bills online can be confusing and a bother. Although some people can call up several online bills at a single specialty Web site or financial services site, many must visit each company's Web site. In all cases, customers must provide personal information and the account numbers of the credit cards or checking accounts they want to use to pay their bills online. They must also create and remember log-on names and passwords for each billing site. For now, many more companies continue to push consumers to give up paper but stop short of charging them for paper bills. Verizon, AT&T, Sprint and several energy companies automatically stop paper statements after customers opt to pay online. In these cases, online customers who want to continue receiving paper bills must request them. And some companies, like America Online, simply refuse to offer paper bills. -------------------- From Tom Watson, King County Solid Waste Division, Seattle, WA, and the National Waste Prevention Coalition: PLASTIC LAUNDRY SCOOPS - REDUCTION AND REUSE The other day I noticed this message on a box of Sun powder laundry detergent: "We are now putting scoops in fewer boxes to help reduce solid waste. If you do not have a scoop, follow the measuring cup instructions on this box." Sun is made by Huish Detergents, Inc., of Salt Lake City, Utah. Although it's a relatively small gesture, I was encouraged by it, and I would like to see the huge detergent manufacturers such as Procter & Gamble do the same. All those little plastic scoops add up, and many people already have several of them sitting on the shelf next to the washing machine. These scoops are often made of recycled plastic, and that's great, but you still don't need to get one in every box. For those who do get a new plastic scoop in every box of laundry detergent, here are a couple craft ideas for reusing them: - Laundry Scoop Bird Feeder, from the website of the Wesley Woods Earth Ship Club, Townsend, TN: http://www.campwesleywoods.com/earth.htm Scroll down. - Laundry Scoop Boxes, from the crafts web page of Marlies Cohen, Halifax, Nova Scotia: http://www.mcuniverse.com/cscoop.html -------------------- Link to a fact sheet from the California state Department of Toxic Substances Control, Sacramento, CA, about the California Mercury Reduction Act: http://www.dtsc.ca.gov/Schools/EA_FS_SB633.pdf Several provisions of this 2001 act went into effect earlier this year. A ban on novelty items containing mercury goes into effect January 1, 2003. This three-page fact sheet also gives background on mercury reduction and alternatives. - end -