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This Book is Not a Tree: A Note About Green Clean
Green Clean is a DuraBook, a waterproof, stain-resistant, super-durable book made with synthetic paper and a special binding. It will last for years -- carted around the house, sitting out in the sun, soaked in a cleaning bucket.
You might expect that a guide to ecofriendly housecleaning would be made of recycled paper. But recycling can only be done so many times; fibers eventually lose their strength and the paper becomes garbage.
The materials we use do not need to become trash. Instead, they can become nutrients for a new generation of goods. “Waste equals food,” architect William McDonough and chemist Michael Braungart write in their landmark book Cradle to Cradle. They describe the coming transformation of industry from one “that takes, makes, and wastes to one that celebrates natural, economic, and cultural abundance.”
Green Clean represents a step toward this more sustainable way of making things. The polypropylene that Green Clean is printed on, which can be traditionally recycled, will, in a better industrial system, become just such a nutrient, part of a stream of materials that can be reused over and over without losing their integrity.
As Green Clean’s authors note, a tool that lasts for years is an ecofriendly tool. If you are done with Green Clean, though, a landfill is no place for a book. Give it to a friend or a library, or send it to us at Melcher Media. We will make sure it is properly recycled.
Melcher Media
124 West 13th Street
New York NY 10011
Posted by GreenClean at May 18, 2005 02:18 PM