Companies all want to be seen to be green nowadays. You can imagine looking at a company’s marketing To-Do list and seeing “Develop some green talking points” listed.

And many are coming out with initiatives that actually look pretty good, but the problem with a lot of these is that they begin and end with the new product: Buy this, because it’s greener than the previous version. The best example of this is new cars. Automakers and some government leaders tell us older cars are less fuel efficient and therefore conscientious citizens should go out and buy a new car. And, as far as the argument goes, it’s true: new cars may use less gas per kilometre than your old car.

But what the pitch fails to factor in is the environmental costs of making that shiny new car. The parts all have to be manufactured, then shipped to an assembly plant, then put together, and then the new car is shipped to the buyer. Each step pumps pollutants into the environment, and any efficiencies that might be gained from driving the new car are more than offset by the environmental costs of creating it.

Similarly, it doesn’t make sense to throw all your old light bulbs in the garbage in order to buy new compact fluorescent units.

So when a press release arrived from Xerox touting its new green paper, I was pleased to see the following: “The new paper for digital printing is made by a mechanical process so it uses half as many trees as traditional paper, is manufactured with less water and chemicals, and is made in a mill using hydroelectricity, cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 75 percent. Plus, because it's lighter than paper made by the traditional chemical process, it costs less to ship and mail. The new Xerox High Yield Business Paper will be produced in a Canadian mill.” 

Details are here. 

I am not in a position to assess the overall soundness of this product, but it is good to see a company which claims to have a green product actually factor in manufacturing, greenhouse gas emissions and transportation.

Peter Wolchak