It has been three weeks since my third blog. So I completely stop using kitchen paper towel at home to dry the dishes. I either use reusable towels or putting them on a kitchen dish rack. I went to Walmart to buy this one; but I was looking for a metal one to avoid having plastic. So I bought one which said on the box Eco-friendly; unfortunately, I did not at this time anything about green-washing and I threw out in the trash before the green washing lesson. So I was not sure if the product is green washed or it’s actually Eco-friendly. On the other hand, I am still not able to find a new way to substitute my paper towel which I use it to dry my fried chicken or fries. Unfortunately, I could not find accurate information about whether using sponge or reusable paper towels are better to the environment. Furthermore, I think that reusable paper towels are better because sometimes sponge recruit bacteria easily and has a bad odor especially by the end of the week. Moreover, sponge is not reusable at all; we can use it more than one time. While I am using the rest room on campus, I noticed something wired that most of the rest rooms don’t have any hand drier. I noticed that in Mathew hall, Pharmacy school, chemistry building. On the other hand, I noticed that Heavilon hall restrooms have a drier although it is the same age as the chemistry building. I am just wondering why the university did not install hand drier in all of the rest rooms. I think the cost of installing hand drier in rest rooms might be little less than providing paper towels in all the restrooms. Also, the idea of having a small reusable towel is a good idea because it is easy to carry and I can use it many times in a week.
I presented the idea of buying hand dryer and installing it in my kitchen. Unfortunately, I the RA replied back to me after she asked the one who is responsible for remodeling and fixing the apartments after the students leave. He told her that it is costly and they can’t do it in all the buildings over the summer because they have a limited budget that they can’t exceed. Also, he said they did not provide the paper towels to the students on their rest rooms. So that is why they can’t substitute the cost of paper towels with installing a hand drier. Moreover, this project fits into the broader context of the course, because in POL 327 we have been discussing the consequences of increasing the carbon foot print which will affect the climate change as well as increasing pollution. So by cutting down the usage of paper towels, most of the factories would decrease their production of paper towels. This consequently decreases the usage of fossil fuels by these factories.
Many countries decided to cut down their usage of paper towel in order to decrease their water and carbon foot print. In my last two blogs, I discussed how some European countries start advising people on decreasing their consumption of paper towel. Furthermore, I discussed how Japan has a successful attempt in banding the usage paper towels by forcing the public to have a reusable towel in their bag. In this blog, I want to focus on Finland. Because they start having bidet shower which person can use in the restrooms instead of using paper towels to wipe down. I think this a good idea because it decreases the overall consumption of paper towels in Finland.
http://www.quora.com/Why-do-we-use-toilet-paper-instead-of-water-showers
saidmblog 