The Great Bamboo Lie

by Michael Smith (Veshengro)

Four companies that use bamboo for clothing and other household fabrics were charged by the United States Federal Trade Commission (FTC) for deceptive advertising techniques: claiming that the fabrics are made from “bamboo fiber”, are manufactured using an environmentally friendly process, are naturally antimicrobial, and will biodegrade. In point of fact, says the FTC, “bamboo fiber” is really rayon, the same fiber invented in the 1850s. Rayon is traditionally made from wood pulp, but it can be made from any pulpy substance, including bamboo, and the FTC had issues with these companies selling rayon under a misleading label that made it seem more eco-friendly than wood-based rayon. Furthermore, they add, both wood-based and bamboo-based rayon are manufactured using air-polluting caustic soda, or lye, which is not environmentally friendly and destroys any antimicrobial characteristics that may have existed in raw bamboo pulp. Regarding claims of biodegradation, the FTC says that bamboo will not biodegrade if tossed into a landfill, where most of our trash ends up.

The FTC is not the first to criticize bamboo-clothing manufacturers for advertising the fiber as eco-friendly when the process of converting the pulp into fiber employs such caustic chemicals. In a recent article for the Council of Fashion Designers of America, a representative from the Natural Resources Defense Council, which is currently working with textile mills to lessen their environmental impacts, recommended that any designer looking for more eco-friendly fabrics should avoid bamboo. And the GREEN (LIVING) REVIEW has, more than once, criticized the claims made about bamboo, and especially bamboo-clothing and I believe that the GREEN (LIVING) REVIEW was, in fact, one of the first to take an issue with the promotion of bamboo and especially bamboo-based textiles as greenwash.

Bamboo is always claimed to have an environmental upside in that grows quickly, replenishing itself in as little as 5 years after it has been harvested always compared with 15 to 20 years for trees, though no one seems to look at proper coppice rotation in this matter. It is said to require few pesticides and very little water. I have yet to see wood grown in most environments to require pesticide and for water, well Nature takes care of that with trees.

Bamboo clothing is not – really – natural and neither is it biodegradable or compostable. It is a viscose material and the same as Rayon with the only difference being that one is made from wood pulp the other is made from bamboo pulp. Same difference.

Someone from the green movement stated in response to the US FTC ruling with regards to bamboo clothing that no clothing, not even from natural fiber biodegrades. I would like to dispute that fact and suggest to that person to try to see what happens to a cotton T-shirt or a wool blanket after a year or two in the compost heap. They will have disintegrated. How do I know? I've done it!

Bamboo fiber bowls, cutlery, etc., are still being promoted in the UK, even and especially on green (trade) events as the be all in green but it is a lie plain and simple.

While traditional bamboo products, including furniture, made in countries where this grass grows are fine and good it is not good and sustainable to import them thousands of miles to Europe and the USA and then call them eco-friendly products. Such imports are, in the same way as bamboo clothing, flatware, etc., are not green nor sustainable.

It we want to be eco-conscious and sustainable then furniture should be from homegrown wood (or better still from reclaimed wood) and the same goes for flooring and treen ware. And as far as clothing is concerned this should be from real fiber or if man-made then it should be marked and marketed as such. Bamboo for clothing is Rayon, which is a viscose material and thus, regardless of the fact that it is either wood or bamboo pulp, man-made. Period!

When it comes to bamboo flooring we encounter the bamboo lie and that on a real heavy level. Bamboo flooring is but a laminate flooring type, like wood laminate flooring, and is not green and environmentally friendly at all regardless of the growth rate of bamboo. You cannot cut bamboo into planks or slabs as bamboo is hollow in the round and a lot of heat and other energy, plus powerful glues, are required to make this kind of flooring. It is also not as hard and hard wearing as normal hardwood flooring. It is greenwash in the extreme and it is time that the truth be told and broadcast far and wide.

If you want green flooring – aside from a “dirt” floor – then choose hardwood and ideally here reclaimed hardwood flooring. Now that is green and sustainable.

If you want sustainable clothing then go for real fiber or recycled fiber materials and, ideally, go pre-used from thrift stores. I have not bought new clothing, bar underwear and socks (I would never go as far as buying them pre-owned), for I do not know how long. And, when the clothes really come to the end of their lives then reuse them for cleaning rags and such like before condemning the material, finally, to the waste stream or, if made of truly natural materials, to the compost heap to return to the soil.

The greatest problem that we are facing as consumers who want to be environmentally conscious and do good to the Planet is the amount of greenwash that is about and whose misleading claims are not just misleading but outright lies, such as in the case of bamboo textiles and bamboo flooring, for example. We must, thus, arm ourselves with the knowledge and combat greenwash wherever we encounter it.

© 2014

Natural Home Guide

by Michael Smith (Veshengro)

Natural Home Guide from www.vine.com. Here you can find room-by-room tips and product suggestions, so you can create a comfortable, inviting and happy natural home of your own.

Bamboo is, once again, greenwashed in this guide. While the material is indeed, when used as it comes, a very sustainable material but when it comes to chopping board and such then local hardwoods, such as oak, sycamore, etc., is a much better and way more sustainable choice than bamboo. Do no get fooled.

Bamboo, while being a fast growing grass the plants of which can reach forest proportions, comes in round hollow stems and hence planks cannot be cut from it.

Any chopping board and other flat items are created by the use of energy and even glues and thus the entire green and sustainable claims go right out of the window here.

There are bamboo products and then there are bamboo products. Those that are made in traditional ways and processes in the way that they are used by the natives of the countries where bamboo grows are the good products; the rest is greenwash. Don't fall for it!

Other products, not necessarily in this guide, also engage in greenwash, not just the bamboo brigade, in that they claim to be so very green when they, however, resist to remove chemicals such as 1,4-dioxane from their cleaning products, as in the case of Ecover.

Know what's what and get informed as to what is in so-called green and eco products and how they are made. Don't fall for the claims by the manufacturers and proponents.

Also, instead of running to the stores to buy products made from recycled materials consider reuse and repurposing and upcycling stuff first yourself. Only then go for buying such products. There is no need to go and buy a pencil bin made from recycled steel when you might as well use a cleaned up tin can for this task. Or, instead of rushing out to buy a set of recycled glass storage jars use some that come free with products that you buy. You have, after all, paid for those anyway and thus if you toss them into the recycling bin you waste your money.

You can also make your own counter/windowsill peely-bin from a large tin can with, is you so desire, a wire handle attached. As you should be tossing that stuff into the compost anyway at the end of the day there is no need for a lid though I am sure you can find something that will fit for that purpose too.

Rethink the use of your dryer when it comes to doing the laundry. Consider the good old washing line or the pop-up dryer for the outdoors. Let wind and sun do the drying for you. Indoors there is always, in winter or such, the heating, be it using a drying rack near the stove or the radiators themselves. It also add humidity to the home, which is very useful if you are using a central heating.

Make reusing, repurposing and upcycling the first choice when wishing to green your home and life; not buying “green” products.

http://www.vine.com/naturalhomeguide

© 2013

The Great Bamboo Con

by Michael Smith (Veshengro)

Green consumers are being conned all over the pace with the claim that bamboo is a very eco-friendly material, especially in the form of flooring, plywood and such for the building trade, or as a fabric.

Nothing could, in fact, be further from the truth.

However, “eco-stores” and green media keep harping on and on about the supposed eco-friendliness and the sustainability of this fast growing grass that can be used, in some ways, like hardwood.

While bamboo is fine when it is used as it always has been in the countries where it grows, for containers and whatever else, made by hand without any real “additives”, when it is being made flooring to – supposedly – be as good as real hardwood flooring and more environmentally sound then greenwash hits.

Bamboo does not come in planks. It is a hollow grass, though rather hard. Thus it has to be turned into sheets and this takes a great deal of energy and also chemicals.

In other words, bamboo flooring is nothing more than laminate flooring, using bamboo rather than sheets of hardwood. Where is the green factor here? There is none. It is as bad for the environment as is wood laminate, period.

Bamboo plywood is recently also being praised as being an environmentally friendly product for the building industry. Since when is any plywood, whether from FSC certified wood or bamboo, environmentally friendly? The glues and resins used certainly are not.

Now we come to bamboo clothing. To make a fiber from bamboo that can be spun and woven it must be created and that is done in the same way as viscose made from wood and used for Rayon. Anyone thinking green product might like to check out how viscose is produced. It should be a real eyeopener.

When it comes to items of tableware and kitchen stuff made from bamboo then those could be seen as green as long as they are made as they have been for centuries in the country where bamboo grows and has been used traditionally to make all manner of things.

Bamboo chopsticks certainly fall under sustainability, as do other traditional products but anything that is created using machinery, glues, resins, and other processes, the story changes.

All in all the greenwash of bamboo is a rather serious issue in the green field that we must conquer and the record must be set straight.

Unfortunately this does not tally with the ringing of the cash registers and producers and merchants vehemently reject any of the factors that we keep raising as to bamboo being not as green and sustainable a product as they claim.

It is all very much the same as with the “Eco-Button”; but you all know the story by now, I guess.

There is so much greenwash about that all I can suggest here, aside from exposing it, that the buyer beware.

© 2010

Bamboo – A sustainable alternative to hardwood

by Michael Smith

The headline can be seen as both a statement of fact as well as a question and we shall be looking at it from those angles as well.

Aside from using bamboo as a (sustainable) replacement and substitute for wood, it can also be spun, if that is the correct term here, into fiber and yarn from which to make clothing, such as T-shirts and such like.

However, our immediate concern here shall be as regards to bamboo as a (sustainable) replacement for hardwood and even more.

In the Far East, where bamboo originates, this grass, for that is what it is, for it is not a tree, is used also in many instances to replace metal.

Scaffolding, for instance, are made from bamboo poles in places such as China, and also, so I understand, the structural frame of many building, instead of using steel. As the material is extremely flexible, even when dry, it is much better in, say, earthquake areas, such as are many of its home countries, so to speak. Bamboo frames withstand the shocks of the earthquake much better than steel does and appear not to suffer the same damage.

Bamboo has also been using in many of those countries such as China, Vietnam, Japan – and in other places where it does grow, such as in the jungles of Asia and Latin America – for cutting blades, such as knives, arrows and spears. Also is was uses as a replacement for steel in the way of digging tools such a spades and shovels, and tools for tending the gardens.

But, I digressed a little here again: we were dealing with bamboo as a (sustainable) substitute for certain uses of hardwoods, were we not?

From what I have so far of products made from this plant, such as the kitchen and lifestyle utensils and accessories by “bambu”, and American company, whose products are now available in the UK via “Green Pioneer Ltd.”, and also others, such as the use of bamboo in ASUS laptop cases, it is quire capable to be a more sustainable (?) substitute for some hardwoods, especially the tropical kind, and in the case of computer cases, of plastics.

The reason I have been putting the word “sustainable” in brackets or, as in the previous paragraph, marked with a question mark in brackets, is that I, to some degree, question the sustainable issue.

Why do I question the sustainable issue as regards to bamboo and bamboo products? The answer here is that, while I am well aware of the fact that bamboo regrows to its full height and extent after cutting in about seven years and that cutting actually makes it grow more vigorously, live any grass, I do wonder as to the environmental footprint of transporting the goods, though often made in “Fair Trade” workshops from, say, China or Vietnam, to the UK or the USA.
That, however, I would hasten to add, is my sole concern, I think, as far as bamboo's green credentials are concerned.

The nice thing with bamboo is that containers can be made from it without the need of much work even, should one want the real rustic look. On the other hand it can be worked into many different things, the list which would be a little too long to mention here.

I must say that the more I hand bamboo the more I enjoy it and it's texture, though I also and especially love wood. The latter is, probably, still a greater love of mine, and here particularly native hardwoods.

Bamboo has an advantage over wood per se in that it can be used for the making of disposable flatware, as well as disposable plates and dishes; something that just cannot be made from wood, at least not directly. In addition to that there are eating utensils such as small pocket-size sporks and also other items of reusable picnic flatware. Not that one only has to use that kind of flatware for picnics, now. Wood just would not have the structural integrity and strength for this. Wooden spoons are one thing but...

Therefore bamboo is a suitable and possibly green substitute here and we should welcome it, especially when those products are made at Fair Trade approved workshops and conditions.

Bambu products can be purchased in the UK via http://www.bambuboutique.co.uk/ and in the USA via http://bambuhome.com/. For stockists in other areas contact bambu in the USA.

© M Smith (Veshengro), February 2009
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“Bambu” bamboo products at “Green Pioneer”

by Michael Smith

We are all, I am sure, familiar with bamboo being used for the making of chopsticks and I am sure that the one or other of us has a set or more of those at home from Chinese takeout meals, for instance. I certainly have. I can never get myself to throwing those away, as they can be washed up (by hand – I would not suggest the use of a dishwasher here) and reused. Carry your own chopsticks is a campaign that is taking off in Japan, for instance, and as far as I can see this is one reason why to retain those that are given with takeout meals, for Chinese to Japanese.

Bambu's bamboo products, originally designed in the USA and distributed there now have a distributer in the UK in the form of “Green Pioneer Ltd” and they can be purchased now in UK currency via their website.

Those “bambu” bamboo products, whether the bowls, natural or lacquer, or the simple one-time (and does it really have to be just a one-time) use plates or flatware, or the sporks, are also not expensive at all, despite their quality and workmanship, especially seeing that, as far as it would appear to me, most of those products are, more than likely, make individually and by hand.

Bamboo is a natural material of tremendous strength and, unless brute force is being used, breading those products is not going to be an easy task. We must not forget that in Asia bamboo is used for scaffolding and, so I understand, even as the skeleton of building. Because of its flexibility is it makes structures a lot less prone to earthquakes than does steel.

Bamboo is a very interesting material that is little known for things other than garden canes and a few other things in the Western world. So far we have not, for instance, seen things like eating utensils, unless you happen to use chopsticks, some of which are bamboo.

Bamboo is, theoretically, a grass and not a tree and wood but the material is probably stronger than many if not indeed all woods. Full grown bamboo cut down will regrow to its full size withing about seven years. Therefore as far as using it for utensils and such like and many other uses this is a very sustainable way to go.

I do not say that we should abandon wood. Far from it but as they say “horses for courses” and this is also a case here as to sustainable raw materials.

Clothing too can be made from bamboo fibers but I am beginning to digress again, I think.

When I met “Green Pioneer” with the “bambu” range at the Top Drawer Spring Show at London's Earl's Court in January 2009 I was given some single use plates and single use flatware as well as a small bamboo spork and to use the plates just once I would say, and the same as to the “disposable” flatware, would be a great shame. The spork certainly is not a “one-time use” tool and the plates could also be, though I still have to give it a try, washed up and reused again, as could the picnic flatware.

The little bambu spork retails £2 and, while that is not expensive, I am sure, for this lovely made eating tool, it certainly is not something that I would want to chuck into the compost soon after, nor are you meant to. It is in fact designed to be reusable and it is dishwasher safe.

This bamboo spork by “bambu”, that I refer to above, is a lovely little eating tool that one can carry on one's person for the “just in case”. Only one must be mindful of the fact that the tines of the fork part of the bambu sport are very sharp indeed, so some sort of cover or small box would be ideal to use with it for carrying it.

I am sure that we shall be seeing more bamboo products on the market all over the place in the not so distant future. There are a number of them, from a number of different designers and suppliers available and via a number of different outlets.

As far as looks and variety are concerned I doubt, however, that anyone is going to match the bambu collection sold in the UK by “Green Pioneer Ltd” via the “Bambu Boutique” will be matched soon and I also doubt this as far as the prices are concerned.

While the lacquer bowls, which are absolute pieces of beauty though which at the same time are timeless and all great for whatever use in kitchen and home, are the most premium part of the range the baskets at £10 for a set of 3, utensils range in price from £2.50 to £3.50) and chopping boards start at an entry level one that is priced at £8. Those all are certainly great values are great value.

Although there are kitchen products from a variety of sources available range from those for the primarily home market to those to the catering trade and everything else in between, and that is just the use of bamboo as kitchen and eating utensils, bowls for a variety of uses and such like, the bambu collection, I am sure, can cater for all needs at a very good price; something with in the current climate (no, the economic one and not the natural one) is very important, I am sure.

In addition to that there are beginning to be a multitude of other uses for bamboo appearing on the “green” market including the use of bamboo by laptop makers such as ASUS and also for the use of flooring in place of wood laminates and such.

In my opinion, bamboo is a natural – pardon the pun – for kitchen and cooking utensils more than for the use in flooring though it is very hard wearing and long lasting.

For more on the “bambu” range of bamboo products check out the Bambu Boutique, the retail portal for this range.

© M Smith (Veshengro), January 2009
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