Seen Any Greenwashing Lately? Share All Examples Here!

I will take the challenge to share a greenwashing story. Right upfront, I will state that I am actively promoting the Ecoblue Cube as the right technology for virtually eliminating urinal flush water and odors. So I am competing with the waterless urinals which I am now going to attack as being greenwashed. I decided to become involved in promoting the Ecoblue Cube technology because after carefully studying it in detail, I concluded that it really does save a lot of water in a natural, environmentally-friendly, economical way and would ask you to take a look at it, ask hard questions, and draw your own conclusions. There you have it, full disclosure. Now here is the story....

Waterless urinals have been promoted in recent years as being the solution for saving an average of around 40,000 gallons of water per urinal per year. They use almost no water except for a few gallons during cleaning and changing the cartridge. This is true (unless we consider the water used in manufacturing them and the cartridges). But the real question is at what price do they save this water and is it worth the environmental cost?

First, unless it is new construction, a waterless urinal is installed by removing an existing, usually functional urinal. So the waterless urinal has to be manufactured and the old urinal has to either be used somewhere else (perpetuating the water use problem unless they install the Ecoblue Cube, but I will get to that in a moment) or else the urinal ends up in a landfill somewhere.

Next, once the urinal is installed, it needs to be serviced. This often involves chemical cleaners. Importantly, however, almost all waterless urinals have a cartridge which needs to be periodically replaced. This is usually a proprietary part of the waterless urinal which costs around $40 or more each and needs to be changed out when it gets clogged. Some manufacturers claim that they will last for 7,000 uses, but some owners experience that they need to change out the cartridge every couple of thousand uses. So depending upon conditions, the cartridge needs to be replaced every 4 to 10 weeks. This is a very big source of ongoing revenue for the manufacturer of the waterless urinal.

What happens to the cartridge and why does it matter? Here is a link to Falcon Waterless Urinals showing how to change their cartridge:

http://www.falconwaterfree.com/pdf/028-EN.pdf

Look especially at step five in this document and you will see the cartridge and Falcon's instructions to put it into a plastic bag and dispose of it. Where does it get disposed? Ususally it ends up in the trash and goes to a landfill. Please keep in mind that Al Gore Jr. is on the Board of Advisers of this company. I have nothing at all against Al Gore and believe that he has a genuine concern about the environment, but this company is promoting the saving of 40,000 gallons of water by building a new urinal, replacing an existing one if necessary, and throwing away a big old piece of plastic which we have proven can be recycled and reused. I think that former Vice President Al Gore should really seriously reconsider his relationship to this technology.

Now compare this to the Ecoblue Cube. this system uses a very minor, inexpensive modification which basically removes the flush handle or actuator and only allows the urinal to be flushed during the cleaning operation. Apart from a gallon or two of water used during cleaning, no urinal flush water is used. The heart of the system is a natural, non-pathogenic bacteria which is supplied in a cube form which dissolves over time with use and generates a clean, fresh smell. No pucks or deodorizers. No cartridges to landfill. No chemicals. No replacing of urinals or valves and we still save on average 40,000 gallons per urinal per year. No waste.

Waterless urinals are being specified for new construction and even retrofits by people who are not aware of the Ecoblue Cube and have not considered the life cycle implcations of waterless urinals. There is at least one community in North America which requires that waterless urinals must be installed in all new construction. The US Army specifies waterless urinals for new construction.

We are currently installing the Ecoblue Cube into waterless urinals where the owners have gotten tired of the expense and effort of changing cartridges. Our bacteria consume the organic by-products which are formed when urine decomposes and which leads in part to clogging of the cartridge and the need to change it. We are showing these same people how to recycle and reuse a cartridge by soaking it in warm water to remove the scaling. Even if these owners don't convert to the Ecoblue Cube, they should be demanding that the suppliers of the cartridges take them back and figure out how to recycle them instead of throwing them away. It's not that hard, we figured it out. However, the waterless urinal suppliers do not want to recycle cartridges; they want to sell new ones like razor blades. It's an important source of profits to them.

There a few integrated trap waterless urinals offered which don't have the cartridge problem, but they are far from being the majority. However, they still have to be manufactured from scratch which adds to their environmental impact. True, we currently have to bring the Ecoblue Cube system components from Australia at the moment until we have enough demand here in North America which adds to our carbon footprint. Nevertheless, we have minimized manufacturing impacts and packaging and made our shipments as dense as possible in order to reduce unfavorable effects and will make the products here as soon as if can be justified. The Ecoblue Cube system has been proven effective for over 10 years now and, to my knowledge, there is no other system which can do this job as effectively and cost efficiently. The average price for water in the United States is approximately 1 cent per gallon and the Ecoblue Cube operating cost is less than that on a per gallon basis so it can be paid for by the water savings in most cases. In addition, valves and valve components last longer, no chemicals or harsh acid treatments and deodorizers are not needed. Finally, just think about the electricity savings if water is no longer pumped high up in skyscrapers only to be flushed back down below street level again. Therefore, the Ecoblue Cube is reducing consumption and having positive environmental benefits in many other areas than just the direct water saved.

You be the judge: Are Waterless Urinals Greenwashed?

The Ecoblue Cube is not a waterless urinal, but is a virtually water-free urinal technology

For more information about the Ecoblue Cube, visit my Linked In page for a slide show and visit www.ecobluecorp.com

Steve Wagner
630-433-6646

Wow Steve, I remember hearing about the Eco Blue Cube in passing but totally forgot about it until reading this. I wonder why I've never seen it in my neck of the woods? (and trust me, I've visited a fair amount of bathrooms in my time, too.) I think that if you posted a summary of the Eco Blue Cube benefits in a blog post (with pictures for dorks like me), it might be a little user friendly. Like a Eco Blue Cube For Dummies. I'm really interested in what you had to say and am floored that Al Gore hasn't taken the entire landfill "collateral damage" into account...

Here's my contribution Bob!

http://www.webwire.com/ViewPressRel.asp?aId=98392

The gist of this one is that a dairy starts an organic brand, creates a niche, creates a discount brand using the organic brand name - who's going to know the difference?

U-Haul is a fairly egregious offender right now. They are promoting use of their fleet of gasoline moving trucks as a way to reduce CO2 emissions, when in fact diesel trucks are far more efficient and produce substantially less CO2 for the same amount of work done. You can read about this in detail here:

http://www.design-impact.org/blog/2009/06/green-fail-u-hauls-spurious-greenwash-promotes-increased-co2-emissions/

The Design Impact blog has a category for Green FAIL. Click on that category to see other examples. You can also submit your examples of greenwashing to be featured on Design Impact.