E-Commerce: Convenience Built On A Mountain Of Cardboard

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Do you order stuff online? Is that stuff delivered by truck? Does your purchase come in a cardboard box? If you answered "yes" to those questions, you are killing the planet. Even recycling cardboard boxes is bad. Personally I like to order my cardboard boxes online so that they are delivered to me...in a cardboard box. :D


The environmental cost can include the additional cardboard — 35.4 million tons of containerboard were produced in 2014 in the United States, with e-commerce companies among the fastest-growing users — and the emissions from increasingly personalized freight services. Though recycling can make consumers think they are helping the environment, the process has its own costs, including the emissions from shipping it to recycling centers, which use a lot of energy and water.

 
I just vote everyone go kill themselves. That will stop all the pollution right quick.
 
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I hear cardboard recycling is the most profitable right now. I usually keep a box if it's about 2' or larger because they come in handy for packing stuff. Not only that, but I can use them to lay on when working under my vehicles. Cutting one in a circle (with a hole in the middle for my finger to hang on) the size of my wheels keep the tire shine from spraying all over my wheels, too. :)
I don't typically order online unless I can save a lot of money - or it costs a lot and I can save on tax. If it's something I can't even get locally, then obviously I will get it online.
If I believe I may have to return it shortly, such as something I'm not sure if it will work or fit what I need it for, then I will buy it locally. More often than not, they will pricematch (at the very least - amazon) and I will buy it locally since I get it instantly rather than waiting for someone to ship it (or amazon to "think" about shipping it).
So, I try to buy locally if it makes sense. Saves on boxes (and the planet? lol), too.
 
Wow... all those words and not a single mention of possible solutions. That was a waste of my time to read.
 
It's either this or live like the Amish. This feeling of guilt the author has is just trying to make himself feel better for the materialism that he embraces. It is completely phony and he has already forgotten it about it after writing it as another package with the newest gadget was delivered to his front doorstep. We all go through this bout of delusion of grandeur once in a while.
 
When i was working in IT retailts with online shopping we reused most of our cardboxes we received our merchandise in as boxes for item we shipped as well. and when a box was to badly damaged to waaranty a re issue. it got "Shredded"/weaved into small blanket of shock protection material for it last trip.
Reuse is better than recycling.
 
SvenBent said:
Reuse is better than recycling.
Click to expand...

I used to reuse many of my boxes when I shipped stuff I sold on eBay, but the fees have gotten so high, I don't I don't sell much any more.

Same goes for grocery bags. They want to ban plastic bags and force the use of reusable bags out here in California, even though cities that have already done this have seem an increate in people getting sick due to contamination of the bags (after a couple months of use they tend to have more bacteria than a public bathroom)
If they ban the plastic bags, a lot of people will end up having to buy trash bags instead of reusing the ones from the store.
 
Am I supposed to care? First, the supposedly "green" libs in charge of government and "science" decided the world would be positively changed by killing off brick and mortar stores. Get people to drive less. Move around less. Produce less carbon. Save the planet.

Now that we've got it down to only delivery vehicles bringing us boxes from one of only a handful of huge online retailers... we can't do that either because the cardboard is killing the planet.

Seriously. #@(% off. It's every bit as bad as having the science change about which food will kill you/save you going back and forth every other year. Except in the name of the environment they keep rewriting how we live day-to-day and then have the audacity to complain about the results of their own actions like it's the fault of the people who did what they said to do! (In this case, order online!)
 
there's an easy way to recycle your cardboard boxes (if you're not already reusing them for something else)....grow oyster mushrooms on them.

cut your boxes up into small pieces, pasteurize them to kill off any unwanted bacteria, then place them in a 5-gallon bucket (a clean one) with holes cut all around the outside of it and inoculate the layers of cardboard with oyster mushroom spores/spawn. throw in your pasteurized old coffee grounds/tea bags/newspapers/supermarket ads in there for good measure. you break down the cardboard naturally without having to have it shipped anywhere, and you get tasty oyster mushrooms to cook & eat out of the deal. or even if you don't grow them to eat, it breaks it all down naturally and cleanly.

if you are going to eat them, though, just make sure you're not using cardboard made in china or other places where harmful chemicals are used in their manufacture. obviously do a bit more in-depth research on what to, and what not to use if you are going to be eating the mushrooms, but it could make a difference, even if you're not going to eat them.
 
Yup, if you take part in commerce at all you are destroying the planet. Also you should turn off the computer you wrote that on and never turn it on again, also you should poop into your hand and spread it on your garden. And don't clean up after doing so, because toilet paper is destroying trees. But you shouldn't use a Bede because third world children drink less clean water per week than would be used to clean your backside.
 
I took the headline to mean its a fragile system and could collapse at any moment. Instead the guy just wants us to buy in store. A small box to me, or hundreds to thousands of boxes to a retail store a week.

I choose just a small box to me every now and then.
 
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