Eco-Friendly Back to School Supplies

Take your back to school shopping eco-friendly this year. Buying 100% new products is hard on the environment. It eats up our precious natural resources, and waste produced from last years discarded school supplies could fill up your local landfill several times over. Before hitting the store, think for a minute, can anything that you already have on hand that can be reused for this school year.

According to Greenschools.net, "14 billion pencils are produced every year, many made with wood from ancient forests. Americans use about 31.5 million tons of printing and writing paper each year, requiring 535 million trees (most from virgin tree fiber) and 12 billion gallons of oil to make."

While reusing last years school supplies is the ideal it is not always possible. Many standard school supplies are now made with upcycled materials to create new back to school supplies.

Pencils:

Pencils do not have to be made out of wood. Companies such as TreeSmart create new pencils out of recycled newspaper. Instead of harvested wood from questionable locations the reclaimed newspaper is rolled and bound to create a material that feels like a standard wooden pencils. These pencils are not coated with the traditional yellow paint so the newsprint shows through and every pencil is a one of a kind creation.

If you are a traditionalist yellow pencils are available from Earthzone that use this same process. The only difference is that the sharpened tip reveals newsprint instead of wood.

Binders:

Traditional vinyl binders are inexpensive, but according to Rebinder, "Each year, over 500 metric tons of toxic PVC ends up in landfills as the result of [the] vinyl binders that people use." Instead of buying a new vinyl or plastic coated binders look for upcycled binders made of cardboard or pressed chipboard from companies such as Rebinder. When traditional binders covers rip they are often thrown away. Eco-friendly binders now also offer the option to unscrew the three ring prongs and switch out the cover.

Terracycle makes upcycled school binders out of used cookie wrappers. These wrappers cannot be recycled, so instead they are giving the wrapper a second life as a school binder.

Notebooks:

Recycled paper notebooks are readily available everywhere from Target to OfficeMax. They are often made from at least 90% recycled paper and although a little more expensive the number of trees you will save makes it worthwhile.

More exotic choices are available from companies like Ecojot. They use 100% post-consumer recycled paper in their hand painted notebooks while offering fun whimsical designs.

Think about the environment when you are shopping for back to school. The trees you save today will offer shade for your children in the future.