We are filling landfill sites in the same way babies fill nappies (From Epsom Guardian)

We are filling landfill sites in the same way babies fill nappies

10:16am Saturday 19th April 2008

• Print
• Email
• Share

In the spring, as regularly as daffodils come into flower, councils hold a real nappy week in order to persuade mums to wrap their infants' rear ends in washable rather than disposable nappies.

This year Real Nappy Week takes place from April 21 to 27.

“They have got to be kidding if they think they are going to persuade most parents, particularly families with both parents working, to go back to washable nappies."

Simon Matthews

Real nappies, made from cotton, hemp, microfibre, or even material made from bamboo, are the "in thing" in certain circles.

Certainly, if more parents gave the bum's rush to disposables, councils would be delighted. It would save them a fortune in landfill costs, in rubbish transportation charges and save council officers' hair from growing grey with the worry of what to do when landfill runs out.

Landfill costs

In Sutton disposable nappies make up 5 per cent of the rubbish - accounting for 2,500 tonnes of refuse heading for landfill each year.

Hence the repeated pleas for parents to help the environment by using washable nappies and certainly the statistics for the tonnes of nappies that go to landfill are frightening.

It is estimated that up to eight million disposable nappies are thrown away every day.

But councils are inconsistent. While they put pressure on parents to put their babies in washable nappies they cry off putting equal pressure on women to adopt the reusable sanitary protection used by their great-grandmothers.

And they do not attempt to persuade incontinent adults to say goodbye to modern disposable hygiene products.

But babies are an easy target - they cannot answer back and to be fair it is estimated that each little posterior will need around 6,500 nappies until it is potty trained.

Saving money

One of the best arguments in favour of traditional nappies is that it is said that parents could save themselves £600 by going for reusable rather than disposable nappies.

Parents are under pressure to go green and use washable nappies, which these days are cute, brightly coloured, fixed with velcro and shaped rather than the huge squares of terry that their grandparents and parents folded into triangles to pin round their babies, the whole bulky package being covered with plastic pants.

But however brightly coloured, real nappies still have to be soaked, washed, and some manufacturers recommend a regular tumble dry to keep nappies soft and fluffy.

Even if mums are affluent enough to use a laundry service the washing process still has to be gone through to a high standard to maintain levels of hygiene.

So how good is that for the environment?

Not very, according to the Environment Agency in a 200-page report which goes into alarming detail on just how many gallons of urine the average baby can produce and how many pounds of poo it can reasonably be expected to deposit in its nappies.

It demanded details of production processes from the manufacturers of each kind of nappy and details of the washing process at commercial launderies.

The experts also went into huge detail on the chemical make up of an infants' bodily fluids and how many nappy changes are likely to be made each day and finally came to this conclusion: "For the nappy systems studied (cloth versus disposables) there was no significant difference between any of the environmental impacts - that is overall no system clearly had a better or worse environmental performance."

This is a conclusion that has been challenged by the Women's Environmental Network which says the Environment Agency report was based on washing nappies at a very high temperature and tumble drying them.

Most nappies can be washed at lower temperatures, says the network, and tumble dried occasionally.

Bounty

The pressure to abandon disposables is growing as the cost of using landfill sites to dispose of household waste is increasing rapidly. The rising costs ultimately being paid by the council taxpayer.

On top of that, the number of landfill sites is decreasing and some councils fear they will run out of space in a few years' time.

Sutton Council was so desperate that last year it offered a £35 bounty to parents to buy cloth nappies in the hope of reducing the number of used nappies it sends to landfill each year.

Other councils offered similar incentives and will be gearing up again for this year's campaign.

A spokesman for Surrey Waste Management said: "We are going to hold all sorts of community events and roadshows - we are putting the final touches to our plans."

In Surrey waste is taken to landfill at Redhill, Albury near Guildford, to Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire and the longer the journey the more damage to the environment - let alone the damage when the refuse is buried.

While a lot of mums are convinced by the real nappy argument, there are still parents to be persuaded and quite a bit of resistance to overcome.

Time consuming

"They have got to be kidding if they think they are going to persuade most parents, particularly families with both parents working, to go back to washable nappies.

"But I would buy nappies that biodegrade more quickly if they were as comfortable and as effective as normal brands," said Epsom resident Simon Matthews, father of two little girls, one now out of nappies and one in disposables.

"It is time manufacturers of mainstream brands worked on a nappy that biodegrades in the ground but not on the baby," he added.

And here is where the supermarkets could help. A few stock lesser-known "green" disposable nappies and nappy sacks made of starch which biodegrade rapidly. But the majority stick with the famous brands which will be filling up landfill sites for decades to come.

• Print
• Email
• Share