Cloth Diaper Debate

Patrick and I are planning to use cloth diapers with our baby. There are many parents using cloth now so we have a lot of supportive people to turn to for help and advice. On the other hand we also get a lot of strange looks and questions. We give our spiel about the environment and sometimes we go into the health reasons but we're more careful with that because we don't want to offend anyone who is using disposables on their own child. It becomes a frustrating conversation when I start feeling like I need to defend my choice. Some people act as if what we'll be doing is the most disgusting, unsanitary thing a human could ever do. I'm not even going to get into that right now. That can be another blog post someday if I feel like addressing those ignorant views. Right now I'm fired up about another issue that inevitably arises when I discuss the environmental benefits of cloth diapers v. disposables.

"But the water you have to use to constantly wash all those diapers isn't good for the environment".

Taken by itself, without any knowledge of recycling or the state of our landfills, I suppose that statement could seem to make sense. But if you give it more than a split second's thought, how could anyone believe that? I just think it's a no brainer that to recycle anything is better than throwing it away and buying a new one. The problem is that people don't think about where their stuff comes from before they get it or where it goes when they are done with it.

So here's my response:
It takes TONS more water AND chemicals to continually produce all those disposables that never get a second life. It's like recycling anything. Should we only use paper plates and plastic eating utensils and styrofoam cups instead of reusable dishes because it would use "too much" water to run the dishwasher? Amazingly, I have heard that argument before. But better yet, it's like drinking water from plastic bottles instead of a reusable bottle, then throwing all those bottles into the garbage instead of recycling them. They sit in the landfills just like the diapers and the energy consumption to keep making those bottles is a heck of a lot more than the energy used to wash out a few Siggs that we would reuse.

So yes, using cloth diapers means doing extra laundry just like using my "real" dishes means running the dishwasher every other day but it also means saving the earth a lot of energy in the long run. If I have 20 cloth diapers they had to come from somewhere. There was energy put into making them before I bought them. Then I'll have to wash them every 2-3 days and then I'll get to reuse them. When my baby outgrows them I can save them if I plan to have a second child or I can pass them on to a friend or I can sell them. There is a huge market for used cloth diapers. If I'm really good and use all cotton or another natural fabric, they will someday break down and go back into the earth when the last baby is done with them. No sitting in landfills until the end of time. So that's it. The energy used to make 20 diapers plus the water and electricity (and all natural detergent) used to wash them every 2-3 days. Now compare that to the hundreds of disposables a baby will go through. Each of those disposable diapers is made up of paper, plastic, and that gross pulp that soaks up urine. One of these diapers is made using energy, water and chemicals for every single time a baby is changed and then where does it go when it gets thrown away? In a landfill, where it will sit FOREVER. Then you buy another case of diapers and the whole cycle starts again. One could easily surmise that we will someday be overrun by diapers and plastic water bottles (and other plastic waste) because without recycling, where are they going to go?

And the real kicker? Cloth diapering is cheaper!