Students organize group for environmentally-friendly toilet paper
New nationwide iniative held campus wide events to raise awareness about environmental consequences of using Kimberly-Clark toilet paper and products
Sarah Rosenthal
Issue date: 2/5/08 Section: News
Last Thursday, UVM students wearing t-shirts that read "UVM Forest Crimes Unit", congregated in the Davis Center as part of Kleercut protest.
Students carried signs that read "Know What You Flush Your Dumps = Stumps"
This new independent activist group has temporarily dubbed themselves "UVM Forest Crimes Unit".
The UVM Forest Crimes Unit is working to help UVM join in the movement, along with schools like Harvard, Skidmore College and American University to cut ties with the corporation Kimberly-Clark. UVM students are starting with the Kleercut campaign.
Kimberly-Clark, which makes Scott and Kleenex products, is distributed campus wide. Scott toilet paper has minimal amounts of post-consumer recycled content.
Kleenex products have none. This means that both the tissues and tissue boxes are not coming from materials that are made from 100 percent virgin pulp.
The paper comes from clear cuttting ancient old-growth boreal forests, which stretch across Alaska and Canada. Old growth forests help to support ecosystem biodiversity and are known for being among the most efficient in turning carbon into oxygen.
Because most Kimberly-Clark products are simply flushed down the toilets, around 65,000 tons of custodial paper waste are generated at UVM every year. Kimberly-Clark doesn't have the forest certifications to prove their "environmental practices".
Students held their first Kleercut meeting in early November.
With increased knowledge and consciousness spreading around campus, the Kleercut meetings continue to have bigger turnouts.
Basil Tsimoyianis, UVM junior and chief investigator into this issue said, "We've opened our doors to each other, ourhomes have become our offices."
The organization found more faculty support, and got over 800 students to sign a petition against Kimberly-Clark.
The goal of this group is to help UVM find better alternatives and replacement industries to support.
Right now, the best alternatives are Cascades products.
Cascades brand products have a high post-consumer recycled content, with a Greenseal environmental certification to back it up.
Cascades is sold by White River Paper Company, the same distributors for Kimberly-Clark products. Representatives from Cascades have expressed interest in coming to UVM to talk about making a closed-loop, financially sound introduction of their products on our campus.
Students carried signs that read "Know What You Flush Your Dumps = Stumps"
This new independent activist group has temporarily dubbed themselves "UVM Forest Crimes Unit".
The UVM Forest Crimes Unit is working to help UVM join in the movement, along with schools like Harvard, Skidmore College and American University to cut ties with the corporation Kimberly-Clark. UVM students are starting with the Kleercut campaign.
Kimberly-Clark, which makes Scott and Kleenex products, is distributed campus wide. Scott toilet paper has minimal amounts of post-consumer recycled content.
Kleenex products have none. This means that both the tissues and tissue boxes are not coming from materials that are made from 100 percent virgin pulp.
The paper comes from clear cuttting ancient old-growth boreal forests, which stretch across Alaska and Canada. Old growth forests help to support ecosystem biodiversity and are known for being among the most efficient in turning carbon into oxygen.
Because most Kimberly-Clark products are simply flushed down the toilets, around 65,000 tons of custodial paper waste are generated at UVM every year. Kimberly-Clark doesn't have the forest certifications to prove their "environmental practices".
Students held their first Kleercut meeting in early November.
With increased knowledge and consciousness spreading around campus, the Kleercut meetings continue to have bigger turnouts.
Basil Tsimoyianis, UVM junior and chief investigator into this issue said, "We've opened our doors to each other, ourhomes have become our offices."
The organization found more faculty support, and got over 800 students to sign a petition against Kimberly-Clark.
The goal of this group is to help UVM find better alternatives and replacement industries to support.
Right now, the best alternatives are Cascades products.
Cascades brand products have a high post-consumer recycled content, with a Greenseal environmental certification to back it up.
Cascades is sold by White River Paper Company, the same distributors for Kimberly-Clark products. Representatives from Cascades have expressed interest in coming to UVM to talk about making a closed-loop, financially sound introduction of their products on our campus.
Viewing Comments 1 - 5 of 5
Tell the TRUTH
posted 2/13/08 @ 11:59 AM EST
It is great to see young people active in what they believe, but it would be nice for them to be more informed than this article demonstrates. First, the Scott brand tissue that Vermont uses contains minimally 80% recycled fiber of which 75% is post consumer waste, when the article states that it contains small amounts of recycled fiber and post consumer waste. (Continued…)
Basil
Basil Tsimoyianis
posted 2/25/08 @ 8:22 PM EST
TELL THE "TRUTH" ???
[In response to LTE "Getting the facts right"]
Kimberly-Clark uses very little recycled fiber and their Kleenex brand tissue uses none. (Continued…)
Tell the TRUTH
posted 3/03/08 @ 9:45 PM EST
I work on the tissue business at Kimberly-Clark and that is how I know the truth. The FACT is that all of the products that Vermont is using meet the specifications that I stated above. (Continued…)
Basil
FOREST CRIMES UNIT
posted 3/05/08 @ 11:14 PM EST
This is about Kimberly-Clark's holistic approach to the manufacturing of their products. In relation to this my arguments are extremely valid.
Since you choose to ignore this truth, let me ask you, are the Kimberly-Clark professional products used at the University of Vermont Green Seal Certified or similar?
Since we know the answer is NO can you tell us why they are not certified?
The FACT is that Kimberly-Clark misrepresents the TRUTH through unrelated facts. (Continued…)
Tell the TRUTH
posted 3/06/08 @ 10:06 PM EST
We are not green seal certified on Scott becasue we do not believe that green seal takes a holistic approach to the environment. All they care about is chlorine content and RF when there are alot of other factors in the paper making industry that impact the environment that need to be taken into consideration. (Continued…)
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