Our first day at EarthX was interesting to say the least. On one hand, I enjoyed seeing all the companies and people coming together in a setting dedicated to environmental care. On the other hand, I couldn’t help but notice some of the underlying issues with the convention. I like to get the negatives out of the way first and that mostly pertains to TetraPak and some of the companies that were at the convention. My biggest problem with TetraPak is that their packaging is very difficult to recycle. The packaging itself, from what I gathered from my interview, is one of the best sustainable packaging products on the market. Yet, that is all for naught because the packaging can only be processed in special facilities that are not accessible to every recycling center. The people I interviewed about TetraPak were very helpful and kind, but the company they work for has some minor issues that annoy me. This also does not account for the issues TetraPak has internationally, but that is a separate matter from the convention. There were also a ton of oil and energy companies marketing themselves as “green,” when they really are not. This connects to the concept of what ‘carbon neutral’ means for companies because that is how most of the companies, especially oil it seems like, market themselves as environmentally friendly. From what I gathered, carbon neutral is essentially just putting money into initiatives to decrease carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. I am not sure, but it is not a measure of how little carbon a company produces, it is a measure of “offsetting” carbon. The most positive experience I had today at the convention was actually with a company. Ecos is a company that produces household cleaning products using environmentally friendly ingredients and methods. Listening to the representative talk, it seemed that this company was actually committed to providing adequate care for its workers, reducing the amount of waste, and decreasing water waste as much as possible. It was a nice change of pace to talk to a representative that explained the reasons why Ecos is fairly green. The day at the convention ended with some delicious food and a plan to come back and watch a film. The movie was another amazing experience we had about the racism embedded in housing and neighborhoods while a city in under a disaster. The movie posed the question of reframing the concept of disaster to include issues such as poverty.
- Logan