apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

Yeah, but apparently, they forgot to factor in the landfill space.

I am glad there are more options out there for disposables. I know if I had a kid I would use cloth, but you cannot force other people to do it. I sent a link the other day to my sister (who just had a baby) about more earth-friendly options with disposables

Never mind the waste, the study also doesn't figure in the massive amounts of water used to grow the wood that is then pulped for the nappies - it's entirely flawed, and it's very, very clear that cloth nappies are much, much better for the environment.

It also doesn't factor in that the same set of cloth diapers can be used for 2 or more children if cared for properly, thus extending their environmental awesomeness.

They do have a point about the multitude of other baby products, and the waste they produce. Some of these baby containers are used for only four to six months...a year at most. And pretty much all of the new mothers I've known have been insistant on buying new for their first child, so they're not being re-used as much as they could be. And the majority of this garbage is just marketing swill. All the bouncies and swings and bassinettes and strollers and joggers and playmats and cushions and a dozen different kinds of seats... I bought into the hype with my first child, and barely touched any of it. I got by with a carseat and a sling for my second child, and it felt so good to not be reliant on random baby props.

Right on, Speakaboo. A bunch of girls at the office had babies recently and I've been to far too many showers. The first time I stepped into a Babies-R-Us, I was like, holy crap! Eventually it creeped me out so much I boycotted showers.

On the other side of the coin, a good friend of mine has two young sons and after just the second year with them, is overwhelmed by tide of stuff that has gotten into her house. A relative brought over six toy trucks and then commented that her house was filled with toys.

It seems people have figured out how to market every aspect of our lives, but I think there's something particularly disturbing about the baby crap. First, because it taps such a sensitive nerve - don't you want to be a good parent? Don't you want to provide for your child? Don't you want him/her to be safe/smart/comfortable/entertained/healthy? It's really below the belt. Second, we're raising a nation of little consumers.

I still think the best idea (and probably the best option for parents who don't like messing with the fit of cloth diapers) is Earth Baby composting diaper service. If we could only get them to expand a bit more!
http://www.thechicecologist.com/2008/12/eco-baby-care-earth-baby-compostable-diaper-service/

I wanted to use cloth diapers, but unfortunately my little one gets severe diaper rash if I use anything other than Pampers Baby Dry. I can't even use another type of Pampers. It's very weird.

My parents used cloth diapers with me. Once I outgrew them, my dad started using them to wash/wax his cars and to wipe up big spills. That was over twenty years ago and they're still getting use.

I'm also a big fan of gdiapers. They're a nice middle ground between cloth & disposable.

Those studies have been shown to be flawed -- seriously flawed. Apart from the issues raised by earlier posters, I believe that I read somewhere that not included in the analysis is the energy cost of the trucks transporting the logs, as well as those associated with transportation through the distribution chain all the way through to the consumer. They also left out the energy costs associated with reseeding and replanting the trees.

Disposable diapers though, do not raise just ecological issues; there are health considerations as well. Studies link disposables to asthma, and raise important questions about male fertility (disposables raise scrotal temperatures in developing male babies, possibly impacting life-long fertility). Disposables (except for unbleached ones) contain dioxins, which are carcinogenic. Gdiapers and disposables contain sodium polyacrylate, which raises additional health concerns (it was banned from tampons in the 1980s).

There aren't questions about health implications and long-term effects of cloth diapers; they are a healthier option for both our children and the planet.

And they are not that much work -- I've cloth-diapered 2 children, and can attest to that.

We discussed this ad nauseum. As we travel alot, we ended up going the bio-degradable route. We use G-Diapers and seventh generation disposables. The nice thing about the G is that the outer cover looks like an article of clothing and comes in colors. With a shirt, the baby doesn't look like a 'trash kid' hanging around in just a diaper!

We use "real" nappies, sorry they're not a diaper in England, for many reasons mentioned above. But also because I don't want some chemical gel that close to my daughter for almost every hour of the day. It's not natural and I don't think it can really be completly harmless, can it?