Hello, FilterForGoodians. I hope you’re being good ‘Goodians, and  not smoking. Smoking is very bad for you. For the rest, and the smokers among you, I have a little green story. I won’t kick your butt for smoking, but Green Butts** might.

First, some knowledge. According to Wikipedia,** “as of 2000, smoking is practiced by 1.22 billion people. Assuming no change in prevalence it is predicted that 1.45 billion people will smoke in 2010 and 1.5 to 1.9 billion in 2025. Assuming that prevalence will decrease at 1% a year and that there will be a modest increase of income of 2%, it is predicted the number of smokers will stand at 1.3 billion in 2010 and 2025.” That’s a lot of people smoking a lot of cigarettes. Many of you may not realize that just like drinking water out of a plastic water bottle, smoking leaves behind a lot of waste – namely, cigarettes butts.

Can’t Beat ‘Em, Join ‘Em

Ok, so if we can’t get smokers to stop smoking, let’s at least try to get them to clean up their act. Green Butts is creating a truly all-natural cigarette. With additive and chemical-free tobacco and natural biodegradable filters, smokers are now able to responsibly discard their spent cigarette filters or use them to grow an assortment of plants.

All smokers need to do is collect their Green Butts in a planter instead of an ashtray and watch them grow. Their filters are made with an all-natural hemp and cotton blend that can be combined with a variety of seeds including grass, flower, fruit, herb or even trees.

4.5 Trillion Cigarette Butts

Like we say all the time on this blog, every little bit counts. Again, this is yet another way that a business is making it easy for consumers to go green without having to change a consumer behavior. They don’t have to stop doing anything other than switch brands (admittedly, a barrier). According to their site, “most cigarette filters are made from cellulose acetate. Although technically biodegradable, these traditional filters can be resistant to degradation depending upon environmental conditions. The duration of the degradation process is cited as taking as long as 10–15 years. It is estimated that 4.5 trillion cigarette butts become litter every year.

In the 2006 International Coastal Cleanup, cigarettes and cigarette butts constituted 24.7% of the total collected pieces of garbage, over twice as many as any other category.  As the filters slowly degrade, the cellulose acetate and other chemical particles, suspected of causing harm in humans, can leach into the ground and water supplies.”

Are you a smoker with an opinion? Comment below.

**You are leaving the FilterForGood Web site. The Brita Products® Company is not responsible for the content or data collection of that independent site.