Environmental Impact of Disposable Coffee Cups

For some reason my Lance Armstrong Foundation “LIVESTRONG” coffee cup is drawing a lot of attention at the coffee maker in my office today.  I’m a strong supporter of the fight against cancer (my dad battled cancer for a good portion of his life), so the attention is welcome.

I am also a strong believer in recycling and reducing waste wherever possible.  This belief entered me into a conversation this morning with a co-worker who chooses to use paper cups for her coffee, as opposed to washing and re-using a ceramic mug as many others choose to do.

She blamed her choice on personal laziness.  A bulls**t excuse if you ask me.  This prompted me to ask her how many cups of coffee she consumes each day. doing some simple math, which she aparently failed to consider, I pointed out to her that her laziness is costing the company and area landfills approximately (4 cups/day x 5 days/wk x 50 wks/yr) 1000 cups per year.  1000 cups probably costs our employer ~$80 at most.  That doesn’t really bother me as much as it probably should.  What does bother me is the fact that paper products constitute the largest fraction of municipal solid waste in landfills across the country.  And let’s not forget where paper comes from.

In my not-so-humble opinion, choosing to use paper cups when more sensible options exist is not so much lazy as it is stupid.

I think I’ll go out and buy a few more LIVESTRONG mugs this afternoon and hand them out to my co-workers.